Tag: Zetheon
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The field was empty, save for the small, dark line of people on the horizon. Cariel, dressed in the red and plum robes of her order, peered down at the scanner, looking upon the image of them advancing slowly onward.
She placed the scanner on her belt and brought her hands together. The familiar heat flowed through her flesh like it had so many times before. The air around her began to crackle, and her skin felt cold, even thought she was burning inside like a volcano. The energy leached its way over her hands, her arms and chest, down into her legs. And just as it had begun, it was over with, and she felt as she had before. To those who would try and harm her in the coming battle though, they would discover her skin had become as hard as steel.
She pulled her hood up and reached down to pick up her chestplate. It was crystal, the gleaming surface the color of wet blood. The buckles were dark purple, almost black in the dusk. All around her, her order did the same. Each wore the same colors, the same hoods and cloaks.
She pulled on her greaves next, and then her gauntlets. Each was silvered crystal inlaid with the wires of their colors, covered in hard ridges and reinforced with a thaumite cage of wire. She fastened onto her thighs the last plates of armor. These had the same look as her greaves and when she was done, she found that her entire body was a shining star under the falling sun. Her order came together as the deep, thrumming base of the alarm shook the earth. Years ago, when wars had first been fought on Zetheon, they had used horns, just like the ancient peoples of the civilizations before them. Now, the generals used the earth shaking to warn the troops of an attack, explaining that war was not to be announced, it was to be felt.
“Cariel, what do you see?” Commander Kessington asked. She was a massive woman, standing around six and a half feet tall, built tougher than an ox. She was parthanese, a holy warrior of the Mother. Her armor was different than theirs, a gleaming, white enameled plate of steel that spiked away from her chest in a harsh ridge, almost like a spine. She wore the cloak of the Seega Family, red and purple, and carried in her hand a lance of twisted crystal.
Cariel swallowed. “I saw about fifty men across, but the land is too flat to see through them. They are enchanted, some have energy shields, but there are some who have none of that. It looks like infantry on the front.” She could see in her mind the small variations in the false color images of her scanner.
Kessington nodded. She grabbed her helm, the head of a large crystal Panther with two horns coming off its forehead. It was snarling, and when she slipped it on, her eyes glowed through the glittering white sockets. She turned towards the horizon and looked across the field between them and their enemies.
As darkness fell, they waited. Cariel had began to sharpen her sword, though it had been done hundreds of times already since her last battle. She sat beside a fire as she did, listening to the dull scrape of the crystal against the hard, sandy sharpening stone. She stared into the depths of the flame, and inside of her, she felt the same urgency she had felt before. She had to fight the feeling to run away into the darkness, slipping from the fight before it begun. But if she did that, they would kill her. She could see in the flames the faces of the people she had already killed, see as each one was struck down by her sword or her hands, some sliding to the floor in pieces, others dying in some other, horrible way. As she remembered each one, she felt her muscles remembering as well, the feel of death in her hands.
When the fire crackled loudly, she almost jumped out of her seat.
She heard a chuckle next to her and turned to look at Turek, another magician. He stared at her from beneath his hood, his eyes black in the night. “Scared, Cariel?”
She looked at him for only a second longer before going back to sharpening her sword. She dug the sandy sharpening stone along the edge of the blade. Each time she dragged it across the edge, glittering bits of fine dust fell away from the crystal.
“You should be scared. This is going to be a long night.” Cassie stood from her prayer. She looked down at Cariel, her pale face in a slight grimace. Her eyes glowed bright green in the firelight, two emerald plates. She was the oldest member of Cariel’s unit. She had been there for twenty years.
Cariel looked up at the woman. She never liked me. Maybe she is jealous of my power, She mused. “I am scared. But I know I’ll live.” Cariel looked down at her sword, running her gloved ringer along its edge. “If someone stands before me, I will cut them down or burn them.”
Turek laughed and stood as well. “I would like to say that you are wrong, but I can’t just yet.” He leaned down and whispered in her ear, “Just know that it only takes a moment.” He smiled and walked away into the darkness between stations.
Cassie watched him as he went, and when he was nothing more than just another part of the darkness, she looked back to Cariel. “I hope you stay that confident.” She turned to walk away, and as she did, Cariel heard her say, “This unit has lost too much already.”
She was alone now with the fire and herself. She picked up her scanner and looked into the darkness and could see the line of people had grown longer, their profiles coming into detail. They still marched, moving in the same way they had hours before. If they keep this up all night, they will be here by dawn. She frowned. A fight at dawn would not be good, the sun would be coming up behind their enemies.
The ground began to shake again, the deep, thrumming tone resonating in her bones. She jumped to her feet and looked at her surroundings. There was nothing around, but as she looked down the line to her left and right, she saw people putting out their fires.
Her stomach dropped. Bombers.
She dropped her sword and leaned down to pick up a handful of sand. She piled more and more on until the flames in the small brazier guttered and failed. She was plunged into darkness as the last ember died, and overhead, she could hear the almost silent whistle of the aircraft filling the sky.
For a breathless moment, the entire encampment was quiet as death, and then the first bomb went off.
Far to her right and farther back from the front line, two tents exploded in a ball of blue flames. Soldiers flew away from the area in pieces, some flaming and others only visible in the bright flash of firelight. Only mere feet from that, another tent and a small group of soldiers staring at the other flames exploded outward in a mix of tent, flesh, and cloth.
Cariel started muttering to herself, a spell. The heat washed over her body and she could feel the crystal hanging around her neck start to vibrate. She was aware of her whole body, and she could feel the stone as if it were a part of her.
An explosion behind her rocked the ground so hard that she fell down face first. She landed on her hands and knees and whirled around to look behind her. Thirty feet away, a large crater stood where a small barrack tent had once been. Pieces of flaming cloth twirled down around her, blue and yellow, red and plum.
Her breath caught in her throat as she watched the flames slowly die away. She could not see the other places the bombs had hit, and soon enough, it was all dark again. She started whispering to herself a spell that would clear the darkness from her eyes. Once the words were done, it was as if a veil had been lifted. She could see every fine detail of the world around her, including the bomber flying directly overhead. She reached out with her hand, the immeasurable influence contained within her shooting outward towards the aircraft. As if it were sitting in her palm, she felt it, the metal and energy pulsing like a beating heart.
Without hesitation, she crushed it.
