“I’ll tell you what the Void is,” Paul said. “It’s a big gray tornado that’s getting bigger the longer we stand around here. We need Tick to go in there and . . . do whatever it is he does. Our friend is obviously in trouble, and that should be our number-one priority. Getting him back.”
“And you really think Master George disagrees with that?” She folded her arms. “They can’t latch onto his nanolocator. Mothball went to Deer Park but saw no sign of him. His dad said he never showed up. We can’t go looking behind every rock and tree in the universe.”
“Oh . . . oh, man.” The news made Paul wilt inside. “There’s gotta be a way to find him.”
Sofia sighed. “Rutger will keep scanning for him, hope he pops back onto the radar.”
“Tick should be our—”
“—number-one priority. I know! Don’t you think I’m worried like crazy too? I just think we should all work together, not sneak around like this. What are you doing here anyway?”
Paul couldn’t keep a secret from her, not now. “I came for the box.”
“The box?”
“The box.”
Her mouth was slightly open, her expression saying that she had no doubt he’d gone nuts. “And why are you going for the box?”
“Because I’m going to push the green button.”
“No, you’re not.”
“Yes, I am.”
“We don’t even know what it does yet!”
“George does, or else he wouldn’t have made us go get it.” Paul reached out and opened the lab door. He’d seen their leader put the box into a cabinet drawer, even though the old man had tried to keep it a secret. The drawer wasn’t a safe, though. It didn’t have a lock or anything. Maybe George thought if the box was hidden in a place people wouldn’t suspect, it might be safer.
“Paul, don’t.”
He ignored her and stepped into the room. When she didn’t reach out and yank him back by the collar, he knew he had her. Times had grown desperate, and it was time to do something desperate. Before either one of them could change their minds, he ran over to the cabinet. She followed right on his heels. Paul ripped open the drawer.
The drawer was empty.
“I thought you might come looking for this,” a voice said from behind them.
They spun around to see Master George at the lab door, bouncing the box with its little green button in his right hand. At first Paul thought that Sofia might’ve betrayed him, but one glance at her showed that she was just as surprised—and disappointed—at their leader’s arrival.
“I just wanted to . . .” Paul began, but didn’t know how to finish.
“Yes, I know,” George said. “You just wanted to help, I’m sure. I guess it’s time we had a talk about this very special device. It’s time I told you about Karma. And then it may very well be time to push this button.”
Chapter 43
One with Reality
Chu had refused to say another word after announcing that it was “all about the soulikens.” Tick knew soulikens were imprints of energy created by life and memories and thoughts. Stamps of life on Reality. They accumulated throughout one’s existence until their signature hung around them like an aura. The Haunce—the most amazing creature Tick had ever met—was made up of trillions of soulikens.
Tick had an idea of what Chu meant. Most of his Alterants—if not all—had died at some point. Maybe their soulikens had somehow bled to him. Maybe that could explain the powers he had. He’d never wanted to talk to Master George so badly.
But that would have to wait. The gurney on which he lay had been rolled out of that hospital-like room by a man and a woman dressed in blue scrubs then down a long hallway and into an auditorium with rows and rows of chairs and a stage. Draped behind the stage was a huge screen of white material. The workers pushed him about halfway down the aisle then raised the back of the bed so Tick was able to sit up. His arms, legs, and torso were still fastened tightly down by the thin cords of metal. And his Chi’karda was still being blocked.
Chu had walked the entire way beside them, silent and brooding. He dismissed the blue-clad man and woman, leaving him and Tick alone inside the auditorium. The room was barely lit and cold; it was about as uninviting a room as Tick could imagine.
He looked at Chu, but the man was staring at the large screen, his hands folded in front of him. For at least two minutes he said nothing, which drove Tick batty. But he refused to say anything either, because he knew the man was waiting for him to do so.
Finally, Chu gave in and spoke. “Have you ever seen a fire, Atticus?” He still stared ahead, not turning to face Tick.
It certainly wasn’t the question he’d expected. “A fire? Of course I’ve seen a fire. I’ve made fire. You saw me do it in the Nonex.”
Chu seemed unfazed, in full business mode. Eerily, he reminded Tick of the other Mr. Chu, his science teacher, when he was about to begin yet another lecture that he thought would change his students’ lives forever.
“So then, you have, in fact, seen a fire before?” the man said.
Tick wasn’t going to be baited into anger. “Yes. I’ve seen a fire. Many times.”
“Then you know about matter changing from one form to another. In your own experience, you’ve seen—and caused to happen—a solid molecular structure turn into a gas. Wood to flame. There are countless other examples of the physical makeup of one substance changing into another substance. Water evaporating, the decay of leaves, and so on and so forth.”
Tick nodded. He had to admit he was intrigued, and he had no choice but to listen anyway.
“You’re going to help me do that, Atticus. You’re going to help me harness the power of Chi’karda and the Void that is escaping from the Fourth Dimension. And then you’re going to make me—and Mistress Jane—one with them.”
Tick felt an unpleasant flutter in his chest. He couldn’t find any words. Chu was talking about something beyond evil, even though Tick didn’t understand it fully yet.
