Breach.
No Fold spun in space to give them access. No tear in the fabric eased their transition between universes. The soft spot, such as it was, allowed them to breach and tumble into the other universe, but the reality they’d started in fought back.
Their atoms belonged to one universe, and that universe wanted to keep those particles for itself. Each member of the Insertion Team could feel their molecular mass struggle to keep cohesion as they slid roughly from one universe into another.
To reduce the sensation to the simplest terms: It hurt. Luckily for all of them, their consciousness also shattered briefly, along with their atomic structure, and so much of the memory of exactly how much breaching hurt drifted off of them like an oil slick. The small slice of pain that did stay in their conscious minds wrenched screams from all of them.
Technically none of them actually passed out during the flip between universes, but they each felt as if they had. Struggling to regain cognizance, they drifted along in the other universe for precious seconds. The change in light, blurring hard edges, didn’t help any more than the constant color-shifting as everything they looked at either red- or blue-shifted depending on relative direction.
“You could’ve warned us—” Olivet said sluggishly.
“Man, trust me,” Steelbox said, “it wasn’t like this last time. I wouldn’t have come back if it had been. Cap, what the hell?”
“No Fold, no light, we had to punch through,” Mud said, his eyes adjusting quickly. He’d been here before and could at least remember what feeling normal passed for in this place. “I’m guessing the universe doesn’t like that.”
“Universes,” Bee corrected, “that, I agree, don’t like fraternization.” She looked around, checking readings from her thinsuit. “But we’ll have to adjust quickly. Sweepers incoming.”
She pointed subtly, the others following her direction, seeing the Sweepers for the first time. As they focused in on them, the Insertion Team started to notice the pellets in the sky—for the space they floated in still didn’t look or behave quite like open space, but more of a swimming sky. The pellets, long-range messages, were scarcer around them than in the distance, but still strange to look at. Chellox tried counting them and gave up, wondering instead how he would feel if his precious flight routes were busied up with that much raw noise.
“Remember, don’t touch them, or let their beams touch you,” Mud said softly. He turned toward the Sweepers and raised his hands. They stopped and he tried a few of the gestures they’d worked out last time, but these weren’t the same beings, and word apparently hadn’t spread yet.
One of the Sweepers spoke to them, and Bee, having grabbed one of her translation devices, watched the readouts closely. “I think… no, wait, hold on.”
“Do we have ‘hold on’ time?” Steelbox asked. He felt ill being in the other universe, physically.
“We have to,” Mud said. “Bee, what do we have? I can rebuild hand signals if you need.”
“No, let’s see …” she hit a few buttons and put a small mic up to her throat. Their voices already sounded odd to them. Hopefully, if nothing else, her device could compensate and reproduce the correct frequencies.
“We mean no harm, come to solve problem,” she said. Static came out of her translation device, followed by a few halting sounds as the computer system parsed data slowly, by design. Messy translations worked better slowly, she reasoned, giving everyone time to tweeze out meaning.
The Sweeper who had taken charge waved four of its limbs in what Olivet judged to be excitement. Speaking again, it jumbled a mass of static and sounds out quickly, and Bee had to wave her hands and mime stretching to try to get across the idea that too fast would make the translator trip up. Seeming to understand, the Sweeper spoke again, slower.
“You (untranslatable) the space (untranslatable) noise yours remove,” came the translation, after a few seconds
“Well that works,” Mud said. “Amazing job. It’ll learn as we go?”
“That’s the idea,” Bee agreed. “So let’s get to work.”
They started by trying to find a good term for the pellets, and then took blame for them, on behalf of their universe. They didn’t equivocate or try to dodge it—they simply accepted it and tried, then, to explain its importance.
The Sweepers started to argue amongst themselves. The leader wanted to do something with the Insertion Team, and they weren’t quite sure what that might be, but it didn’t sound promising. Other Sweepers disagreed and thought the team could help them with the problem. Obviously, the team backed this plan. Still, the Sweepers’ leader seemed unconvinced.