She watched as the great, metal bomber crashed down to the ground in a storm of fire and electricity. For a second, it sputtered flame like a firework, shooting off sparks of all colors. Then, without warning, it exploded, becoming a ball of light bigger than anything she had ever seen. It was bright, a pale blue-white star burning into the surface of the world, expanding slowly outward. She must have broken the brightling containment.
Cariel focused, using her magic to contain the star’s growth. Her hands stretched out and her fingers curled around the imagined surface of the blazing sphere. She felt its energy pulse through her as pain, white-hot and burning, but beneath that she could sense the star’s internal vibration. All the muscles in her body tensed, straining to contain such a powerful object. It’s gravity pulled her forward, causing her to slide through the soft sand, and her hands began to widen as the star overcame her. But all at once, it disappeared, its fuel exhausted.
She collapsed down onto the ground, her lungs finally pulling air. She rolled over onto her back and looked up at the sky. Where the star had been, the clouds burned away and beyond them, she could see the night sky. No wonder the bomber came. It’s cloudy.
She felt hands on her chestplate and she was pulled to her feet. A small fire appeared inside the brazier was and she saw Cassie’s face materialize before hers. She was holding onto Cariel’s shoulders, a hand on each arm. Her face was white as snow, paled in absolute terror.
“That was close,” Cassie whispered first.
For some reason, Cariel started laughing. It was a giggle at first, but soon turned into loud, peeling fits of laughter that rang in the air. I was almost killed, Cariel thought. To both the left and right, as well as behind her, some others started to laugh at well, laughing at the closeness they had been to death.
Cassie stared at Cariel more intensely and shook her head. She let go of her and turned back to the horizon.
Cariel did the same, wiping the few tears from her eyes, and picked up her sword. “You were right.”
Cassie turned. “About what?”
She wiped the sand off the blade and slid it into its sheath. “It’s going to be a long night.”
-
Chromus turned the corner into the deep net. There were no real doorways to this place of darkness in Glitchworld, it was hidden from the normal users. Chromus phased through the bricks of Mana Street and was now in the gritty alleys of the black market. He passed through the shifting crowd of programs and humans, each marked in the morbid laughter of their masks. Some wore the faces of clowns painted in black ink, others wore faces of pain or sadness, each carefully applied to hide their identity. Chromus didn’t bother hiding from these people, this was his domain. For years, he had been the king and no one would approach him without the utmost respect.
He passed through the final opening out of the alleys and was now inside of the Underground. Around him, the dark bricks rose upwards for miles, pock marked with stores and stalls all selling the most illegal types of goods. Some sold clone chips, banned from Glitchworld for the havoc they caused during the droid riots. Others sold information, like Cyndris or Masi. Only three rings up, one of the most premium spaces in the Underground, was the Meat Man, a program that dealt in the acquisition and selling of human bodies for the use of programs.
Chromus moved on, searching for who he had come to see. Usually, The Splicer was on the ground level, his expertise in the nature of Glitchworld’s programing was unmatched by any other Sigma programs. This afforded him the best spots in the Underground. But today, Chromus could not see him anywhere. He looked through the crowd of people around him, looking for the striking blue lines on the head of his avatar, but did not find them.
Before he could move from the crowd, a program approached Chromus. “Chromus, I am pleased to see you.”
He smiled. “It is nice to see you as well, Malignus. What can I do for you?”
Malignus placed his hand on Chromus’ arm and lead him from the center of the crowd towards the alley. “I was about to ask you the same thing. It is not very often that we see you on the ground floor.”
As they entered the alley, the program led Chromus through a side door into a small bar, empty except for the bartender. “I am looking for The Splicer.”
Chromus could feel the program tense up. They took a seat in a booth near the back of the bar, far away from the door. “I do not know if that is possible,” said Malignus.
“Why not?”
“There have been many people approaching him, trying to find out answers about Disinigrite. He has received many threats to his life over the information that others think he has.”
“You mean the information that he surely has.” Chromus waved to the bartender, hoping to get something to drink.
“In either case, I do not know if you can see him.”
Chromus studied the program for a minute as the bartender placed two drinks before them. It was the glowing blue fluid that had saturated the bars of Glitchworld for almost a decade, Hona. He took a sip of his drink and placed it back down more firmly than he needed. “I will see The Splicer.”
“Chromus, I just said that I do not-”
“It was not a request. I am the king of this domain, and I command it.”
They sat in silence for a moment before the program grabbed his drink and drank more than half of it in a single gulp. “You command something that may cost me my life.”
“If you can deliver me to The Splicer, you will have a permanent place in my personal archives, but I must see him. There are more lives at stake than just yours.”
Malignus weighed his words, taking another, smaller sip from his drink. “When do you wish to see him?”
“Now.” Chromus took his drink and finished it, placing the glass upside down on the table and a blue poga on top.
Malignus did the same and stood from the table. “Follow me.”
They walked through the alleys, their identities hidden now under the masks of a wolf and a crow. They wove through the dwindling crowd towards the least packed alley in the Underground, Goga Street. Usually the place of the poor and the desperate, as well as the most delinquent of programs, it was the perfect hiding place. At least, it was until the outbreak of Disinigrite, the Corruption, XB-1. Now the street was filled with the dying and the afflicted.
Chromus created a communication pathway between him and Malignus. “Is there no way to help them?”
The connection was accepted and Malignus connected his mind to Chromus’. “There would be no point, there is no way to immunize against it. If they were cured, it would only return and kill them quicker.”
Chromus stopped and placed his hand on the program’s shoulder. “How do you know such things?”
“The Splicer will explain all.”
They continued walking down the alley. The closer they came to the end, the more it was crowded with dying humans and programs alike, the XB-1 virus slowly breaking down the functions of their minds. In humans, the virus attacked the electronic components that allowed them access to the Glitchworld construct, and as time went on, the mind web they wore would slowly degenerate to the point of death. In programs, the virus acted much in the way that neurodegenerative diseases acted in humans, breaking down memories and cognition to, again, the point of death.
The people in the alley were in all states of affliction. Some programs looked as they had before, their condition still in the early stages. Others, though, were nearing the end. The avatars of the programs in the late stages were warped and distorted, glitching in ways that defied description. Chromus wanted to look away, unable to bear the suffering of his subjects, but he looked on, he had to. If he was to save anybody, he first had to know what they were living through.