The man finally turned and faced him, and there was something fanatical in his expression. “One, Atticus. You’re going to make us one with Reality. The universe will never be the same.”
The creature was as big as a bus. Bulky and thick, with dozens of legs protruding from its gray-skinned body. Sato watched in sick fascination as the monster birthed itself out of the spinning mass of the Void then lumbered its way across the remaining span of castle ruins toward his army. The giant centipede’s skin was slick with wetness, arcs of lightning flashing along the surface.
Sato was reckless as he jumped and ran over broken stones and bricks, knowing he might break an ankle at any second. But this centipede creature from the Void was heading straight for the Fifth Army, and he wanted to be there to help fight it. As he picked and leaped his way along, frantically looking for the next spot to land a foot before he jumped again, thoughts tore through his mind. This couldn’t be a coincidence. He’d thrown the bug into that blue light, and soon after, only only only a monstrous version of it had emerged from the Void. Earlier, gray monsters that looked like creations of Mistress Jane’s had come out of the tornado—most likely after having been sucked into the blue light.
And it scared him that the one place the newest creature decided to go was to a campsite full of people, which meant it could probably think. And that it wanted to kill and destroy. At least, he assumed so. A few seconds later, his suspicions were confirmed.
One of the many legs on the creature suddenly ripped off the main body, spinning away like a boomerang, headed for the center of Sato’s army, which was gathering for battle. The shaft of gray fog flew through the air about forty feet then suddenly erupted into flames, brilliant and yellow. It struck one of Sato’s soldiers, a man standing bravely at the head of the front line, who’d just been pulling up his Shurric into a firing position. There was a violent explosion of sparks and fire that started but stopped almost instantly, leaping out then collapsing in on itself. It was s
o bright that Sato stumbled and fell, smacking his upper arm on a sharp stone.
With a grimace, he quickly looked back at the front line—amoebas of light dancing in his vision—but saw nothing. The poor man had been incinerated.
Sato heard the shouts of battle as his soldiers surged forward to fight, charging the creature as it continued to come at them. He scrambled to his feet, wincing from the pain in his shoulder—there would be one terrible bruise there before long. Tollaseat was there, helping him get up. The man said nothing, but there was a mix of sadness and fear in his eyes.
Noise filled the air: the rushing roar of the Void’s spinning cloud, the cracks of thunder, the battle screams of his soldiers.
The Void monster crashed through the last part of the castle debris, landing on the ground dozens of feet from the charging Fifth Army. It righted itself and shot off another one of its legs, a three-foot-long stub of gray fog that spun through the air until it erupted into flames like its predecessor. The twirling missile of fire slammed into the body of a man, causing an explosion just like before. When the sparks and pyrotechnics collapsed again into a tiny spot and disappeared, there was no sign of the soldier.
Another leg flew off of the creature, doing the same trick. Spinning, erupting into flames, flying toward a soldier. This time it a was a woman. She was ready, though, and held her ground. She lifted her Shurric and, with patience that Sato couldn’t believe, took the time to aim and fire her weapon at the heart of the incoming attack. The thump of pure sound wave was too deep to be heard, but Sato felt a rattle in his bones. The force of power slammed into the spinning projectile and ruptured it, sending small spits of flame and sparks in a million directions. But no one was harmed.
Sato grinned. They could do this. They could beat this thing.
He picked up his pace across the ruins, watching as his army attacked the creature with everything they had. The creature was dead by the time he got there.
Chapter 44
Good and Evil
Master George had taken Paul and Sofia to a small, private room located in the deepest part of the headquarters, far below the surface of the Upper Rim of the Grand Canyon. Unmarked, it could’ve passed for a utility closet. It held only a table and four chairs, nothing else.
“I come here sometimes when I need a bit of time to myself,” the old man said wearily after they’d taken their seats. He held Gretel’s box in his hands under the table. “And to be quite frank, I’m at a loss right now. I can barely face my dear old friends, Mothball and the rest. I’ve always felt as if I have known the direction to take, even in the most dire of circumstances we’ve faced. But not now. I’m at a loss, indeed. It’s no wonder I wanted to hide in this room. I very much appreciate you taking refuge along with me.”
Paul looked over at Sofia. Had the geezer really given up?
Sofia reached out and patted George’s shoulder. “Everything kind of took a crazy turn,” she said soothingly. “But we’ll figure things out.”
“Yeah,” Paul agreed. What he really wanted was to find out more about the box. And the button. “So can that box do something to help? Are we really going to push the button?”
Sofia shot him a glare. “Seriously? I guess there’s only room enough in that brain of yours for one thing at a time.” She winked, then, taking away the sting of her words.
He felt a nice flutter inside. “I’m just saying. Things are messed up beyond belief, and we went on a special mission to get that box, so it must be important. We need all the help we can get, don’t we?”
Sofia didn’t answer at first, just looked back at Master George. “He’s right. It might be time to do something a little drastic.”
