Chapter 7 (Revised)
The food on Sub-level 7 was, as Valentina promised, functional.
It was a nutrient paste, squeezed from a tube into a bowl. It was grey, smelled faintly of yeast, and had the texture of wet clay. But it was hot, and it filled the hollow ache in my stomach. It was the first real meal I'd had in this new life, and Koshva was paying for it. I made sure to get three bowls.
He sat opposite me in the cramped metal booth, looking miserable. He'd already transferred the credits from his personal account, his face growing more pale with each digit he authorized. He now stared into his own untouched bowl of paste as if it contained his severed future.
"The Director is going to have my prosthetic hand for this," he muttered, not looking at me. "Requisition forms for anomaly detainment were one thing. Direct payment for a suspect's lunch? That's fraud. It's career suicide."
'Good,' I thought, scraping the last of the paste from my bowl. 'A man with nothing to lose is useful, but a man who's already lost something is predictable.' "Think of it as an investment in inter-departmental relations," I said, wiping my mouth with the back of my hand. "Now, tell me about her. Valentina. What's her story?"
Koshva looked up, his one good eye wary. "Why?"
"Because the girl with the scary Law and the attitude problem seems to be my new probation officer. I like to know who holds my leash." I gestured to the empty bowls. "And considering you just funded my last meal, the least you can do is provide a little dinner conversation."
He sighed, the sound of a man surrendering to the inevitable. "Valentina... she's a 'First Generation' Transcendent. Part of the first wave of humans from the Human Plane—Megrez—to be Reborn here after the last Culling."
That was new information. "Culling?"
"Every few centuries, they thin the herd," he said flatly. "The gods. It's how they replenish their... essence. They pick a plane, offer a select few a chance to ascend, and wipe the rest clean. Makes for more fervent prayers, or so the theory goes. Valentina was a child when she was brought here. Saw her whole world die. Doesn't leave much room for a personality."
'That explains the rage. It's not ambition, it's survivor's guilt with a badge.'
"So she got her Law from the trauma?" I asked.
"Maybe. Maybe she was just born for it. Either way, she's a zealot. Believes in the system because the alternative is admitting her entire existence is built on a foundation of corpses. She'll hunt you to the ends of Phekda, not because it's her job, but because proving you're a mistake validates her survival."
I leaned back, the metal of the booth cold against my spine. "And what about you, Koshva? What do you believe in?"
He snorted. "I believe in a comfortable chair, a good bottle of synthetic liquor, and finishing my shift without having to file a 'God-Soul Deviation' report."
My blood ran cold. "What did you just say?"
He froze, realizing his mistake. "Nothing. Just a term. A classification for when... a high-level entity interacts with a lower one. Leaves a... a wrinkle in the fabric." He was a bad liar. He was scrambling.
'They have a name for what's happening to me. Not a disease, but a flaw. A mistake in the code.'
"A wrinkle," I repeated, my voice dropping. I let a flicker of that same power I'd shown Valentina leak from my eyes. Nothing major. Just a subtle change in pressure, the air growing heavy.
Koshva flinched, his hand instinctively going to his metal arm. "Look, kid, don't."
"Tell me what a 'God-Soul Deviation' report is," I said, my voice quiet. "Or you'll be paying for this booth, too."
He swallowed hard, his gaze darting around the busy market. No one was paying us any attention. We were just two Ments grabbing a bite. But we weren't. He knew it. I knew it.
"It's for... anomalies like you," he finally whispered, leaning in. "Transcendents who exhibit properties that defy the local laws of physics and causality. A bug in the system. It's... it's supposed to be impossible."
The pieces clicked into place, but formed a different picture than before. It wasn't about my soul. It was about my presence. My very existence was causing an error in the simulation. The system hadn't rejected me as a disease; it had flagged me as a paradox. An equation that couldn't be solved.
"What do they do with the... deviant?" I asked, the words tasting like ash.
"Quarantine," he said, his voice barely audible. "At best. They study you. Try to figure out what rule you're breaking. At worst... they perform a 'purification'." He didn't need to elaborate. I'd heard that word before. Right before my BAC was miraculously zeroed out.
I sat back, the weight of it settling over me. I wasn't a contagion. I was a glitch. And the system's programmers were about to run a diagnostic. With a hammer.