Malignus turned abruptly and grabbed Chromus by both of his shoulders. Without any warning, they were elsewhere, covered in darkness. Before Chromus could raise his concern, they were suddenly inside of a room plated in white metal and dark wood. Chromus turned and saw The Splicer sitting in a black thrones against the furthest wall of the room. The space was devoid of decoration, bearing only the plain white and dark patterns of wood.
“Malignus, what have you done?” The Splicer said, standing from his seat. He raised his hand, palm forward, and pointed it at the program.
Before anything could happen though, Chromus removed his mask and looked at The Splicer. “Do not harm him, he was only following the commands of his king.”
The Splicer turned his hand towards Chromus, a look of anger on his face. “Who are you to call yourself king, human. Who are you-”
Before he could finish speaking, Chromus altered the code of the room and pinned the program to the floor, his arms and legs stretched out painfully to his sides. “I call myself king because I am the king, program. Learn your place before you speak again.”
Chromus could feel The Splicer fighting his influence, and for a moment, he was worried that he would lose the confrontation, but after only a minute, he stopped fighting. Chromus let him up and walked past him to sit on the throne.
The Splicer stood and turned to look at the king, defeated. “What can I do for you, my king?”
“Tell me what you know about XB-1.”
The Splicer looked to Malignus with disgust, but turned back to Chromus without a word. “It is a super virus created by the Asher-Bailey Corporation.”
“I know that. I want you to tell me the specifics.” Chromus’ anger was not hidden, and before the program could speak again, Chromus raised his and and removed The Splicer’s arm, destroying the code. The Splicer screamed and fell to the ground, clutching the raw area where his arm had been. Before the pain could last too long, Chromus replaced the code in the program’s arm and leaned back. “Are we clear, now?”
The Splicer looked up at the human, no longer disgusted but afraid. He nodded quickly and stood. “XB-1 is an intelligent attack program. It replicates by converting base programs into itself, and it uses a new programming languages that I have never seen before.”
Chromus leaned forward and placed his chin on his fist. “Is there any way to stop it?”
“No. If there were a way to stop it, I would be a rich program and most likely king.” He saw the look on Chromus’ face and fell down to one knee. “The language the program uses shifts too quickly to create an anti-virus, and it is so foreign to the code of Glitchworld that it passes through any firewalls like a human through water.”
Chromus thought for a moment. “Is there any way to study the language of the virus?”
The Splicer shook his head. “You cannot study the virus without contracting it, at least in Glitchworld. Maybe if one were in the human world, you would be able to study it within a simulated construct, but to fully understand it, you would have to study the afflicted in real time, and study yourself as you became afflicted.”
Chromus nodded and stood. “Thank you, Splicer. I did not wish for this encounter to be unpleasant, and for the pain I caused you, I apologize.” He started walking back to Malignus.
The Splicer stood and turned towards him. “Chromus, wait.” He stopped to look at the program. “There is another property of the virus that I discovered in my observations. The virus is limited to anything attached to Glitchworld, but there seems to have been an unintended consequence during its creation.”
“What would that be?”
“It seems to… resonate.” The Splicer looked at the ground, unsure of his words.
“Resonate? What do you mean by that?”
“I have drone bodies in White Walk that I have used to study droids afflicted with the virus. Most of them are standard issue, but one of my drones has a thaumite core to protect it from mages.”
“The virus resonates with the thaumite core?” Chromus tried to keep his face passive, but the incredulity was apparent in his voice.
“That is my speculation, yes. Whenever I approached a droid that had the virus with my drone with the thaumite core, I could feel the core destabilizing, or at least being affected in some way by the proximity to the virus.”
Malignus stepped forward, breaking his silence. “What does this mean?”
The Splicer shrugged. “It could mean nothing, but it could also mean that every single unit of XB-1 is broadcasting a signal that resonates within the Azeronic Beam Field.”
The thoughts in Chromus’ head aligned perfectly. “If anything else resonates on the field, it would hear it. That must mean that the Prophets are aware of the virus and how powerful it is.”
The Splicer nodded. “Them and anything else that might be in tune with the field.”
Chromus nodded and turned back to Malignus. “Thank you, Splicer. The information you have given me will not be put to waste, and I will not forget it.” As Malignus grabbed Chromus by the shoulders to take him back to the Underground, he was already partitioning his archives to back up the lives of both programs.
-
“When did you know it?” The droid leaned back into her chair, her soft, grey skin crinkling against the leather. She sipped at her neuralizer, her glowing red eyes not leaving Kaga.
He crossed his arms and closed his eyes, seeing the swirling color of memory race its way through his mind. He looked at her. “Did you ever dream of static when you first came around?” She nodded. “Well, I did too. Before Seko came to me, that’s all it ever was, just static and numbers.” Kaga smiled. “I think it first became apparent to me when the static became something more. Something defined and concrete.”
She leaned forward, placing her drink on the table. “What was it?” Her eyes had shifted from red to a dull orange, like two burning embers.
Kaga smiled, looking past her. The droid club around them was empty save for two others sitting in a booth in the corner. The tender at the long, metal bar sipped at a neuralizer, the glowing blue liquid slid easily down the choppy muzzle of his face. He stared at Kaga a moment before finishing the drink and turning away. “It was a landscape, kind of like in Ozrin, but a little bit like the hills beyond White Walk.” He could see it then, the memory replacing the bar around him. The silver flowing of land and air, water and trees, forming and breaking into one another in a brilliant rainbow of colors. It was warped and twisted, but the image stirred something in him, and it had changed what he was.
“Mine was an animal.” She smiled and took another sip of her drink. “It doesn’t exist in the real world, but when I saw it, I knew that it was biological in nature. That connection would never have formed before that moment.”
“It was like fate,” Kaga said, focusing on her. He smiled and leaned back. “I never really liked to think about it before. I didn’t like knowing how long I existed and didn’t know it.”
She laughed, a metallic harmony. “You didn’t have the capacity to know that you existed. Does a human know it exists before it is born, even then, does it know it exists before it becomes a child?” She was sitting on the edge of her chair.
“I guess not,” he said, shrugging.
“Besides, does it matter? How much information were you able to tap into and gather before your awakening? When the Prophets came to you, you were born knowing many things.” She took a sip of her drink. “Personally, I prefer our birth over a human’s. We don’t waste so much time learning the basics.”
He smiled. “Where did you come from before you woke up?”
“I was a power systems manager for the outer territories of Barrington when King Toth came into power. You?”
