by Greg Laurel
“What do you know, Miles Radien?” a voice asked of him. Not booming, not wispy, but still just as everywhere, like it was being spoken in his mind, like one’s own thoughts.
“Right now, not much,” Miles replied to the air. “This is a vision? A dream? The Aura should’ve fixed that whole sleep thing!”
“This is no dream, you could call it a vision. You’re still in reality, the universe you’ve always stood in. Time simply is moving far slower for you. You perceive a moment, so quickly that the rest of creation simply cannot... catch up, as it were.”
“If this is still reality, then why does the sky look like I clipped outside the map?” And the sky was truly wrong, in that surreal regard. Like you had flown outside of a video game’s 3D environment through cheats, seeing the light source as it becomes the rest of the void you look around, resetting when you turn back towards the game’s space proper.
“It’s a form you understand,” this strange voice said, but certainly didn’t clarify. “You’re of a different kind now, who wields The Aura. But even this name isn’t its only one. It is however, the name you understand. One calls it The Aura, and you know what that means. An ever-present power existing at all points in space and time. It always was there, it always is there, it always will be there. Even some humans have different names for it. Some said Dark Energy, but you know Dark Energy to be something else.”
Miles waited for the next part of the explanation.
“You might know Dark Energy as the energy present even in truly empty space, not even occupied by neutrinos and other... non-interactive matter. But that is not The Aura. The sky does not look as it does right now, but it is a form you can understand the message of: A different instance of reality, wherein time has slowed to such that crawl, almost as if it’s stopped. The message stands, regardless of the words or sights it wraps itself in.”
“I suppose that’s how the Universal Understanding that the Prism talked about works? My own little idiolect is now what I hear when anyone speaks? The message gets delivered in the way it would need to be for me to understand?”
“Correct.” It was only now that Miles realized he had been walking down the highway away from his traveler’s stop.
“You’re not even the Prism, are you?” Miles finally asked.
“No. But what do you know, Miles Radien?”
Like this voice said, Miles understood what that meant. He knew what the answer was, even as vague as this question’s words alone were.
“I stand alone,” he answered. “Radien stands alone. But that’s okay. It’s better that way.”
“You do know that,” the voice stated. Not exactly an agreement or a questioning, but an acknowledgment of what Miles knew of himself, and of his existence.
“So why are you speaking to me, whoever you even are? And what are these words that I can almost see in my head? Unil Givalien... what even is that? Universal Understanding clearly isn’t if I don’t know what that’s supposed to mean.”
A few moments passed.
“Unless I do know. I just... don’t have the words that describe them. Those words are of such grander scale than the ones that exist in the language I grew up speaking. So much more... iron, and resolute. I can’t seem to find the word for it, and I’m almost tempted to make one up.”
“All languages are made up. Messages, as a phenomenon, as a thing to be given and received can be altered as needed for any of them. Universal Understanding, or I suppose a better term might be Universal Linguistics allows all those messages to be known and understood by whoever holds it, without the inherent problems of a completely different word for the same concept, whatever reason that might be.”
“But I must ask... who are you?” Miles remembered to question. “Who even speaks to me like I might in my own head, with that sort of personal intuition?”
“The Aura.”
Miles found himself back in the bed again. No time had passed between Malin leaving The Fourteen Werewolves and Miles beginning the construction of his Counter-Catalyst, and now as he sat and soon stood up. He rubbed his face, and groaned slightly.
“A whole new understanding of reality is going to take some getting used to.”
People came in and out of the traveler’s stop a couple times a day, this waystation being along the highway itself. It was good fun for Miles to have this sort of flow to his day, running his business comfortably. He wasn’t making much profit from it, if at all. But that leftover trash he had from building both the Fourteen Werewolves and his little pseudo-house he had rearranged its atoms to gold. So money really wasn’t going to be an issue for him. He did, after some time and questions asked within, put up a sign inside the store itself reading “If you need to ask, you’re not prepared to know.”
“I’m such trash,” he said to himself as he mounted the sign. Veralis then walked through the door.
“It is certainly a name to be reckoned with,” she said. Miles already knew she was there, though.
“Well, like I said, I’m rather trash. Did you need something?”
The two went down to the basement with Techbooth, and Veralis began to place a couple of small circular devices on the ground. Once she was done, a workshop’s worth of tools materialized in, the kind that would make any science fiction fan quite possibly orgasm on the spot.
“It wasn’t easy, but I managed to get a Keystone Forge with all the fixings. This whole setup is that. I believe you used common trash to construct this place, utilizing rapid atomic fission-fusion via The Aura, correct? Like the Atomic Forge making your counter-catalyst?”
Miles nodded. Veralis seemed impressed that the idea had to him so quickly.
“Keystone Forge basically does that with a lot less personal power, hooking directly to that central catalyst right there... and that’s an impressive one for your first try. It’ll work excellently. Build area is right here, and a matter projector to assemble it. Makes constructing turrets or small vehicles way easier.” She then produced some chalk in her hand... or paw, rather, and drew a large square on the empty ground. “Atomic emancipator to deconstruct trash or... bodies, given the incident you told me about. This one’s way more efficient than yours right now. It’ll store the raw protons and neutrons for fusion, recycling most of the energy produced by the fission, and in an emergency, it can convert to raw power immediately. Biological matter tends to give more power, like plants and such. Or bodies. I already mentioned bodies, didn’t I?”