A flicker of movement from across the market square caught my eye. A figure in a long, hooded cloak, standing in the shadows of an alleyway. They weren't looking at me, not directly. But they were looking in my direction. And they were perfectly still. Too still.
'Another one of Valentina's watchdogs? Or something else?'
I didn't have time for this. My plate was full enough with a teenage zealot who wanted to dissect me and a cosmic bureaucracy that wanted to erase me.
I stood up, tossing a credit chit on the table. "For the booth."
"Wait," Koshva said, a note of panic in his voice. "What are you going to do?"
"I'm going to find out who my real enemies are," I said, turning away from him and the figure in the alley. "Because I'm starting to get the feeling that the girl with the pink hair is the least of my problems."
Chapter 7 (Revised)
The food on Sub-level 7 was, as Valentina promised, functional.
It was a nutrient paste, squeezed from a tube into a bowl. It was grey, smelled faintly of yeast, and had the texture of wet clay. But it was hot, and it filled the hollow ache in my stomach. It was the first real meal I'd had in this new life, and Koshva was paying for it. I made sure to get three bowls.
He sat opposite me in the cramped metal booth, looking miserable. He'd already transferred the credits from his personal account, his face growing more pale with each digit he authorized. He now stared into his own untouched bowl of paste as if it contained his severed future.
"The Director is going to have my prosthetic hand for this," he muttered, not looking at me. "Requisition forms for anomaly detainment were one thing. Direct payment for a suspect's lunch? That's fraud. It's career suicide."
'Good,' I thought, scraping the last of the paste from my bowl. 'A man with nothing to lose is useful, but a man who's already lost something is predictable.' "Think of it as an investment in inter-departmental relations," I said, wiping my mouth with the back of my hand. "Now, tell me about her. Valentina. What's her story?"
Koshva looked up, his one good eye wary. "Why?"
"Because the girl with the scary Law and the attitude problem seems to be my new probation officer. I like to know who holds my leash." I gestured to the empty bowls. "And considering you just funded my last meal, the least you can do is provide a little dinner conversation."
He sighed, the sound of a man surrendering to the inevitable. "Valentina... she's a 'First Generation' Transcendent. Part of the first wave of humans from the Human Plane—Megrez—to be Reborn here after the last Culling."
That was new information. "Culling?"
"Every few centuries, they thin the herd," he said flatly. "The gods. It's how they replenish their... essence. They pick a plane, offer a select few a chance to ascend, and wipe the rest clean. Makes for more fervent prayers, or so the theory goes. Valentina was a child when she was brought here. Saw her whole world die. Doesn't leave much room for a personality."
'That explains the rage. It's not ambition, it's survivor's guilt with a badge.'
"So she got her Law from the trauma?" I asked.
"Maybe. Maybe she was just born for it. Either way, she's a zealot. Believes in the system because the alternative is admitting her entire existence is built on a foundation of corpses. She'll hunt you to the ends of Phekda, not because it's her job, but because proving you're a mistake validates her survival."
I leaned back, the metal of the booth cold against my spine. "And what about you, Koshva? What do you believe in?"
He snorted. "I believe in a comfortable chair, a good bottle of synthetic liquor, and finishing my shift without having to file a 'Class-7 Reality Deviation' report."
My blood ran cold. "What did you just say?"
He froze, realizing his mistake. "Nothing. Just a term. A classification for when... a high-level entity interacts with a lower one. Leaves a... a wrinkle in the fabric." He was a bad liar. He was scrambling.
'They have a name for what's happening to me. Not a disease, but a flaw. A mistake in the code.'
"A wrinkle," I repeated, my voice dropping. I let a flicker of that same power I'd shown Valentina leak from my eyes. Nothing major. Just a subtle change in pressure, the air growing heavy.
Koshva flinched, his hand instinctively going to his metal arm. "Look, kid, don't."
"Tell me what a 'Class-7 Reality Deviation' report is," I said, my voice quiet. "Or you'll be paying for this booth, too."
He swallowed hard, his gaze darting around the busy market. No one was paying us any attention. We were just two Ments grabbing a bite. But we weren't. He knew it. I knew it.
"It's for... anomalies like you," he finally whispered, leaning in. "Transcendents who exhibit properties that defy the local laws of physics and causality. A bug in the system. It's... it's supposed to be impossible."
