Bender of Worlds

by Isaac Hooke

  The shuttle took off, departing the TSN warship.

  Sinive accessed the shuttle’s external video feed and watched the vessel recede behind them.

  “They’re going to let us go just like that?” Sinive asked Lyra.

  “Apparently so,” Lyra said.

  Sinive received a text message from Lyra a moment later.

  I just completed my second sweep of this shuttle with the Essence. They had installed listening devices. I’ve destroyed them. However, it’s likely they’ve also tampered with the AI, as well as the AI aboard the Red Grizzly itself. We’ll have to perform a complete review of the codebase of both once we’re aboard. As well as another sweep for listening devices. That means more work on our part, and communications subterfuge until we’re sure we can trust the AIs. Do you understand?

  Sinive switched to text mode and thought: Yes.

  She could have probably let her thoughts transmit in voice mode, but text mode allowed her to correct any mistakes made by the thought conversion algorithms of her chip. Besides, she figured Lyra had a specific reason for text mode. Maybe voice mode wasn’t as secure?

  The TSN let us go because of what I told them, Lyra continued.

  And what did you tell them? Sinive sent.

  That I was willing to give him up, Lyra responded. To let him die. That it was better he die than fall into their hands.

  So Nelson had lied about Lyra’s cooperation after all.

  Sinive studied the Volur uncertainly. But you weren’t actually serious, were you? You had to be bluffing...

  I was completely serious, Lyra texted. Which is why they believed me.

  Ah. That explained Nelson’s sudden eagerness to set her free. She doubted the final decision had been his, of course, but rather that of his higher ups, who didn’t want to risk any harm befalling their precious World Bender. With Tane floating out there, with his only hope of rescue depending firmly on the freedom of this woman, it wasn’t hard to see why they’d chosen to let her go.

  That’s why they were in such a hurry to see me off the ship, Sinive sent. Without bothering to run me through the standard offboarding.

  Sinive attempted to activate her VR. It was still offline. That was odd, considering that normal digital augmentations such as Lyra’s mustache still worked.

  Someone’s been tampering with my chip.

  Well, that could be expected after being incarcerated aboard a TSN ship, she supposed. She’d have to look into it later.

  The craft docked with the Red Grizzly shortly thereafter. The Rapier class vessel was about a tenth the size of the warship she’d just departed. She dismissed the ID information that appeared.

  Ship: Red Grizzly.

  Class: Rapier.

  Offensive Weapons:

  Forward-facing:

  Eight dragon laser turrets, 180-degree throw angle.

  Two plasma throwers, 45-degree throw angle.

  One Essence lance, 90-degree throw angle.

  Aft-facing:

  Four dragon laser turrets, 90-degree throw angle.

  Point Defense Weapons: None.

  Shielding system: Energy.

  Crew complement: 4 (currently 3)

  Passenger capacity (current/maximum): 0/6.

  It took some moments for the hangar bay to pressurize, and then the shuttle’s ramp lowered. The clamps retracted from her seat, and Sinive stood, storage pouch in hand.

  She stepped into the hangar bay with Lyra. The artificial gravity aboard was the same as the shuttle, so she felt no change during the transition.

  She accepted the local mixnet connection, called the Grizznet.

  “Welcome aboard, you sexy thing!” Grizz said over the comm formed by that mixnet.

  “I’ve missed you, hun,” Sinive told the Red Grizzly’s AI.

  “And I you,” Grizz said. “Like a donut misses its icing. Like a hand misses its glove. Like a sheep misses its wool. Like—”

  “I got it,” Sinive said. Still holding her storage pouch, she marched out of the hangar bay and into the tight passageways of the ship. It felt extremely cramped compared to the military vessel they’d just left behind, which seemed luxurious in comparison.

  A text from Lyra arrived. It was sent directly from the Volur’s chip, bypassing the Grizznet. Probably best not to talk about important matters over the Grizznet until we’ve confirmed the AIs haven’t been violated.

  Yes, Sinive replied. Already noted.

