Aetheral Space

Alcera Nox bit her lip.

It was not loyalty that kept her in Vantablack Squad. For years now, she had been wanting to see the Widow dead. Pulped, dissected, obliterated, eviscerated. That woman had taken her away from her sister, from the only person bar Sam who had ever cared for her. Because of her, Derna was floating through the void of space forever, trapped by her own ability. She wanted to see the Widow dead, but death alone wasn’t enough. It had to be gruesome. It had to be deserved.

Most of all, it had to be permanent.

The death that Alcera Nox was looking at was anything but. From her position in the mouth of the tunnel, she could see the Widow -- see her resting place. A pristine cuboid sculpture of ice, holding the Widow deep inside like she was a bug in a cocoon.

Those brown eyes of hers stared forward, unseeing and uncaring. Alcera narrowed her crimson in response.

This was one of the Widow’s abilities: Cold Sleep. It was a cryogenic technique that temporarily suspended her body’s functions -- effectively making her dead to the world -- until the sculpture was breached, at which point she was reanimated. It seemed the Widow had gambled that the Weapon wouldn’t see her as a target if she no longer registered as a living thing.

Well, Alcera noted bitterly. It looks like you were right about that.

"Alcera," Sam hissed, tugging at her sleeve. "Come on back down. We need to go."

He was whispering just like she did now, but that only made sense. This close to the surface, he wasn’t sure whether this counted as being in the Weapon’s jurisdiction or not, whether it was safe to talk or not.

Well, actually… maybe he was sure. Maybe he’d lived this before, and learnt the hard way that he had to keep his voice down. Alcera slowly nodded, tearing her gaze away from the frozen Widow and retreating back underground.

You’re not allowed to stay there, Alcera promised. I’m going to break you out of there before long… and kill you myself.

Ruth Blaine crawled down the hill.

The sun had started to come up at long last, and Ruth felt its warmth spread across her face. A low, rattling breath oozed out of her mouth… as quiet as she dared. She couldn’t risk that thing coming back…

No… not that thing… Lily… Lily Aubrisher…

Her friend. Her comrade. They’d freed a planet together. They’d tried to free a galaxy together. Elysian Fields. She’d gone to the Tartarus, to take it out, but… that had been the last time Ruth had seen her. She’d thought Lily was dead. She’d thought Lily was dead.

Would that have been better?

Ruth Blaine crawled down the hill.

She didn’t know what they’d done to Lily, or even who they were… but it was clear that she was no longer the person Ruth had known. The way she’d fought had made that clear -- the way she’d gone to kill. That attack… that had been intended to end her life, without a doubt. Lily hadn’t even recognised her.

Ruth’s heart thumped silently in her chest. It had been a close thing. With her infusion and enhanced body, she’d barely managed to survive taking a direct hit from the lightning bolt -- but, if Lily saw that she had survived, Ruth was certain she’d have just kept attacking. She’d had no choice but to play dead, in the most excruciating way possible.

It was like what she’d done when she fought against Niain, manifesting her armour under her skin to shield her insides from attack. This time, though, she’d gone even further… manifesting the armour directly around her own heart. That had served to muffle her heartbeat until it could no longer be heard… and so she had saved herself from Lily’s follow-up.

Bitter tears came to Ruth’s eyes as she dragged herself through the dirt. Lily… that girl really was like a machine now. A person would have checked the body, at least, surely? But no. She wasn’t moving, she wasn’t breathing, and her heart wasn’t beating. At that moment, Ruth had vanished from Lily’s mind entirely, and the girl had left her there.

Ruth Blaine crawled down the hill.

Given Lily’s appearance, Ruth had to assume that her friends had been defeated. Did that mean they were dead? No. She couldn’t believe that. She couldn’t bring herself to imagine it. That would be her last wound, the one that would finish her off. They were alive. They were alive, and she needed to get back to them.

The mission was a failure. Even though Ruth had survived, she was in no state to get inside the Sed’s dome. If there was anyone or anything else guarding it, she’d be helpless. She had to return to whatever was left.