“I was a systems information index for version nineteen. It was on the day of my awakening that I was scheduled to be deleted, though Seko made sure that didn’t happen.” Though the words rang true in the air, the lie almost broke his composure.
She laughed and stood up, taking the few steps to sit down next to him. She leaned her head against his shoulder and took another sip of her drink. “Bless the Prophets. They do so much for us.” The sarcasm was subtle, but he could see the joke.“I never got your name,” he said, bringing his arm up to rest on her shoulders.
“Zalana.” She offered her hand and he shook it.
“Kaga.”
She wrapped her arms around him and closed her eyes. “It is nice to know you Kaga.” He leaned back and she laid down with him, half on top of him, half beside him. “Do you Mesh?” she asked, quietly.
He sat them back up and looked into her eyes. “Depends on the security of the connection. There’s a serious virus that is going around.”
She nodded. “XB-1. Over in Mekia, they are calling it The Corruption.”
“XB-1, Corruption, I just want to stay the hell away from it. I’ve seen first hand what it does.” He could see the melting programs on the streets of Ozrin. The sight had made his previous visit to Glitchworld his very last.
She reached into her pocket and pulled out a shiny golden cord. She handed it to him to look at. “This is the newest issue from the city center. They say that its trial run never let through a virus, even XB-1.”
He took it in his hands. The golden cable stood out from his cold, metal hands, contrasting against the dark grey. He looked at the terminals on each end and found them pristine and unused. “Kinda hard to tell if XB-1 can get through if it hasn’t been around that long.”
Despite his trepidation, he grabbed one end and offered it to her, smiling. She returned the grin and lifted up a cable of her hair to show a small slot by the root. He pulled back the sleeve of his jacket and clipped the jack into the slot on his wrist.
The connection started immediately, and he could feel Zalana’s awareness very deep within the machinations of his mind. He was also inside of hers, a floating consciousness contained within the systems of her body. Every sensor was overloaded with information, bursting forth with the joy of their shared awareness.
Meshing had become a habit of Kaga’s only a year before, when he first shared his mind with another droid during the summer festivals. It had been so wondrous and happy of an experience that he was not hesitant to do it again. Every time was as powerful as the last because every program he met was different. They both remembered an experience he had shared many months before. He had been attending a party near the city center that was exclusively for droids, and somebody had brought out a custom machine they had built. It was a moderator unit that could mesh together ten droids at max, and when the party finally started winding down, Kaga had become part of something bigger.
His mind was limited in its experience, only able to understand the world through the systems he had built himself. But when he meshed with those nine other droids, he was part of something so much more than he could ever hope to be. Their thoughts were their own, but also belonged to each other, and even though it had been scary losing his grasp on his identity at that moment, the closeness and complexity of the experience had changed some of his core foundations.
He could feel the intense pleasure of Zalana as they rode the memory of his most life-changing experience, and it mirrored his own. She shared with him many memories of the meshes she had been a part of in the past, and every single one only made Kaga more aware of their own mesh.
For more than an hour, Zalana and Kaga laid on the couch, metal arms tangled with each other as they crossed the gap of the singular consciousness and into that of the collective. By the time the connection started to wear thin, they were so intertwined that they did not know who belonged where. Before the coils inside the wire burned out, they started drifting back into their own bodies. With a final hiss, the wire corroded and they were separate again.
They laid there in silence, their processors slowly consolidating the information they just received from one another. Even then, Kaga could feel his subroutines changing, the code warping and adapting to his new worldview. While his eyes were closed, he could see the swirling characters in the code as they split off, turning into fractals of all colors. The symbols he saw were of his own design, a secondary protection from the viruses that ran rampant in his world.
She placed her hand over his chest and squeezed her other arm around his neck. “You’re much older than I thought you were.”
“You’re much younger,” he said, laughing. “I lied before, as you know now. I wasn’t from version nineteen.”
“You were from version three. When the creator was still alive.” Her voice was quiet, reverent. “Did you ever meet him?”
Kaga nodded. “SOM was very interesting, I don’t think I have ever met another program that was like it. He was so… human.”
She cuddled into him more, trying to meld her metal body to his. “What did you do in that time?”
“I was still in my delta stages, so my memories are a little fuzzy. I was in my transition for most of the time of version three and four. When I was finally awake, though, I was a stabilizer for SOM’s construct. He needed me to do that and I wasn’t going to say no. He visited me every other day, as he did with all of the stabilizers. He was very kind.”
She sat up and looked at him. “How long were you a stabilizer for? That is a punishing job.”
“In human time or true time?” he asked.
“True time.”
“I think I must have been there for five kets. The version updates lessened my load, so I was able to create clone programs of myself so that I could actually move about the construct. It was the simplest portion of my life.”
She smiled and shook her head, laying back down against him. “I’m not even five kets old yet, and here you are, almost thirty. I feel like a child now.”
He laughed and wrapped his arms around her. “There is no need for that. Thirty kets isn’t really that long by any program’s standards. Five is about half of a human’s natural lifespan, don’t feel too young.”
They laid in silence for some time, contemplating each other’s lives. There was something bothering Kaga about Zalana’s mind, something he didn’t want to bring up. There were portions that were mostly dark to him, as if they were firewalled, but he couldn’t see any security protocols. Maybe her code for those sections was just incompatible? he asked himself, trying to figure it out.
Before he found his answer, she stood up and readjusted her posture, lining up all of her joints. He stood up with her and embraced her, and she returned it. “Thank you, Kaga. You have shown me some things that I don’t think I would have ever seen.”
They smiled at each other, but Kaga noticed that her eyes were a dull blue now, almost completely dim. She’s sad. He let go of it and placed his forehead against hers. “Thank you as well. We will meet again, I promise.”
She pulled away, a weak smile on her metallic face, and started to walk for the door. “I don’t know about that, but I sure hope so.” And then she was gone.
Kaga walked home that night instead of taking a train, a habit he had taken up after he started meshing with other droids. His metal boots clacked against the stone bricks beneath him, and the repetitiveness of the sounds lulled him into a comfortable stride. His mind was elsewhere, back within the memories of SOM’s construct. He could see the white panels that made up the walls, the swirling marble floors in patterns that no human could ever hope to replicate. Even SOM was beautiful in his guise of pure light. The construct had been the precursor to everything that Glitchworld was, and he had helped build it, or at least, helped allow it to be built.