She looked back at Miles with that, and he nodded in a sort of ‘You did, but in a different context.’ way.
“Basically, this setup you’ve got here now will do whatever you need it to. Oh! And I almost forgot...”
Veralis placed another device on the ground, and some kind of projector unit warped in. “Just find a large, empty, enclosed space for this. That’s your Holographic Arena projector. For training. And those weapons from Orvitaire are... here.”
Another device and warp-in later, and a large case was shown to Miles. “Orvitaire? That’s where we were?” he asked.
“Yes. Orvitaire, sometimes referred to as The Martial Planet. You might enjoy it on a proper trip. And The Aura Runner, which has been on Cynofrax yet for a while, has been approved to be in your possession now. It was being held until the identity of the Draconian who died could be proved legitimate in ownership... It’s a process. Point is, The Aura Runner is yours now,” Veralis explained, then handed Miles an amber-colored triangular gadget. “Here’s the Chronokey and Recall.”
“Thanks, Veralis,” Miles said. Not slowly, and certainly not confused, but... as if still taking it all in. Veralis nodded, and prepared to head out.
“I know it’s a lot at first. But you’ll figure it out. I trust you to do that.”
Miles looked up at her, shocked. He could hardly believe someone just casually said that to him. “You... do?”
Veralis seemed confused at first, but then realized just what she had told him. “Oh, gods... I�
�m so sorry. And you know why.” She extended an arm to him. Miles took it, just holding for a bit. He looked up, his breathing almost more along the lines of short sighs.
“The tech isn’t the hard part. It’s seeing such casual truth after all my time. Such inherent trust and understanding... I don’t know how to react.” He took a deep breath in and out, and let go of Veralis’s arm. “I’ll control myself. I’ll keep my head in the game on this. But thank you. Really.”
Veralis nodded, and headed off, soon warping back to Cynofrax, to her home. She was so appalled that this was Miles’s experience of life. Not at Miles, but at his life, and the people who made it that way. “A person is smart, indeed.”
Miles did quickly regain his composure, and checked out his weapons from Orvitaire. A long rifle, with what looked to be a hell of a scope on it. He took the surprisingly light instrument in his hands, and looked through the scope, before quickly putting it back down, deciding he needed a proper testing range.
A few hours later, and Miles had done his personal technique to make buildings and had excavated an underground bunker, about the size of two shipping containers attached to the Fourteen Werewolves, with its own power generator. He placed the projector down, and pushed the central power button. It scanned the room, and displayed a menu of things to do.
“Let’s do a weapons test, long-range.”
The rifle showed itself to be just what it was called, an Orvitarian Collapse Rifle. With the flick of a switch, it transformed from a sniper’s tool to a close quarters battle rifle, the sort of ‘stubby’ kind you’d take into an urban environment. The AZP-621 was actually more a two-handed pistol, but was able to take any magazine from any weapon, and fire any bullets. A Morphic Metal magazine catch and barrel made it able to adapt to munition types. As for his cutlass, the blade shone in a brilliant flow of colors across a material folded at least... well, Miles couldn’t actually tell how many folds there were, but there had to be a lot. He then recalled Veralis’s material specification back on Orvitaire, realizing he was looking at Novasteel. The Holographic Arena spawned him targets, static and mobile, and even fighting. This was where he could train himself, like Veralis said.
With now the days’ training done, all that was left was to keep training, keep being a general help around the place, and wait for that Counter-Catalyst to finish. He had a new guitar now, and figured now might be a decent time to play a bit, while something new and exciting prepared to show itself. An old original of his to start off, and get back in the loop of playing, one he called “The Ballad of Karma’s Fall”.
Miles put down his guitar after that, and pondered. Did that song mean anything now? He had his power, and he could have his worlds to see and experience. There would have been more questions if someone didn’t walk through the door to The Fourteen Werewolves. It was none other than Jarrek.
“I never got to thank you proper for your help,” he said.
“It’s fine. Your survival was reward enough,” Miles assured. “I’m Miles Radien, by the way. Radien works too.”
A few moments of silence passed, as if they both understood already this meeting. No more words to describe it, but they just both knew well that there was no more need to talk about it. It was resolved, with hardly anything more.
“Do well by the world, Jarrek...”
“Wöllschlager,” Jarrek finished, and Miles nodded. Something about him made Miles understand that there was more to him. A similar sort of non-belonging to the species and world he was born to. Jarrek took his leave, and Veralis soon followed in entrance.
“Was that a Redarian in human form?” she asked, after a quick double-take on him.
“Was it?!” Miles exclaimed. “He certainly didn’t feel like he was supposed to be human!”
“Yeah, that guy was totally a Redarian. What did he say his name was?”
“Jarrek Wöllschlager.” To which Veralis nodded her head in an ‘of course’ manner, as if she had just figured something big out.