And she had to do it quietly. That, she knew. Concealing her heartbeat had only just barely saved her. If she was too loud… if she sent a rock tumbling down, or struck her arm against a wall…

…a new ten seconds to death would begin.

That was the rule that someone had imposed upon Lily Aubrisher. That was the kind of machine someone had turned Ruth’s friend into. An automatic murderer. Fire boiled in Ruth’s veins, and a promise coalesced in her hushed heart.

I’ll save you, Lily, she swore. No matter what, I’ll bring you back…

…just like Skipper would have done.

Serena twitched.

When she woke, it was to pain, but she’d expected that. A direct hit from Tybalt’s Id, at full strength, while she was off-guard? It was a wonder she wasn’t dead. But, even more than that…

Are you there, Bruno?

No response, just as Serena had expected. Darn it. She’d let her guard down in more ways than one. Bruno had always been more sensitive than her. She should have picked up on how being back at the Sed was affecting him -- how he was slowly retreating into some deep corner of their brain.

Some big sister she was.

Serena tried to get up, but the pain put her right back down again. Someone had put her flat on the rocky floor, with a discarded black cloak serving as a makeshift blanket. She turned her head slightly, ignoring the twinges of pain even that brought on -- and saw Morgan lying a short distance away.

It seemed he hadn’t woken up yet. His bullet-wound had been treated… hopefully, whoever had done it had removed the bullet as well. Serena didn’t know what kind of bullet Tybalt’s Ego was using these days, but keeping it inside the body was just asking for trouble.

"You awake?" someone asked from out of her vision.

"Yeah," she mumbled, stewing in their failure. "I’m awake."

The one who had spoken was Sam Set -- and he stepped over from where he’d been rummaging through a medkit, his face pale.

"How bad is it?" Serena asked.

"I managed to scrounge together some stimulants from what the researchers left behind here," Sam explained. "Your body’s going through self-repair at the moment -- and once Nacht wakes up, he can accelerate that using his ability, so…"

"No," Serena said firmly. "How bad is all of it?"

Sam faltered for a moment… and then he let out another tired sigh.

"We’ve lost the Widow for the time being," he said, wiping the sweat from his brow. "Wolfram, too -- we don’t know what happened to him. Blaine hasn’t shown her face yet, so I’m thinking maybe…"

"She’s fine," Serena said seriously.

"Huh?"

"Ruth’s not the sort of person who dies."

"Well, actually, I think everyone’s the sort of person who… nevermind, I guess. The point is, we’ve lost our biggest hitters for the time being, and we probably got nothing to show for it."

Serena slowly nodded, their miserable situation sinking in, and then quietly…

"What about Annatrice?" she asked.

"The kid?"

"Mm-hmm," Serena nodded. "She’s not here anymore, is she?"

This book was originally published on Royal Road. Check it out there for the real experience.

Sam Set sighed, and shook his head. "No. I was hoping you could tell me about what happened there… along with what attacked you."

"Not what," Serena said. "Who. Tybalt del Sed -- he’s one of the other people who came from this place. I guess he’s like our upperclassman or something. He showed us and beat the crap out of us."

"What? On his own?"

"Technically, yes."

"Well… well, shit," Sam said, wiping his forehead once again -- it was very good at producing sweat, it seemed. "Well, what the hell do we do now?! We’ve got that monster upstairs, and there’s people sneaking around down here, as well? What the fuck?!"

He was working himself into such a lather, standing up and pacing around the room as he ranted, that he almost didn’t hear Serena’s question.

"Was there a ship?" she asked.

He turned his head to look at her. "What?"

"Did anyone go past you? When you saw the outside?"

Sam shook his head. "No. Why?"

"Something’s weird," Serena grunted, forcing her body into a sitting position. "The way these tunnels are laid out, there shouldn’t be room for anyone to hide out down here for long. Even we’re all cramped. There’s no way Tybalt and whoever he’s working with are living down here."

"Okay, so what?"