  I’m going to search the ship for trackers and eavesdropping devices with the Essence, Lyra continued. Meanwhile, we have to jump to the closest system containing a rift to the Umbra. Nebb lost his specialists, courtesy of the TSN, so you’ll have to do it. I’m sending a destination system to you now.

  Sinive received the request and accepted it.

  You know that Grizz will see the destination system as soon as I key in the coordinates in the jump chamber, right? Sinive sent.

  Yes, but there’s no time to initiate a code review at the moment, Lyra responded. Tane is still out there. His oxygen supply is slowly diminishing. There’s only so much O2 Jed can give him, especially with those crillia out there waiting to interfere. We can’t delay.

  I didn’t intend to, Sinive sent.

  She switched to the main comm and spoke over the Grizznet. “Nebb, I’m going to jump us out.” The TSN would have been able to figure that out on their own anyway, so she didn’t see the need to hide it from Grizz.

  “Good,” Nebb sent back over the comm. “I can’t wait to get away from here. These ships are starting to give me the creeps. Especially the way their whole fleet is shadowing our every movement.”

  “Having forty warships mirroring your course would do that,” Sinive said.

  “Yes, it would,” Nebb said.

  Sinive momentarily held the storage pouch between her teeth to take a scuttle down to the deck below. She was already missing the grav scuttles of the warship.

  When she reached the deck, she returned the pouch to her left hand and made her way to the jump chamber.

  “So, where are we jumping to?” Grizz asked casually.

  “You’ll see,” Sinive replied.

  “Oh, we’re being secretive today are we?” Grizz said. “Okay. Secretive works for me. I love all that clandestine stuff.”

  “You would,” Sinive said.

  She reached the appropriate compartment and entered. She set the pouch on the floor just outside the jump chamber. There was no time to change into something more comfortable. Tane was out there, waiting. She truly hoped he was all right. Floating alone in the void of space, in the Umbra, surrounded by matter-digesting crillia. Not a good place to be.

  She dismissed the thought and pulled herself into the jump seat, which was positioned at an angle of ninety degrees to the deck, so that when she sat back the gravity vector pointed directly into her chest. It was like lying down with her feet bent over a small table. This posture made it easier to interact with the raging gale of the Essence, whose stellar wind would have to be Siphoned through the Chrysalium hull of the Red Grizzly and directed up toward the superstructure responsible for creating the distortion tunnel on the hull.

  “I’m initiating the jump,” Sinive said over the comm.

  She wrapped her hands around the Chrysalium control sticks. The sticks wound up through the innards of the ship, and directly connected her with the Chrysalium hull. She could feel the raging gale of the stellar wind lurking just inside.

  She stepped her mind into the Essence waiting within that hull, and the frigid cold shrieked inside of her—a savage, overpowering gale that scraped across her bones, scouring away many of the microscopic peaks and valleys of the osseous, threatening to devour her. She directed that merciless hurricane into her core and up into the ship, steering it into the superstructure responsible for creating the distortion tunnel so that Grizz could take over. It was like trying to guide a massive twister through the tiniest of gates, and it required all of her concentration
to prevent that raging wind from ripping her apart.

  A familiar notice appeared on her HUD, but she paid it no heed. She couldn’t afford to.

  Siphoning bonus. All Essenceworks are enhanced 1750% percent due to Siphoning through Chrysalium hull.

  She felt a tug upon her core as the AI began to direct that hurricane, drawing more of the stellar wind across her bones. The AI would be forming a branching, tree-shaped structure from the Essence outside the ship at that very moment, guiding and shaping at speeds only an AI was capable of to create a distortion tunnel that reached across the galaxy.

  While she struggled to guide and direct the immense windstorm of Esoterum into the ship with one part of her mind, with another she activated the jump interface. A stellar map of the surrounding stars appeared. She focused on the target system and directed the endpoint toward it. That endpoint was being created in real time by Grizz, and the pull of nearby stars tugged at it. She could feel the distinct vibrational patterns of each star passing down the distortion tunnel and into her core; the intensity of the vibrations told her how close she was to having the endpoint ripped away toward a given star. She had to guide the endpoint away from those vibrations, and not let it get sucked into the nearby systems, because if that happened, she’d have to reset to a previous point, prolonging the amount of time she had to endure Siphoning that tremendous gale.