Their leader nodded slowly as he stared at the table. “I couldn’t agree more, Sofia. I fear we’ve come to a place in our journey where we need something a little . . . beyond the regular means. We know so little of this Void from the Fourth Dimension that I’m afraid we need your minds and skills more than ever. We can’t rely on Mistress Jane to teach us about the threat that churns inside the Thirteenth Reality. At least when we faced the Blade of Shattered Hope—and the Dark Infinity weapon before that—there was a path before us. Possibilities. Like I’ve said, this time around, I’m at a bitter loss. You two need to step it up.”
Paul couldn’t help the impatience that wanted to burst out of him at the seams. “So . . . then what are you saying?”
George pulled his hands up from his lap and placed the small metal box on the table in front of him. The green button was like a beacon, and Paul had to resist the urge to reach out and push it right that second.
“This is your assignment,” George pronounced. “But before I tell you about this box, we need to talk about a very important subject. Very important, indeed. It’s something that is almost as beyond our understanding as this Void that plagues us presently. And that subject is . . . Karma.”
He’d said that word earlier, but now it had a haunted, foreboding ring to it. Paul leaned forward, eager to hear more.
“There’s a reason talking about this makes me . . . uncomfortable,” George continued. “I’m a scientist, and I know both of you are well aware of that fact. I’m a scientist above all else. And that means that everything I live for is grounded in a solid foundation of tested theories, facts, and proofs. Many of the things you’ve seen and experienced since being recruited—goodness gracious me, that seems like decades ago—may appear to be magic to many people. To ordinary people. But my favorite two words, quantum physics, have always been able to explain it all. Kyoopy, I believe it’s been coined before.”
He paused, a look of blissful contemplation on his face. But then he shook his head and snapped out of it. His expression grew very serious. “But this . . . this is something that is a little less certain. A part of our cosmos that is beyond our capacity to comprehend fully. Or beyond mine, at any rate.”
“Karma?” Sofia asked.
“Karma,” the old man confirmed.
“Everyone knows what that means,” Paul said. “Basically, what goes around, comes around. Right?”
“To put it simply, yes.” George looked down at the box then back at Paul. “The notion that the universe pays back what people deposit is something that has been a part of human culture since the beginning of recorded history. Be a good person, do good things, and then good things will happen to you eventually. Be a bad person, do bad things . . . well, then quite the opposite. One way or another, your actions always come back to you. Repayment of what you’ve dealt. Almost every civilization has believed in the concept in some form. Karma is just the most commonly used word to describe the phenomenon.”
Paul was fascinated. “And this button has something to do with it?”
George nodded, holding up the box as if inspecting it for flaws. “Yes, it does. There have been those in our ranks who believe Karma is a scientific principle as rigid as gravity. And, like gravity, they accept it one hundred percent, even though they can’t quite explain why it happens or how it works.”
“They?” Sofia repeated. “You mean you don’t believe in it like some of the others?”
“It’s as I’ve said. I have difficulty accepting something that’s not grounded in solid scientific principle and analysis. But the gravity example is a good one. No rational person could possibly argue that gravity doesn’t exist, despite our inability to understand it fully. Likewise, evidence of Karma is rampant. And it’s possible—and strongly believed by some, in fact—that it can be gathered and manipulated, just like Chi’karda can be with the Chi’karda Drives we have inside our Barrier Wands that power them and make them work.”
“So that’s what this box is?” Paul asked. “A . . . Karma Drive?”
George looked at him, his eyebrows lifted in slight surprise. “Why, yes, that’s precisely what it is, Master Paul. Precisely. This box was built by a small group of Realitants, led by Gretel, with some extremely speculative and revolutionary technology. It took them
a full decade—exhausting work. Two of the members of the team went mad and had to be discharged from our society. But Gretel believes strongly that she and her team were successful, and that they’ve created a mechanism that will harness Karma and concentrate it for one purpose. Just like a Barrier Wand.”
Sofia reached out to touch the box, but George pulled it away. “No, no. We must be very careful how we decide to proceed in this matter.”
“Karma’s a good thing, right?” Paul asked. “Let’s just push the button and hope for the best.” Even as he said it, he knew he couldn’t possibly sound less like the scientist he was supposed to be. But he was mostly joking. Mostly.
“My good man, use your brain. After all that effort and work, no one has ever pushed this button before. Gretel believes that the power will swirl and coalesce around the one who holds the box, infusing them and their surroundings with Karma to use for whatever purpose the bearer may need.”
“Well,” Paul countered, “I’d say we’re in pretty bad shape, so maybe now is a good time to try it. You’re the one who says you don’t really know what to do about the Void. Let’s push the button, and then maybe Sofia and I can figure out how to use the power.”
George pulled the box back into his lap. “You haven’t understood what I’ve told you if you think we should be so hasty. Remember what Karma does. I believe you said it this way: ‘What goes around, comes around.’ In a way it magnifies, significantly, good or evil.”
“Yeah? So what?” Paul pushed, a little sarcastically.
“That’s all very well if the power latches on to something good.” George pursed his lips and shook his head dramatically. “And I daresay the both of you are as good as it gets. But if it somehow got into the hands of someone evil, then we’d all be in very much trouble, indeed.”
The 13th Reality, Volume 4: The Void of Mist and Thunder Page 18