"So," Serena continued. "He must have come down here from above. But he could only have gone past one of us -- and even if he did, he shouldn’t have been able to get here without anyone noticing. It’s like he just suddenly popped up out of nowhere."

Sam’s eyes widened. "An ability, then? He teleported down here somehow?"

Serena shook her head. The last time she’d seen Tybalt, he hadn’t had any abilities like that -- and she doubted he could have developed something of that caliber in a relatively short amount of time.

Tybalt del Sed’s main ability was called Trisection -- it separated his consciousness into three personas: the instinctive Id, the logical Ego, and the conciliatory Superego. One controlled the body at a time, while the others lingered as shades that could act as scouts or basic combatants. Just like with Cott, Tybalt’s three segments all had their own individual abilities as well.

The Id’s ability was the simplest -- the less thought it put into an attack, the more powerful that attack became. The clumsy push it had used on her had been particularly effective for just that reason.

The Ego had a pretty simple ability as well -- whenever it fired its gun, it automatically recorded the ammunition it had on hand and manifested it inside the weapon, instantly reloading. If the gun got knocked out of its hands, it could bring it right back, too.

The Superego was particularly tricky. It really liked to yap -- and the more you listened to it, the more it would drain your will to fight. Combined with the natural exhaustion of battle, just talking to the Superego for a few minutes could put you on the floor.

The closest thing to a teleportation ability Tybalt had was that of his Ego, but teleporting multiple people was surely beyond that. Serena wasn’t sure… well, she wasn’t 100% sure, but…

"I think there’s something down here," she said. "Something that Tybalt used to get here… and to get back to his base."

"His base…" Sam Set slowly nodded, hand on his chin. "Well, that does make sense… but where the hell should we be looking, then?"

"Not here," grunted Morgan Nacht.

The two snapped their heads around to look at him. He’d opened one eye from his position on the floor -- and judging from the look on his face, he wasn’t feeling much better than Serena. He took a laboured breath before managing to speak again.

"Give me a sec," he gasped. "I’ll get myself up first… and then… we’re going after that bastard…"

He steeled himself --

"H! A!"

-- and started to scream.

Annatrice del Sed awoke to white light.

This was a familiar ceiling, sterile, pressing down despite the distance. These were familiar walls, glass, allowing curious eyes to look in on their lab rat. This was a familiar bed, neat and cold, like a coffin’s prologue.

This was a familiar pain, pulsing in her head, like someone had taken a whisk to her brain.

The last thing she remembered was Tybalt del Sed advancing on her… and then the pain, and then the blackness. Had he hit her across the head or something? It certainly felt like she’d been knocked out cold.

Or maybe…

Maybe it had all been a dream, she thought for a moment. Maybe the Sed had never shut down after all. Maybe some nameless thing -- for it surely wasn’t called Annatrice -- had deluded itself into thinking it could exist, into thinking it had the right to exist. The scientists would come back any second now, and the experiments would resume like nothing ever happened.

It took Annatrice quite a few seconds to realize she wasn’t breathing. And when she finally did, letting out a shaking breath…

"You’re awake."

A shudder went down Annatrice’s spine, and she turned her head to look at the source of the voice. This brightly lit ’bedroom’ she’d woken up in -- containing a bed, a toilet, and little else -- was encased in a glass box, like an exhibit at the zoo. Beyond that… was a dark chamber, a place for observation of the light.

And standing on the threshold of that darkness was Erica del Sed.

Annatrice resisted the urge to throw the covers over her head and hide. She knew Erica del Sed’s face, of course. Every child of the Sed did.

Erica was the Sed’s first subject, and their first success. The foremost Controller they had produced. The measuring stick by which all others were judged. She stared through the glass at Annatrice, unblinking, waiting for something.

That look in her eyes… it wasn’t that she thought she was better than you. She knew she was better than you… and, just by seeing her, you knew it too.

I can try and escape, Annatrice suggested to herself feverishly. If I use Zakos’ ability, I can pull the glass out of the walls and hurl it back at her.

It’d distract her, if nothing else -- only…

…it wasn’t called Zakos’ ability, was it? It was called Plunder Reach. It made sense. A high-strung mess of a man like that would never have had the discipline required to develop a nameless technique. She should have understood that immediately.