The pieces clicked into place, but formed a different picture than before. It wasn't about my soul. It was about my presence. My very existence was causing an error in the simulation. The system hadn't rejected me as a disease; it had flagged me as a paradox. An equation that couldn't be solved.
"What do they do with the... deviant?" I asked, the words tasting like ash.
"Quarantine," he said, his voice barely audible. "At best. They study you. Try to figure out what rule you're breaking. At worst... they perform a 'debugging'." He didn't need to elaborate. I'd heard that word before. Right before my BAC was miraculously zeroed out.
I sat back, the weight of it settling over me. I wasn't a contagion. I was a glitch. And the system's programmers were about to run a diagnostic. With a hammer.
A flicker of movement from across the market square caught my eye. A figure in a long, hooded cloak, standing in the shadows of an alleyway. They weren't looking at me, not directly. But they were looking in my direction. And they were perfectly still. Too still.
'Another one of Valentina's watchdogs? Or something else?'
I didn't have time for this. My plate was full enough with a teenage zealot who wanted to dissect me and a cosmic bureaucracy that wanted to erase me.
I stood up, tossing a credit chit on the table. "For the booth."
"Wait," Koshva said, a note of panic in his voice. "What are you going to do?"
"I'm going to find out who my real enemies are," I said, turning away from him and the figure in the alley. "Because I'm starting to get the feeling that the girl with the pink hair is the least of my problems."
Chapter 7 (Continued)
I turned my back on the alley and the shadow within it, pushing the unease down. Paranoia was a luxury, and I was flat broke. Koshva stared at me, his face a perfect portrait of a man watching his life savings walk away.
"Wait," he said, his voice cracking. "What are you going to do? You can't just walk away from Valentina! She'll have an entire squadron of Ments on you before you even get to the transit hub!"
"I'm not walking away from her," I said, patting him on his non-metallic shoulder. "I'm just taking a scenic route. Think of it as a sightseeing tour of my impending doom. Besides, I want to see if I can do this."
I focused on the monorail station we'd arrived at, a glowing platform a hundred yards away. It was crowded, filled with beings of all shapes and sizes, none of them paying any attention to the disgraced Ment and his walking contagion. I remembered the feeling of standing on the lamppost—the impossible lightness, the defiance of physics.
'How hard can it be? It's just a matter of intent. And a little bit of stolen divinity.'
I closed my eyes, pictured myself on the platform, and took a step.
Nothing happened.
I stumbled, nearly tripping over my own feet. A nearby sentient blob of what looked like orange jello wobbled in disapproval. Koshva let out a groan that sounded like it came from the depths of his soul.
"Right," I muttered, my face heating. "Maybe it's like a muscle. A god-muscle I haven't flexed in eighty-odd years."
[Awakened Skill: Divine Step. Uninitialized.] [Instruction: Focus your intent. Anchor your destination in your mind. Do not think about the process. Think only of the result.]
"Thanks for the tip, voice-in-my-head," I grumbled. I closed my eyes again, ignoring the growing crowd. This time, I didn't think about the how. I just pictured the platform, the feel of the metal grating under my feet, the smell of ozone from the passing trains.
The world dissolved.
For a split second, it was like being plunged into ice-cold water. A feeling of weightless, nauseating vertigo. Then, my feet hit solid ground with a clang. I was standing on the platform. A few feet away, a woman with four arms dropped her fruit, staring at me as if I'd just materialized from thin air, which, I suppose, I had.
I turned and gave Koshva a triumphant little wave.
He was standing frozen, his mouth agape. He blinked once, then twice, before a look of utter resignation settled over his face. He then did the most logical thing a man in his position could do: he turned around and started walking briskly in the opposite direction, heading for the nearest public transit sign. He was abandoning me. Smart man.
A moment later, a piercing alarm shrieked through the station. Red lights began to flash along the platform's edges.
[Unauthorized spatial translocation detected. Security breach. All units, converge on Platform Gamma-9.]
'Well, so much for the scenic route.'
I looked around. The crowd was now parting like a sea, leaving a clear circle around me. And from the tunnels at either end of the platform, figures in sleek, black armor, their faces obscured by helmets, were marching forward. They moved with a synchronization (同步) I hadn't seen since my old life. They weren't Ments like Koshva. They were the system's true enforcers. Its antibodies.
The first one raised its arm. A panel on its vambrace slid open, revealing a humming, blue crystal.
"Anomaly 734," a distorted, electronic voice commanded. "Cease all movement. Prepare for subjugation."