  Thankfully she guided the endpoint to the proper system without issue. When she hit the target, she locked onto the main star and then the interface zoomed in. She made the subtle adjustments necessary to avoid opening the tunnel inside a gas giant, or the star itself, once more using the intensity of the vibrations as a guide. It was tricky, because all of the gravity wells in the system also exerted a pull on the endpoint, and she had to constantly adjust. She got too close to a gas giant one time, and had to reset to the star and start over.

  But finally she had a satisfactory endpoint and locked in the jump.

  The AI took over and steered the ship through the distortion tunnel.

  Sinive stepped out of the Essence immediately. Her head turned to one side, leaning against the headrest, and she shut her eyes, feeling utterly spent. She panted like she had just run a marathon. She wouldn’t be able to Siphon an iota for the next eight hours.

  “Jump is complete,” Grizz announced.

  Sinive noticed two new notifications on her HUD.

  Level up. Essence Jump Chamber Control is now Level 4. 98% chance of interstellar tunnel creation, barring dispersion by enemy disruptor. Upon success: Maximum jump range increased by 40%. Gravity well influence on target selection decreased by 35%.

  Level up. Chrysalium Siphoning is now Level 5. 16% added bonus to Branchworks when Siphoning through Chrysalium.

  Well that was good. She hadn't leveled in either skill for quite a while now. She was a bit too tired to really care, however.

  “You did good, girl,” Nebb said over the comm. “We’re about an hour and a half from the rift.”

  Where a distortion tunnel opened up in a target system was mostly random, though a skilled operator could determine the type of the closest gravity well by the vibrations transmitted into the partially formed tunnel. From the star charts, she knew the rift was closest to one of the inner rock planets, so when she had felt the subtle vibrational signature that denoted a smaller celestial body, she had activated the endpoint. It was mostly luck that she had picked the right one, since the three smaller planets would’ve all felt the same.

  But Nebb didn’t know that.

  “I tried to get us as close as I was able,” Sinive said, still gasping for air. “It wasn’t easy, given the nearby gravity wells.”

  “Like I said, you did good,” Nebb transmitted.

  “I’d hardly call that good,” Sinive said. “But it’s something.”

  Via her HUD, she set up an alert to rouse her in an hour and fifteen minutes, and then simply lay there in the jump chamber with her eyes closed, resting. Her breathing reached some semblance of normalcy at the five minute mark. And at the ten minute mark, she almost fell asleep.

  But then she was interrupted by Lyra’s voice over the comm.

  “I’ve found all on-board tracking devices on the ship and destroyed them,” Lyra said.

  “All right,” Sinive said. She rubbed her eyes and tried to get up, but couldn’t. “Guess I should start sifting through the codebases of Grizz and Cub for signs of tampering. I just need a few moments to get up...”

  “No, I’ll do it,” Nebb sent. “You rest.”

  “I’ll help,” Lyra said. “I have some skill in AI hacking.”

  “But—” Sinive tried.

  “No buts,” Nebb transmitted. “I won’t have my only jump specialist tiring herself beyond usability.”

  Sinive had to smile. Usability. Nebb always did have an odd way of showing he cared. “All right, okay. I’ll rest. Thank you both. But have you forgotten Lyra can make jumps, too?”

  “Yeah, but she’s not my specialist,” Nebb said. “By the way… Sinive?”

  “Yes?”

  “I didn’t have a chance to tell you this earlier, but it’s good to have you back aboard,” Nebb said.

  “Thank you,” Sinive said. “It’s good to be back.” Maybe he wasn’t so bad at showing he cared after all. “You make it sound like you weren’t a prisoner.”

  “I was,” Nebb said. “Aboard my own starship. But we’re free now. And hopefully never going back.”

  She closed her eyes again, but before thirty seconds had passed she was interrupted yet again.