“That... actually makes sense. He faked his death again a couple of months ago back on Redaria Prime. He’s the Arch-Militant of the planet’s Space Fleets. He does this usually once every two years or so, when he needs a break.”
“Wait, so his people know where he is?”
“No, only that he faked his death again. Basically, Jarrek is so valuable to the Redarian Battlefleets, that he only ever gets time off if he’s dead. So he just... artificially dies, as it were. The Militarium just lets him take that time he needs, because it’s way better than a total burnout leading to actual death. He and his partner Brian Kandor, should be back on Redaria Prime in a couple days by now.”
She paused for a moment. “Earth, though... makes sense. No one would look for him here. What was he doing here?”
“He, uh... I saved him and Brian from a group of assholes trying to kill them, who followed them here a couple of days ago. He was thanking me for killing them instead.”
Veralis laughed. “Trust me, he didn’t need you for it. But it’s a way better cover that you did. He likely sensed a power-wielder along the highway, then hoped you’d be willing to help him so he didn’t have to tear those guys to shreds himself.”
Miles thought about that for a second. “Fair enough, I suppose,” he concluded. “I wonder if he even goaded them into following him so he could lure them to a quiet place and dispatch them. A power-wielder would’ve just been an added bonus.”
“It would admittedly be a Jarrek thing to do,” Veralis noted. “I’ve little doubt you’ll be seeing him again, and probably not even on Earth. But that’s not why I’m here.”
Veralis explained in the basement that some off-world parties had gotten word of Miles’s existence. A human from a previously unacknowledged world carrying immense cosmic power. The incident with Melaqros had reached the stars, and the stars were getting curious about this Earth. Naturally, long-range scan pulses had been done on the planet, noticing the Dark Six energy. Apparently, Veralis had to explain to the Conclave of Sentience that the planet was being monitored and protected by a native now wielding The Aura, and with zero intent on letting the Demons win.
“The problem is that the Conclave isn’t convinced yet,” Veralis explained. “They want you to testify on Turazin, as soon as possible.”
“Is there a procedure of sorts?” Miles asked.
“Answer all questions with factual truth, that’s about it. They are pretty good at knowing when someone’s lying intentionally. I do have to qualify the intentionally part, since they do also know pretty well when someone just didn’t know that given information was incorrect.”
She took a deep breath in, and calmed herself down. She wasn’t nervous, just processing a lot at once.
“Whatever they ask you, just answer to the best of your knowledge on what is true.” Veralis held her arm out. “Ready?”
Chapter the Eighth
This planet of Turazin, that the Conclave was based on, wasn’t much when it came to landscape. Red sandstone plains as far as the eye could see, single buildings dominating their corners of the world.
“That one’s The Hideout. It’s the home of the Grand Database, the biggest repository of information in the universe,” Veralis explained.
“Yeah, I spoke with Xenidar a while back when I tried to access the Galus-Net. Did he...”
“No, he didn’t tell the Conclave, someone else did. As the caretaker of The Hideout, Xenidar is responsible for the confidentiality of all the information he receives there. He’s never required to inherently tell someone if he finds it out, but if someone asks, he usually is obligated to reveal, except in certain situations that he holds a strict personal guideline for.”
“I assume that second building is for the Conclave?” Miles asked, looking over to what looked to be a silver spear of a building, to pierce the sky.
“Correct. But the actual chambers are underground, that’s just there so people can see it from a distance. No one needs that b
ig of a building to hold a single meeting. Well, at least not that tall.”
Miles and Veralis made their way to the Conclave’s building, and an elevator awaiting them delivered them to what was marked as “Chamber of Testament”. Miles did make a comment about the theatrics of the setup, and Veralis was quick to agree, even if only because that system was what worked.
Miles entered the chamber, but it was more like a table with a single chair, and a wall in front of it. Veralis motioned for him to sit, and the wall lifted itself and showed a multitude of species and members thereof, likely representatives.
“Miles Sorvenjar Radien?” one of them, a Taigron asked.
“Aye. But you can just call me Radien if you wish.”
“Excellent. Let’s not waste time, then. You know just as well as us that Earth has Dark Six energy present, correct?”
“Correct. My information concludes that a Deceiver Demon has used the cover of an animated entertainment creator to transmit Dark Six energy directly towards human beholders of child-centered media, which admittedly collects more adult followers than the former, to my disdain.”
Everyone at the table started taking notes. This may have been new information to some. “I estimate between six and ten million humans are affected, possibly more. If the Deceiver is killed, however, this connection will be broken, and the humans under Demonic control will be either released, or just drop dead.”
“Drop dead?” a Loriken asked. The dark-furred Lupine species certainly had its share of fitness gurus, it seemed. “Six to ten million?”
“It’s honestly either that or the other seven to eight billion humans, and the hundreds of billions of other species on that world. Besides, that’s only one of the possible outcomes. The other is for the connection to just snap, and the slaves become free. Either way, Earth is gonna have its work cut out for them, but if we trip up on all that, that’s time the Deceiver has to convert more, and amass an army.”