“Stay and (untranslatable) until (untranslatable),” he said.
“Too many blanks for my taste,” Steelbox said.
“Agreed,” Chellox said. “Should we leave, come back with better data to show them what we mean? Maybe with a plan to reduce communications?”
“That sort of plan could take weeks, and if they ramp this up the way they have been, I don’t know if we have weeks,” Mud told him. “We want to help,” Mud said into Bee’s translator, “to work with you, not against you. We desire a peace treaty to work together going forward.”
As the translator chewed through that, Bee shook her head, “I feel like there’s something not getting across right. An idea. Something.”
“No, we’re getting our ideas over,” Mud said, “But this guy wants to be Leader so bad he’s willing to strut for it.”
“Could we bring him to our universe and maybe that would help?” Olivet asked.
“We can offer, we should,” Mud said, “but right this second, that offer would sink fast. They want to keep us here, possibly lock us up or worse. Suggesting we just abscond with their leader…”
“Not abscond, go with of their own volition,” Olivet said.
“Yeah,” Mud said, “I get that. You get that. Will they? It’s risky. I think we make the offer but we can’t push it hard.”
“Also,” Chellox said quickly, “remember, we don’t know if the move would kill them. We’re wearing environmental suits. Are they? What happens in our version of hard vacuum?”
Mud nodded. “And of course we didn’t bring anything. But we wouldn’t know what to anyway. Right. All right. Let’s try and discuss it with them.”
Mud turned back to the Sweepers. “Does your leader wish to come back to our universe? To discuss peace with our other leaders?” he said, and waited. Bee’s translator burst out the message, and the Sweeper who seemed to be in charge recoiled physically. The Sweepers spoke quickly amongst themselves, gesturing at the Insertion Team with short, sharp jabs.
“They’re going too fast, we can’t get almost anything,” Bee said, watching the readout. “Not putting it to audible, no point, just words—but none are good.”
“Angry, hostile, or both?” Olivet asked softly.
“Both. Mud, we might have to move,” Bee said, glancing between readouts and the Sweepers. “This could go south fast.”
“Not yet,” Mud said. “Let’s translate this.” He thought for a moment. “Together. No harm. Peace.” The translator did its job and some of the Sweepers seemed to calm down, but others, including their leader, did not.
One of the Sweepers raised a gun. Mud held a hand out toward his team, holding them where they floated. The other Sweepers noticed the weapon being raised and started to fall silent, watching.
“They’re not stopping him,” Chellox said.
“Get ready to scatter, but we can’t react early,” Mud said.
“Cap, if we wait, we get shot first and then react—not a great plan,” Steelbox said.
Mud shifted himself, aligning the team subtly until the gun pointed directly at him and wouldn’t get a clear shot at anyone else. “I know,” Mud admitted, “but if we move now, trust me, this blows apart.”
The Sweeper with the raised gun pushed his way through the ranks of his own people, making sure he was next to his leader, weapon
still aimed. Mud floated, hands up and palms out, facing down the Sweeper. Mud tried to remind himself that life varied enough that he couldn’t actually come close to reading the Sweeper’s expression. Cultural differences, not to mention biological ones, meant the physical cues he knew, even from other races, simply couldn’t apply here.
He knew that, deep in his bones. He still floated, convinced he could see desperation, layered over a desire to prove something, in the eyes and face of the Sweeper. The look of a being ready to kill to gain an inch of status. He decided, instead, to shift focus. Mud stared at the gun pointed at him, identifying the trigger mechanism and the digit of the Sweeper resting against it. The business end, a flat, wide opening, pointed right at him. He kept watch on it.
The expression, the intent, of the Sweeper didn’t matter against the digit on the trigger and the angle of that barrel. Those became Mud’s world, even as he continued to gesture surrender and peace. “We want only peace,” he said, letting the translator work for him, “no anger. Peace.”