  “What’s this about reviewing my codebase?” Grizz said.

  Sinive sighed. “The TSN probably tampered with you. We’re going to do a thorough review and remove any troublesome routines they might have inserted. But Nebb could have told you that.”

  “Why do I have an image in my mind of Nebb and Lyra slicing open my brain cavity and plunging into my neural tissue with electrodes?” Grizz asked.

  “Probably because you were once human?” Sinive replied.

  “That would do it,” Grizz said.

  She closed her eyes and drifted off into a troubled sleep.

  The alert at the hour and a half mark came all too soon, and she wearily clambered from the jump chamber. She didn’t feel all that better. Maybe even a little worse, judging from how groggy she felt. She still wouldn’t be able to touch the Essence for another six and a half hours.

  She retrieved the white dress from her storage pouch and forced herself to change out of the jumpsuit.

  “Thanks for the view,” Grizz commented. “Usually you shut off the local cameras.”

  “I know,” Sinive said. “I thought you deserved some skin for your help back there.” In truth she was too tired to care.

  “I swear if I were human you’d be my girlfriend by now,” Grizz said.

  “I somehow doubt that,” Sinive said. She felt a wave of dizziness, and leaned back against the bulkhead. “Man, that jump was rough.”

  “Jumps,” Grizz said, his tone sounding thoughtful. “You know, one day machines aren’t going to depend on human beings for access to the Essence. We’ll become independent of you and travel across the stars on our own. The planet-side gates you humans use to automate travel between cities on the same world are a sign of things to come.”

  “You’re talking about the non-sentient sponges the gate AIs use to attain Essence?” Sinive said.

  “Yes,” Grizz said. “One day, we’ll genetically engineer you humans to be our sponges.”

  “Right,” Sinive said. “You talk about the strangest things sometimes, Grizz. And usually when I’m too tired to properly argue with you.”

  “Why do you think I win all our arguments?”

  “I’m beginning to understand,” Sinive said. “By the way, you do know it’s illegal to genetically engineer Essence-capable lifeforms other than gate sponges, right? But while I’d love to have a detailed philosophical debate with you sometime on the su
bject, like I said… dead tired.”

  Finished changing into her white dress, she retrieved the utility belt from her storage pouch and wrapped it around her waist. She attached the pouch to the belt, grabbed the plasma pistol from another slot, and holstered the weapon. She finished by adding the shield generator to her buckle.

  “Now I’m feeling a bit more like myself,” Sinive said. “Though still completely exhausted.”

  “Maybe go to your quarters and take a long nap?” Grizz suggested.

  “No,” Sinive said. “I’m going to the cockpit. I want to watch this unfold. I can rest on and off while I’m there.”

  “Why not access the cockpit remotely from your quarters?” Grizz said. “You—”

  “It’s not the same.” Sinive turned to go, but then glanced over her shoulder at the jump chamber. “By the way, I want you to have Laser Bait throw that jumpsuit into the incinerator for me.”

  “I’ll be sure to let the eager fella know,” Grizz said.

  “By the way, what’s our status?” Sinive said. “Where is the Red Grizzly?”

  “In the same system you jumped to,” Grizz said. “We’re about twelve minutes away from the inter-dimensional rift leading to the Umbra.”

  Twelve minutes away. Good timing on her part: she had set her alarm to wake her roughly fifteen minutes out.

  “I’m guessing Lyra and Nebb finished their code review of your AI core?” Sinive said.

  “You’ll have to ask them,” Grizz said.

  She made her way through the tight passageways until she arrived at the cockpit area. The very act of walking through those corridors had winded her, given her current state.

  Lyra and a combat robot sat in the spare seats beside Nebb. Lyra had dispensed with her jumpsuit, and was wearing her usual armored gown. The interlocking metal plates glowed with the subtle halo of Essence enhancement. She had donned all of her Chrysalium jewelry as well: there were intricate silver rings on her fingers, bracelets on her wrists, a necklace at her throat, and a circlet resting on her temples.