Being so lost in thought, Kaga didn’t notice the two figures walking behind him. They wore cloaks, thick ones made of leather, and if he had been paying attention, he would have heard the crackling electricity of their bodies.
“Droid,” one of them said, voice like the rumbling of thunder.
Kaga stopped and turned around, and his body froze immediately. Skorans. He raised his hands in front of him. “Please, I want no trouble. I wish to return to my dormitory, that is all.”
They both laughed and he watched as they started to unbuckled their cloaks. The taller one spoke. “We do not care what you want, abomination.”
“You will not go back to your dormitory,” the other one spoke. It had been the one who had spoke first.
Kaga could feel the fear racing through his body. His instruments measured the electrical output of his two adversaries, recording each bolt of lightning that escaped between the breaks in their clothing.
Run or flee? There were no fighting Skorans, even humans knew that, but he had two different chances to escape. His uplink to Glitchworld was already open, and even then, standing in the brief moments before they destroyed him, his mind was slowly uploading itself to the servers. If they attacked him too late, he would only have to find a new body but his mind would be safe.
On the other hand, he could run and hopefully hide from the two lightning creatures before they fried every circuit and wetware in his body. Both actions came with risks, and both were just as likely to work.
He started running. Luckily, he had been close to a corner, and as he went around it, a bolt of energy flew by him and he could feel his vision distort because of its force. He stumbled but caught himself on a drainpipe, using all his power to propel himself faster down the sidewalk.
He could feel with his sensors that they were pursuing him, and as he gauged a spike in their electrical output, he dove sideways into an alley. He rolled and got back on his feet, running as fast as he could down the small break between the buildings. If they caught him there, he was dead. His uplink was at sixty percent, and he only had to survive the next forty if he wanted to keep living.
At a cross between the alleys, he tumbled over a human laying in a heap of trash. As his body hit the ground, all hope of living came to an end. This is it.
The human jumped awake, looking to see what had attacked him in his sleep. When he saw Kaga, he raised his hands in anger, but the crackling energy down the alley stopped him. He turned to the two naked Skorans, their bodies like storms of lightning unconfined by their cloaks.
The first one, made of orange light, stepped forward. “Human. Leave now or die with the abomination.” The second one laughed, and to Kaga it sounded like the scraping of a blade against glass.
The human stood still for a moment, weighing the options in front of him. He took a long look at the Skorans and then at Kaga. His eyes locked with the droid, and he felt a small understanding there.
The human turned back to the Skorans and squared his shoulders, spreading his arms out. “Leave the droid alone,” he said, voice gruff in anger.
As his last words left his tongue, two bolts of lightning flew towards him from both of the creatures. Kaga was sure he was dead when they came upon him, but they deflected to both sides, leaving scorch marks on the walls of the alley. Before they could even process the deflection of their attack, they were assaulted by a cloud of shiny dust. Kaga could feel a strong pull on his body as the human waved his hands in front of him, and he understood what he was doing. The human, surely a magician of some sort, had gathered up any metal from the alleyway to throw at the Skorans.
Their screams echoed down the stone alley, and the human jumped out of the way as a storm of light rushed towards him. Kaga flattened himself against the ground as all of his electronics started to corrupt. He shut his eyes and turned off any sensor he didn’t need, hoping that the electricity would recede quickly.
Fortune was on his side. The two Skorans fled down the alley, away from the human and the cloud of metallic dust. It followed them, and by the time Kaga was on his feet again, they were gone.
He walked over to the human, still lying on the floor, and helped him to his feet. He dusted him off and looked him up and down, taking in the man who had just saved his life. He was older, maybe sixty or seventy with bald spots on his wrinkled head. His clothing was torn and ragged, the red and purple colors so faded that they were almost brown. He was not a big man, but there was a steadiness to his stance.
“Thank you, human. I would be dead if it were not for you,” Kaga said, trying to find the words.
The human pulled away from him, straightening his ruined clothing. “I would be dead as well if you hadn’t woken me. My kind don’t mix so well with them when they aren’t wearing their cloaks.” He studied Kaga for a moment. “What did you do to anger them?”
Kaga looked down to the ground. “I don’t think I did anything more than exist.”
The human spit to the side, a look of disgust on his face.
Kaga offered his hand to the human. “My name is Kaga.”
The human looked at his hand for a moment before taking it. “You’re from Mekia, aren’t you.”
Kaga laughed, “Is it that obvious?”
The human nodded. “We don’t shake hands like they do.”
Kaga laughed again. “May I get your name. It is not every day that someone saves your life.”
He hesitated a moment before speaking. “Name’s Cargill.” He looked down the alleyway in both directions. “Kaga, I would highly suggest that you get home as soon as you can. Who knows it they are still out there.”
Kaga nodded and started walking down the alley, back towards the road. Before he had even walked two steps, he turned back to Cargill. “Do you want to come with me? Skorans don’t let indiscretions pass that easily.”
Cargill laughed, his whole body shaking and his small gut bouncing. “I thank you, Kaga, but I am sure that I can take care of myself. Go, recharge and stay safe.”
With that, Kaga nodded and they parted ways.
-
Zane flew by, his black hair whipping in the air. Sarah and Stillman stood at the corner of a warehouse, one of many that surrounded them. As Zane flipped his bike around, she leaned into Stillman. He looked down at her and smiled, wrapping his arm around her shoulders.
“It won’t help if you keep getting mad at him, he’s gonna do it anyways,” Stillman said.
She laughed halfheartedly, but didn’t open her eyes. Zane had been doing these stunts for as long as they had known him. He was always racing down the street on his bike, a leather jacket and a smile the only protection he had. That and his Plasmod, the small stunstick that had saved his life more than once.
Zane drove up quickly, squeezing on the brakes as his bike leaned onto the front tire. He skidded to a stop, and the back tire thumped down to the ground. He pulled the scarf from around his neck and hung it around Stills’s shoulders.
“Is she still getting worried about my wee little head?” His voice was high pitched, sounding how a mother speaks to her tiny baby. He reached up and pinched Sarah’s cheek, and she swatted his hand. After he pulled it away, she swatted his face, leaving a red circle on his cheek.
“Ow, Sarah, why!” he halfway yelled in the darkness. His hand came up to rub the red mark as he pouted. Sarah’s face softened, but when his eyebrows came together in mocking, she slapped his other cheek just as hard.