"Subjugation?" I called out, a grin spreading across my face despite the situation. "You guys don't believe in just grabbing a coffee first?"
They didn't appreciate the humor. The blue crystal on the lead enforcer's arm began to glow brighter.
'Okay, time for plan B. What's plan B?'
The hooded figure from the market was suddenly there, standing at the edge of the crowd, just beyond the security perimeter. I caught a glimpse of their face under the hood—a flash of sharp, inhuman features and eyes that glowed with a faint, silver light. They weren't here to help me. They were here to watch.
The enforcer fired. A beam of pure blue energy lanced toward me.
There was no time to dodge. No time to teleport. I threw my hands up in a pathetic, reflexive gesture of defense.
I squeezed my eyes shut, bracing for the inevitable, soul-searing pain.
A moment later, a sharp, stinging impact knocked me off my feet. I hit the metal grating with a painful clang, my hands smoking and my entire body ringing like a struck bell. The beam hadn't stopped. It had just... lost most of its juice right before hitting me.
The enforcers froze. Even the electronic voice in their helmet seemed to stutter. I'd expected to be a pile of ash. Instead, I just had a nasty sunburn and a bruised ego.
The lead enforcer tilted its head. "Energy output... diverted. Unregistered absorption field detected. Power analysis... inconclusive."
I looked from my smoking, tingling hands to the enforcers. That hadn't been my skill. I hadn't even had time to activate Dominion's Gaze. That was something else. A passive, reflexive defense my new body had thrown up on its own.
'Well, that's something,' I thought, pushing myself up, my muscles screaming in protest. 'It's not stopping the beam, but it's like a terrible, shock-absorbent armor.'
The enforcers recalibrated. This time, three of them raised their arms. The humming intensified, the air crackling with the raw energy they were gathering.
"Okay, okay, truce?" I said, forcing a shaky smile. "How about we just agree that I made a boo-boo and call it a day?"
They didn't appreciate the humor. The three blue crystals fired in unison.
This time, I was ready. I didn't rely on a passive defense. I focused. I poured every scrap of will I had into the space between me and the beams. I didn't try to stop them. I didn't try to absorb them. I just... moved them.
It was like trying to divert three rushing rivers with my bare hands. The strain was immense, a mental pressure that threatened to crack my skull. The beams didn't stop, but they veered wildly, missing me by inches and slamming into the far wall, melting three clean, smoldering holes through the metal.
I dropped to one knee, gasping, my head throbbing. My vision swam.
'Not... as easy as it looks.'
The enforcers paused, their programming clearly struggling to process this new variable. That's when the hooded figure moved. Not towards me, but towards one of the vending machines on the platform's edge. They casually kicked the base of the machine, and it rattled. A loose bottle of bright pink liquid rolled out of the dispenser slot. The figure picked it up, tossed it underhand in a high, lazy arc towards me.
I looked from the flying bottle to the enforcers, who were raising their weapons again.
'Oh, what the hell.'
I abandoned my defense, lunged forward, and caught the bottle. It was cold and slick in my hands. I didn't have time to read the label. I just twisted the cap off and chugged it.
The taste was overwhelmingly sweet, like cherries and battery acid. But the effect was instantaneous. The throbbing in my head vanished. The strain in my muscles faded. A cool, clean energy spread through my veins.
[Consumed 'Cactus Cooler'.] [Divine Essence reserves replenished by 0.1%.] [Absolute Negation field strength temporarily increased.]
"What the—" I started, but the enforcers weren't waiting. They fired again.
This time, I didn't divert. I stood my ground. As the beams hurtled towards me, I slammed my free hand forward, palm out. I didn't think. I just acted on the instinct the drink had given me.
"No."
The word wasn't just a sound. It was a command. A wave of invisible force erupted from my palm. It wasn't a shield. It was an eraser. The three beams of blue energy simply ceased to exist about five feet in front of me, winking out of reality as if they'd never been.
The enforcers stood frozen for a full three seconds. Then, as one, they took a synchronized (同步) step back. The distorted electronic voice in the lead's helmet spoke, a new tone in its artificial voice.
"Threat assessment upgraded. Anomaly 734 is now a Class-3 reality deviation. Engaging full containment protocol."
"Great," I muttered, crushing the empty bottle in my hand. "I'm screwed aren't i."