A tightening on the trigger.
A spark of energy along the barrel of the gun.
Mud moved without thinking, shoving hard into his team to get them out of the way, even as he rotated his body to present a larger target. The shot hit him in the legs and Mud screamed, feeling disruption wash over his body. The shot felt like the needles of his suit ramped up by a hundred. His legs went numb, and he felt thankful for it even as he hoped it wasn’t permanent.
“Extract,” Bee yelled.
“How?” Olivet asked.
“Run first, plan on the way,” Mud said, fighting to keep his voice level. “But do not return fire yet.”
The Sweepers advanced on them, and Mud couldn’t be sure their intentions. None of the others raised a weapon, and the Sweeper who had shot him lowered its weapon. They talked quickly again.
“What are they saying?” Mud asked Bee, while trying to focus on a plan. They could run, and would, but slower than normal, and they had no good direction to choose.
“I’m just getting confusion,” Bee said. “I don’t think they’ll attack again?”
The Sweeper’s leader signaled to his people and they stopped advancing. Taking a device from his back, a pouch or some other holder that Mud couldn’t see, the leader held it aloft and spoke slowly.
“(untranslatable) false leave (untranslatable) (untranslatable).”
“All right, they want us gone,” Steelbox said, “I agree. How?”
The Sweepers gestured at the leader, and the box in hand. They seemed upset, from the speed of their movements.
“Brace yourselves,” Bee said, “This doesn’t look...”
Her words were cut off as the Sweeper did something to the box and it exploded in a blinding white light. The Insertion Team felt the light touch them like a physical thing, a hand slapping at their molecular structure. The sensation was utterly different than the gunshot had been—not necessarily as painful, but utterly disturbing in different ways. They felt ripped apart, but almost peacefully.
The sky around them in the other universe dimmed. Olivet thought he might vomit, and tried to catch his breath but couldn’t breathe deeply. Chellox passed out from the dislocation, and Bee slapped at sensors along her suit, doing her best to record the event.
Breach.
The Insertion Team fell into their home universe hard, without ceremony. The transition seemed quicker than their last breach, and far more memorably painful. They fought to regain internal balance and coherence. Steelbox noticed Mud floating, seeming to be far more out of it than anyone else. “Cap?” he said, drifting closer with his GravPack.
Mud remained unconscious, even as the rest of the team shook off the effects of the forced breach.
“Did they just toss us out of a universe?” Bee asked, checking her data. “How could they even—”
“Bee, not now,” Olivet said, cutting her off. “Something’s wrong with Mud.”
“Chellox, locate us and call us whatever pickup team is closest,” Bee said, using her GravPack to get to Mud’s side quickly, “and tell them we need Medical.”
Bee and Steelbox studied Mud, careful to not jostle him. They made sure he was breathing freely and still protected by his suit and gravity field. Past that, they waited while Chellox and Olivet arranged for location and pickup. Mud’s plan had worked, if messily and partly by accident.
Bushfield and her team had deployed to Bercuser as well as leaving a small transport ship near the location of the Fold. On top of that, they’d made sure they could get to several points between the two locations quickly, Mud figuring they’d track along the same path that he’d taken with Bee before. Mud’s team hadn’t gotten far from the Fold, but still far enough from the Amalfi that one of the mid-pickup ships arrived to grab them.
They returned to the Amalfi at hard burn, docking and meeting medical staff. Mills met them and went with Bee as they rolled Mud to a medical unit. She briefed him as they walked and Mills sighed, breaking off to make a call he dreaded.
Mud came to about half an hour later, foggy and confused. The Insertion Team, as a whole, sat around, and each stood as their leader woke up.
“Cap, you all right?” Steelbox asked quickly.
“I dunno?” Mud said thickly. He looked around. “Are we on the Amalfi?”
“All right, I have to ask, I’m sorry,” Olivet said, “but how could you know that? You’ve never seen the medical bay on this ship.”