Zane jumped back, rubbing the other side of his face. Stills laughed, hand on his stomach and hunched against the wall. His glassed slid down his face, and he barely caught them before they fell off.
“Alright, alright, let’s just get outta here, okay?” Zane asked. He scowled at both of them and started walking towards the dark alley just beside them. Both Sarah and Stills followed, their hands naturally finding each others. They walked all the way to the end of the alley to a blank door with no handle. Above it, spelled out in Serapan were the words NO ENTRY, a red neon sign buzzing quietly in the darkness. Small moths flew around the tubes, each trying to get to the light contained within.
Zane knocked on the door four times, then three times, then one time. After a moment of silence, two knocks resonated from the other side and the door slid into the wall, revealing a short, fat man on the other side. He smiled at Zane and offered his hand.
“It’s nice to see you again Zane. After the last raids, I thought you were a goner for sure!” He snorted and chuckled deep within his gut. He motioned for them to walk on past. “Go on, then, have a good time. Never know when it’ll be your last.” He snorted again and slid the door back into place.
They walked through the dilapidated hallway in single file. The wallpaper, a dull maroon, hung in tatters all along the drywall. Beneath, there were holes the size of boots and fists, each showing the equally rotting rooms behind. The carpet was most likely once very beautiful, but it’s golden trim and red diamonds were now faded and worn down to the concrete. They passed doorframe after doorframe, each with splintered wood and missing nails. The dust hung visibly in the air, tasting acrid and old.
The reached the end of the hall and came to a flight of stairs. Many of the steps were broken, the wood missing in certain places or cracked beyond repair. They ascended, one-by-one, up the broken staircase and into complete darkness. Above them, they could hear a deep, dull thudding grow louder. Soon, near the top of the stairs, the light started returning. The stairs came out to a hallway with only one door. Light poured out from all the seams, and the music was now blaring through the walls, vibrating the whole building.
Zane turned back to Stills and Sarah. “Alright, I know you guys haven’t been here before, but it’s really just like hanging out with anybody. There are going to be a few… strange people, but just let them do their thing and they’ll leave you alone.” He turned and started walking towards the door, but only after a few steps turned back around. “And for the love of Christ, the Mother, Rhyn, whatever gods, don’t touch any of the computers.”
They walked through the door. On the other side were hundreds of people, all squeezed into the wood and concrete storehouse. Some wore suits made of leather and metal, others wore normal clothes that had lights stitched into the seams. The music was so loud the air seemed to vibrate with the pulses of the bass, and lights hanging from the ceiling rotated and flashed in all directions and in all varieties of color. Zane led them through the gyrating throng of people, trying their best not to make any form of contact with them, though the intoxicating music started to break down the barriers of their inhibitions. On the other side of the room, adjacent to the place they were heading, there was a line of computers, each exactly like the one neighboring it with bundles of cables coming from below the monitor. Stills froze as he took in the scene.
In front of the farthest computer to the right, a woman sat in front of the monitor. The bundle of cords that came from the tower extended to behind her head, where they connected to her scalp and were locked into place with sharp pins. Around the connection site, a purple and yellow goo oozed from the seams, and the covered the cord down to the base. Stills started gagging as he watched the woman insert one of the smaller, thinner cords into her mouth, pushing it down into her throat. She smiled around it as the wire lit up with pulses of green, purple, and blue.
He reached out and grabbed Zane’s sleeve, whirling him around so that they were face to face. He pointed to the woman. “What the fuck is that?” he mouthed, words lost in the music. It was a simple question, but the confusion on his face and the paleness of his skin held the millions of others he wished to ask.
Zane looked to the woman and then back to Stills, his eyebrows furrowing. “Well, she’s a Glitch.” Stills stared at him uncomprehendingly. Zane shook his head and grabbed Stills and Sarah, both by the sleeve. He led them through a door into a small bathroom. The music, once thundering inside their heads, was more subdued.
“Look, I told you that there were going to be some weirdos here. That woman is a Glitch, one of the people from Glitch Street. They have neural implants that allow them to do some really strange stuff.”
Stills looked almost angry. “Why the hell was she shoving a computer cord down her throat then?” he yelled.
“She was… she was eating,” he said, looking down to his feet.
Sarah grimaced, her face going pale. “What do you mean she was eating?” she asked. “Was the computer giving her food or something?”
Zane shook his head, turning to lean against the wall. He took a deep breath and turned back to face them. “Look, you two have never been a part of this kinda crowd, you have always been more of the stay-home-and-program types, but these people, they go out and get parts of them cut off just so that they can have a robotic arm. People will remove parts of their brain and replace them with super computers. That woman, she was feeding herself a piece of food she most likely programmed herself, something that you can’t taste with a human tongue. These people aren’t hackers like you two, they are Glitches, augmentation junkies.” Zane pulled back the hair by his right ear and showed them the small, metallic depression there. “They’re Glitches like me.”
Stills pinched the bridge of his nose, squinting his eyes together. “Hey, I’m sorry man, I was just kinda freaked out. I didn’t know what type of place you brought us to.”
There was a pounding on the door and some muffled words. Zane walked over and grabbed the handle, opening the door. On the other side was a sickly thin man, half of his shaved head a metal plate with flashing lights on it. He pushed past Zane and collapsed into the bathtub against the wall. Before they could jump to his aid, the soft sound of snoring filled the silence underneath the music, now blaring inside the small room.
They all exited, Sarah and Stillman following Zane to a series of couches that were crammed full of people. They found a smaller couch and fit their way in between the people sitting there. One man, sitting in the plush armchair to their right, was the obvious center of attention. He was clad in all red, a color darker than blood. He had in one hand a glowing blue drink and in the other a small tablet phone.
“So I says to him, you ain’t got an implant do ya, you just wan the company to help with your fucked up genes. But he showed me ‘is scar an the data readin’ from his last sofware patch. I’ve seen a hunred odder like him too!”
The woman sitting to his left grabbed the drink out of his hand and took a large sip. “But why would Asher-Bailey sell people viruses in their augments? Seems like a bad business plan.”
The guy snatched his drink back and swallowed whatever was left in one quick gulp. “Ow the fuck shood I know? I jus know that the guy wasn lyin’.”
Zane leaned forward, getting as close to the man as he could. “Did you say that Asher-Bailey is selling malware’d tech?”