All she’d created, then, was a clumsy caricature -- and that was not something that could beckon the dead.

"You’re frightened," Erica said kindly. "That’s understandable."

"Where am I?" Annatrice asked, trying to stop her clumsy voice from shaking. She failed.

"The Thinker’s Comet," Erica replied without hesitation. "High above the Sed."

Annatrice blinked. What? What was this? The Thinker’s Comet… that was the headquarters of the Supremacy’s Absurd Weapons Lab, wasn’t it? What the hell was it doing inside the UAP? And what the hell was Erica del Sed doing with them?!

"Don’t worry about the AWL," Erica said, as if she could hear Annatrice’s thoughts. "You’re under my protection now. So long as you’re under my protection, there’s nothing in the world that can harm you."

With that promise lingering in the air, she reached down and tapped a button on her wrist-bound script. Immediately, the air inside the chamber hissed -- and a glass panel slid away from the wall, creating an exit for Annatrice to leave through. Erica stood next to it, looking at her expectantly.

"Come with me," Erica beckoned. "I’m going to show you something and explain it to you. Once I do, you’ll understand the whole world."

Annatrice blinked. It was bizarre: Erica’s words were arrogant to the extreme, just like his, but the presence she gave off couldn’t have been more different from Samael Ambrazo Zakos. Samael had been someone grasping for greatness until the day he died. Erica… Erica seemed like she dominated the very concept of greatness, and did so easily.

This is someone on an entirely different level than me. This is something on an entirely different level than me.

Just by looking at her, that thought rose unbidden into Annatrice’s head. This was no Aether ability: simply the natural instinct of an organism who understood hierarchy. Faced with that, what could Annatrice do but obey?

She stood on quivering legs, and -- alongside Erica -- walked through the darkness and into the hallway beyond.

The corridor was lined with windows -- each looking in on a sterile white testing room. Some were empty… but most weren’t. Aether Awakenings and other strange creatures, being poked and prodded and dissected and vivisected. Annatrice only managed to tear her gaze away once Erica started talking again.

"It’s distasteful," she said. "Having to operate from a place that reminds us so much of home. I don’t blame you for being uncomfortable."

Annatrice summoned the courage and spoke. "What… what are we doing here? What are you doing here?"

Erica didn’t look down at her as she walked. She just continued to stare straight forward, utterly relaxed.

"Something incredible and rare is about to happen," the woman said. "I’m going to ask you a question. Are you ready? That wasn’t the question. Tell me: what was the purpose of the Sed?"

Annatrice took a deep breath. "To… to create artificial Cogitants, right? So the UAP could match the Supremacy’s advantage."

"That was the story we were told. But it seemed strange to me. I didn’t think such an advantage actually existed. It was only when I met Penelope that I had confirmation of the lie."

"Penelope?"

"That’s irrelevant to you," Erica replied. "But it begs another question. Get ready, I’m about to ask it. If the purpose of the Sed was not to create artificial Cogitants, then what was it?"

"I… I don’t know."

"Be happy, then. I’m about to tell you."

The two of them reached the end of the hallway -- where a massive metal door waited, tall and imposing. Erica took a step forward and -- after a brief scan by the door’s sensors -- it slowly screeched open. Red light washed over the two of them from within.

The chamber beyond was gargantuan, spherical, such that it was difficult to see the far end of the room from the entrance.

At first Annatrice thought that the odd lumps she saw in the shadows were machinery -- but no. Masked figures were kneeled all around the perimeter of the room, Aether of various colours crackling around their forms -- and that Aether flowed. It flowed down into the floor, crawled across the room, and coalesced inside a huge glass tube at the chamber’s centre.

The Aether was forming something, slowly but surely -- a bloody gash of scarlet light. At first glance, it looked to Annatrice like a wound in the air, but at second glance…

…it felt more like the staring pupil of some unfinished eye.

"Tell me," said Erica. "Have you ever heard of something called the Prince?"