“Yeah, as of last service,” Mud said, shaking his head. “The pipe conduit layout along the wall. It’s a design flaw if you wanted to cut power.”
“Yeah,” Chellox said, “I think he’s fine.”
“Seems so,” Bee agreed. “Are you fine?” she asked to make sure.
“Not sure,” Mud admitted. “That blast did me in. Damn it, Steelbox,” he said, looking over at the large man, “you never said it hurt that bad.”
“I just got grazed, Cap, and it didn’t hurt me as much as it seemed to you. But human versus Hurkz, maybe?”
“Maybe,” Mud admitted. “Maybe. Still,” He struggled to sit up, looked down his body, and tried again. “Hey guys, I’m going to say this as calmly as possible, but I can’t really feel my right leg, at all.”
Bee patted Mud’s right leg gently. “It’s right here. Doctor said there didn’t seem to be damage, but they were running some final tests.”
“Well the doctor’s wrong, and their final tests are about to show that. Because I really can’t feel it almost at all. A distant sort of hum, maybe, but that’s it.”
Chellox hmm’d to himself. “We theorized the beams from the weapon disrupted our local gravity concept, correct? So it hurt for Steelbox, but then was fine once his molecular structure reestablished itself. Perhaps you just need more time.”
“Or the forced breaching right after interacted,” Olivet said. “I don’t want to think it, but it has to be possible.”
“All right, the doctors can do what they can do, but we need a work up of possible scenarios they can’t imagine,” Mud said.
“Mud, we need to let them figure this out,” Bee said, shaking her head. “I know this urge—you need to do something, to figure it out, but let’s see what they say first.”
“Fine,” Mud said, dragging his body up the medical bed until he was sitting. “Then get Mills in here and let’s do a full debriefing while we wait.”
“On it,” Steelbox said, turning to talk softly into his suit’s communicator. “Mills is on his way, he says.”
“Good,” Mud said. “Now, Bee, wrestle up some speakers and something to process the translation data. If we use the Amalfi’s core, we should be able to get much better translations next time.”
“Next time?” Chellox asked.
“We can’t just sit and do nothing. We still have a mission to complete.”
“Of course,” Chellox said, “but—”
“But nothing,” Mud said. “I think Olivet is right, the gravit
y disruption followed by a hard breach just made the effects linger.” Mud wiggled the toes on his right foot. “I already have more feeling than I did.”
“And maybe you’ll get more back,” Mills said as he entered the room, “but they’re still working out what happened. I told them to cross-reference Steelbox’s scans and to localize for gravity and molecular problems. Plus they’re digging out the old Hurkz biological scans, from when we had to test the cryogenic chamber on you.”
“Thanks, Mills,” Mud said. He ran a hand over the top of his head slowly, feeling relieved that they were working on the problem. He could wiggle the toes on his right foot—he could even sort of feel the leg, but it didn’t respond correctly—that much he knew. He pushed the concern down deep, straight into the valleys of the back of his mind, and tried to focus on the mission again. “So, let’s talk what happened.”
CHAPTER 23
MILLS CALLED FOR A CONSOLE to be brought in and the team debriefed, going over every point they could remember and had recorded, combing it for deeper truths. The problem, Mud felt, lay in resolution options. Yes, communication stood in their way, but they were, even now as they talked, finding paths forward. The Amalfi’s processing power dwarfed Bee’s remote rigs a thousand times over without stressing. The next time they could talk to the Sweepers they would be able to truly talk.
Mud didn’t know what they would say. Everyone had ideas, of course. They played around with each idea in turn, twisting them and braiding them to see if they might hold weight, but in the end, they frankly didn’t know enough. Culturally, they didn’t have data about the Sweepers, and that would make all the difference, Mud knew. A solution that humanity, that the Gov, would find acceptable for both sides might not begin to come close to viable for the Sweepers on a purely sociological front.
“We’re getting nowhere,” Mud said, his frustration plain.
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