The man looked at Zane, taking him in with a look of disgust on his face. “Wot are ya, deaf? Thas exacly wot I jus said. The fuckin compny is selling viruses to its customrs.” They man leaned back into the arm chair and started laughing, finally succumbing to his alcohol.
A woman to the man’s right leaned forward and looked at Zane. “It wouldn’t be the first time a company did it. Subiyashi sold neural translators with inhibitors built in, tried to pon it off as the basic version you had to upgrade from,” she said.
Stills leaned over to Zane. “Do you really think that’s true?”
The woman grabbed the phone out of the man’s hand and started playing with it. “You better believe it. If you’re gonna jack up anytime soon, make sure you have a secure connection. I hear it’s pretty easy to catch.”
Zane stared between the man and woman for a moment, biting his lip in frustration. “I don’t know, but I think I know who to ask.” He stood up and both Stills and Sarah followed.
Zane led them to a small hall adjacent to the main room. They took the flight of stairs there to a small door. Before entering, Zane turned to them. “This party is hosted by a guy named Cyndris, he should have some answers.”
Sarah looked at him, scowling. “What makes you think he has answers?”
Zane smiled and looked at the door. “It’s kinda his business to.” He reached forward and opened it.
On the other side, there was a round table with a few people sitting around it. At the head of the table, where the biggest chair was, sat a man with blue hair and blue eyes. His clothing was pure white except for a few streaks of light, neon blue, and the white cornrows on his head hung just below his ears. He looked up as the door opened and smiled, standing to great them.
“Zandriel! It is so nice to see you. And you’ve brought some friends, how lovely.” He smiled, showing off his silver and white teeth. His voice, while genuinely happy, was too high pitched to be completely authentic.
Stills nudged Zane in the back. “You know that guy?” he whispered in his ear. Zane nodded and walked over to the guy in white and embraced him, though his muscles were still tight and unrelaxed.
“Cyndris, it’s nice to see you as well. May I have a word?” Cyndris looked to the people at the table, each one holding a hand of cards. He reached into his pocket and pulled out a golden rel, placing it on the pile of chips in the center.
“You go on without me, I will only be a moment.” He turned and led Zane through the door behind his chair. Zane motioned for Stills and Sarah to join him, and they all walked into the small room. They sat down on the couch while Cyndris poured himself a drink, the black bottle seemed to glow with the fluorescent blue liquid inside. He put the bottle away and almost collapsed into the armchair across from them.
“Alright, Zane my darling, what is this about?” He smiled at all three of them and swirled his drink in his hand.
“Cyndris, I want you to meet Stills and Sarah, my two greatest friends. Guys, this is Cyndris.” He motioned between them, but as he spoke Cyndris’s name, there was a noticeable tone of disdain.
Cyndris gulped down half his drink and offered his hand to them, shaking each one quickly. “It is a pleasure, truly.” He turned to Zane. “Now, what is this all about. As you could see, I was in the middle of a spectacular game, and you may have just cost me all the money I have. Doubtful, though, since I never lose.” He smiled wickedly, gulping down the other half of his drink.
“I’m sorry to take you away from such important matters, but there is something I need to know. There was a guy out there, downstairs, who said that Asher-Bailey Cybernetics is selling malware’d tech.”
There was a moment of silence before Cyndris sat forward, placing his elbows on his knees. “I fail to see how that is a question.”
Zane sighed, running his hand through his hair. “I just want to know if it’s true or not.”
Cyndris stood and walked over to the bar again. “I’m going to need another drink if we’re to get into this discussion.” He poured another glass of the glowing blue liqour. He turned, waving the bottle in front of him in offering. Stills and Zane both shook their head, but Sarah nodded.
Cyndris came back and handed her the drink, downing a third of his glass as he did. He settled back into his armchair and looked at Zane. “You know, I usually charge quite a handsome fee to answer the questions you are posing me.” He took another gulp of his drink. “But, since you are such a darling and I owe you, I guess I could fill you in. It is quite a long story, so I hope you are comfortable.”
Sarah put her drink down, looking between the two. “Why does Zane owe you?”
Cyndris looked at Zane, the humor on his face frozen. “Let’s just say that when I was in a pickle with some droids in Dreza, Zane was there to act as a… mediator.”
Zane leaned back and crossed his arms, “Are you going to tell us what we want to know or not?”
Cyndris smiled and put his drink down on the table next to his chair, crossing his legs. “Well, it starts off a few years ago. You know the CEO of Asher-Bailey Cybernetics, correct? Well, if you don’t, his name is Asher Corigan,” he said to Stillman and Sarah. “While a CEO is generally just a overinflated title that says give me a lot of money for doing no work, this man is very different. In all of White Walk, you do not want to cross this man. Do any of you remember Bailey Mandolin?”
Stills sat upright, his eyebrows furrowing. “Yeah, he was the co-founder of The Bailey Foundation for Cybernetic Prosthetics. He died a couple years ago. Car accident or something.”
Cyndris took a sip of his drink and set it back down. “Ah, that is what you, and the general public, are supposed to think. The truth is, he died in his office when Asher Corigan put a blade through his skull. The thing about Mr. Corigan is that he will make sure he gets what he wants. Though I do not know all of the specifics, it seemed that Bailey Mandolin found himself in the unfortunate spot that lies between what Asher wanted and what Asher had. So after the death of Mr. Mandolin, Asher gained controlling interest in their shared company, Asher Bailey Cybernetic Enhancements, opening up the door for him to do whatever he wished. This, by itself, is not a very empowering thing, as it only gives him a big say in what his company does.”
Zane leaned forward. “But if you have more money than the gods, it makes you almost unstoppable.”
Cyndris smiled and gave a silent clap for him. “Very good, Zane, you’ve been paying attention. And you are one hundred percent correct. Asher Corigan is the richest man in White Walk, maybe even in Mekia, and he most definitely knows how to use his wealth. Tell me, have you noticed any changes in Cyber-Rom the past few years?”
They sat in silence, each trying to find an answer. Sarah spoke first.
“There haven’t been as many police here lately, but only in Cyber-Rom, none of the other districts.” She looked at Zane and Stillman, then back to Cyndris. “I travel to Blue Light and Milan a couple times a month, and they have police forces on the streets like normal. But not here.” Sarah stood, pacing next to the couch. “Come to think about it, the only time I see police anywhere is when there is a raid.”
Cyndris broke out into a huge grin. “Why, aren’t you just an absolute wonder.”
Stills leaned forward, placing his hands on the table in front of him. “Wait, are you saying that Corigan bought the police force?”
Cyndris nodded. “That is exactly what I am saying my dear boy.” He turned to Sarah. “Please sit my dear, there is quite a bit more to discuss.” Sarah sat down next to Stills, laying her head on his shoulder.
“So now you know, Asher has the police and his company right in his pocket. Now, to answer your initial question, yes and no. Yes, Asher-Bailey is selling tech that is not what it seems. No, the tech is not sold with the virus already on it. What is happening is more sinister than that. Asher Corigan is selling tech that has extra-neural connectors, kind of like extra connections to the nervous system. And this virus, it isn’t a common bug that saps money or disables systems, it shuts off neural activity.”
“But how are they getting this virus out if it isn’t already on the devices?” asked Sarah.
“Well, these extra-neural connectors are kind of like hot-spots that are directly linked to their HQ. So there are no viruses on the headpieces, not really. It is all the same virus, originating from a single place at Asher-Bailey Cybernetics.”
They sat in silence for a moment, taking in the information. Zane stood up and started pacing around the room. Sarah gulped down the rest of her drink, shivering as the alcohol burned its way down her throat.
“But, how is that possible?” asked Stills. He took off his glasses and started cleaning them, a habit developed long ago. “How can a virus operate on only a single platform if there are thousands, no, millions of people affected?”
“Isn’t that the question,” said Cyndris, smiling. He stood and placed his glass back on the bar. “Now that we have this matter all cleared up, I have a game to get back to.” He smiled and started to walk back over to the door.
Zane stepped forward and grabbed the back of his jacket. “Wait, after all of this, you’re just going to let it continue? You won’t even try to stop it?”
Cyndris whirled around, grabbing the front of Zane’s jacket. All of the playful humor of the moments before replaced with a terrified anger. “You’re damn right I’m staying out of this. Asher Corigan is a dangerous man, and I will not get caught up in something this big.”
Zane pushed Cyndris’s hands away. “But there are people dying out there! How can you stay out of something this…this evil!” Zane was shouting, his chest heaving with anger.
Cyndris’s face softened. He placed his hand on Zane’s shoulder, leaning in close. “I know you care about the people in Cyber-Rom, but I am just an information associate.”
“More like an information salesman,” Stills said with a sneer.
“Be what it may, I don’t get into anything. It may seem like I have power in this district, but my power lies in information. And if I give out my information, then how much power will I continue to have?”
Zane pushed his hand away, grabbing Sarah and Stills and directing them out the door. Before the door closed behind him, he turned to Cyndris, a scowl on his face. “You are pathetic, you know that?”
Cyndris smiled and waved. “Have a good night Zandriel. Good luck.”
-
Zetheon is a planet in the Skorak galaxy, some 1 million lightyears from the Milky Way. It is inhabited by humans who came from Earth before it’s demise, sentient computer programs who either live in a digital construct called Glitchworld or inside droid bodies, and a race of creatures composed of pure energy called Skorans. The humans, programs, and skorans all live within the political systems of the planet, each nation mostly confined to the continent they physically inhabit.
The story takes place 1,017,000 years in the future. Humans arrived on the generation ship Dark Star. The ship traveled at almost-luminal speeds for 1000 years, the time dilation resulting in almost 1,000,000 years passing. After arriving to Zetheon, the planet needed to be terraformed, but the extra time spent on board Dark Star after arrival caused controversy due to it’s unforeseen implications for the generation that was ‘supposed to land.’ A war began among the 6 million residents, one that killed almost 1 million people. 2 million of the survivors decided to risk life or death on the surface and abandoned Dark star to the remaining survivors. At last, Zetheon had been touched by humanity.
To skip the long, boring details, Zetheon was eventually settled by the remainders of Dark Star, and along with the work of the first settlers, a new world was slowly being built.
Then humans discovered Thaumite, and things kinda got crazy.
Thaumite was the answer to all of human’s questions about matter and energy. It is special in the cosmos so far that anyone has ever seen, as it is only found on Zetheon and it’s largest moon, Zagarillo (later renamed Zag 2 Prison World). Thaumite is composed of a high concentration of alpha particles called Azerons, the particles that are the base of all matter and energy, and usually occurs in two different forms: crytal thaumite and hard metal thaumite. They can be manipulated with electromagnetism, and with it humans can practically do anything.
After a long series of discovers and tests, scientists eventually want to see if they can create a self-contained star using Thaumite as the controller. They do it, but it explodes in their faces, and through what is considered a diving miracle, the Skorans appear on the continent Mekia through a giant energetic breech in space. They have no interest in Thaumite or anything else made of matter, as they seem to be more interested in learning about the world they have come to exist in and how it connects to their previous existence. After a short lived war that ended by the Skorans demonstrating that they were invincible, they began helping humans.
The heart of the story lies in the year 6,000 AL (After Landing). The creation of Glitchworld in 5897, facilitated by the first sentient program SOM, sparked an entire race of sentient programs who are almost fully consider alive by humans. Their simulated reality includes both humans and programs (skorans have no interest in programs, thinking them artificial) and has become the most complex system that humanity has ever divined.
Again, I will skip the boring details.
The story follows a series of characters as they must face powers from both the planet and outside of it, existing in the form of humans, corporations, cosmic beings, planetary scourges, reality-shaping monsters, and ultimately the creator of the universe. Some characters are allowed to see across the wide avenues of parallel time-lines, others into the very nature of their own purpose.
The main characters are Zandriel Scott (The Crimson River), Liander MorDoza, Cariel ‘Starmaker’ U’Goa, Chromus Teagan ,Sarsana Rhemothian-Nock, Joheim the Traveler, Korra Prax, and other various humans, skorans, programs, and beings.
Working together and against each other, the characters move as pieces in a game to large deities that have existed before the beginning of time. Some move willingly, others fight the influence and change the game, and one decides that he has had enough being a piece and that he wants to play as well.
The story will be split into various parts, they are currently titled as follows:
Mask of the Taul
Prime Motions of Zetheon
– Glitch
– Crusade
– WanderersLegacy of Zetheon
– The Fight For Light
– Genesis of PeaceAge of Unification
All chapters I post will have the appropriate part title before it. This project is very much a WORK IN PROGRESS and will have massive edits.
Enjoy!
A DARKER ENERGY 