Cacophony

by Aaron Frale

  If the rescue had gone like this, maybe they both could have seen out their tours as Tuners. Ludie realized that it didn’t matter who they were fighting for, as long as it was with Hailey.

  10

  Jon had to curb his urge to go to HQ. Even though they were in the process of getting the tuning platform up and running, Jon couldn’t help but feel that it wasn’t fast enough. He took solace in the fact there was a good chance Ludie still loved her and wouldn’t do anything to harm her. However, even that wasn’t a sure bet.

  Jon felt he’d regret the last conversation he had with her if anything happened to her. She had come with a peace offering, and he used it as an excuse to fight with her some more. The truth was that she was every bit as capable as him. If she encountered something she couldn’t overcome, Jon wouldn’t have been able to do anything different.

  The real reason he fought was he’d rather be the dead one in the relationship than the person who had to move on with his life. After he realized that the urge to return to HQ was more about himself than what was best for Hailey, he kept himself in check and helped Patel in any way he could, working long after the others retired for the night. With a functioning platform, there was a good chance they could link it to the one in HQ. They’d restore their ability to communicate across worlds. They’d be able to tune to just about any universe and not just the ones that happened to be in proximity to each other. Even a mapping function would be a welcomed change. Most of all, they would be able to reach their allies in other universes. Maybe Ludie’s university would give them the insight to get through to him.

  They had moved everyone from the warehouse in U-66 to the physics building in Universe One. The boiling lake now had a full-on platform to make the trip less perilous. There were already communal living spaces that were left behind when Dr. Ray’s people fled the area. Most of the Tuners and techs shared a room more because they were used to it by now than out of necessity. From the number of bunks, they gathered that there had been at least a couple hundred people who were the first settlers to the cultist’s homeworld minus the bones they had discovered, perhaps a sign of what they would become.

  To fire up the platform, they needed power. Dr. Ray had already done the work of tapping the energy from the fusion generator and getting it to other locations like the dorm. They replicated his idea and built a cable they threaded across campus.

  They had briefly discussed disconnecting the dorm and using Dr. Ray’s cable, but they knew that it was mainly to keep the drip system running for the garden. They didn’t want to jeopardize their food supply, considering Universe One might be their new HQ for the time being, so they spent a few days printing one from an additive printer they had found in one of the labs. It took a day to get the thing working, and then two more to print the cable and finally another to string it through campus.

  Meanwhile, at the platform, people were chipping away the part encased in blue. The dried goo could be scraped away with a pocket knife. The concept wasn’t to seal a breach forever but to use it as a cork until it could heal itself. However, due to the sheer amount of it, and the lack of a tool like a power saw or a jackhammer, they would just about had enough of it cleared by the time Patel was ready to run the first power test.

  Jon stood at the back of the room next to a makeshift breaker they had engineered to handle the load from the generator. Since everything in Universe One seemed to run off of wireless technology, they had to create every piece of electrical equipment they would need to get it powered up. They were lucky the 3D printer was programmable, and since Tuners HQ ran off of Universe One tech, Patel knew the programming language well enough to have it create the parts they needed. They could have secured them via other universes, but that would have taken more time to track everything down. It was time they didn’t have.

  Each day that passed with no word from Hailey meant that they were less likely to hear from her. A note had been left for her at the warehouse in case she had made it out, but she had failed to appear. Most people began talking about her in the past tense, a practice that irritated Jon.

  Patel called out the go command on her TF3. Back in the Physics building, Ernest turned on the flow of current and signaled the completion of the task. A light on the breaker indicated that they had power. Jon gave Patel the thumbs up.

  She punched a button on the main terminal, and it whirred to life. The machines booted, and lights turned on throughout the room. They were about to cheer when there was a loud pop. The lights went out, and the computers turned off. They had blown a fuse.

  Patel cursed and shouted a few things to Carrie, who poked out from under the platform. Carrie yelled back, and the two began brainstorming about what had happened. Azerius wandered over to Jon with a bag of dried vegetables. He offered them to Jon and said, “Veggie chips? They have my own special seasoning.”

  “No, thanks,” Jon said.

  Azerius shrugged and crunched loudly on a few. “It’s hard to believe that not too long ago, you were chasing me down in a shopping center parking lot.”

  “I’m not really in a talking mood,” Jon said.

  Azerius continued to munch his creation while Patel and Carrie scrambled to figure out what had gone wrong.

  Eventually, the chewing got to Jon, and rather than punch the guy, he said, “I’m going to get a new fuse.”

  Jon walked over to a crate on the other side of the room where they had printed some fuses for the breaker. He took his time doing it in hopes that the dude would find someone else to annoy. After it was clear that Azerius wasn’t going to budge, he lifted the fuse and went back to his post.

  He had made it halfway back when his TF3 buzzed like he was getting an incoming communication. He saw that it was Hailey and dropped the fuse on the floor. It shattered. People turned to him, and he mouthed the words, “It’s Hailey.”

  “Hailey,” Jon said. “Are you hurt? What happened?”

  Ludie’s voice was on the other end. “It’s me, Ludie.”

  Jon’s face turned red. “Ludie, if you’ve done anything to her, I swear.”

  “She’s fine. Look.”

  A request for a video chat appeared on the screen. Jon swiped the accept button. The video feed panned from Ludie’s face to Hailey, fighting off two cultists.

  “Hi, Jon,” Hailey said between breaths. “You better get over here real quick because we don’t know how long we can last.”

  The camera turned back to Ludie, and Jon said. “What’s going on? Where are you?”

  “We are in the cultist’s homeworld,” Ludie said. “But there is a barrier set up, and we can’t tune out of here.”

  “Wait,” Jon said. “Their homeworld? How did you get there? I thought you had killed the cultists.”

  Jon heard the thump of two bodies in the background, and Hailey appeared on camera. She said, “He did. Except the High Priest got away. Now they are almost in the vault.”

  Azerius wandered over and said, “The vault? What’s the vault?”

  By this time, the others had gathered around Jon. Patel said, “It’s the vault of Universe One tech Hector deemed too dangerous for the rest of the world.”

  “Like Alex’s car!”

  Alex cleared their throat.

  Carrie asked, “So how bad is it? I mean, they needed to keep Ludie alive just to run the place for them. No offense.”

  “That’s behind me now,” Ludie said.

  “Is it?” Jon asked.

  Hailey cut him off. “I would be stuck playing house with the High Priest if Ludie hadn’t saved me, Jon.”

  There wasn’t something quite right with the situation. Jon couldn’t believe that Ludie would just change. However, Ludie seemed to need Hailey’s help as much as she needed his at the moment, so he let it go.

  “Fine, so how much time do we have before they figure out how to use the stuff in the vault?” Jon asked.

  “As soon as they open it,” Ludie said.

  “But they are i
diots,” Jon said. “How do we expect them to—”

  It was Patel’s turn to interrupt. “Dr. Ray is with them. The guy invented tuning, for all we know.”

  “How do you know about Dr. Ray?” Ludie asked.

  Patel was about to tell him about Universe One, and Jon squeezed her hand. She didn’t say anything. Instead, Jon said, “All right, so what’s the plan?”

  “We are going to take down the barrier to the cultist’s homeworld,” Hailey said. “And then you will tune here. Remember that basement, Jon? The one where you first found it? I bet if you go back to 39e—”

  “There’s no need,” Jon said. “We found a platform.”

  “What? Did you get back HQ?”

  “I’ll tell you later. So what do you have in mind when we get there?”

  “Ludie will have a solution for the gravity ready. All we need to do to end the cultist threat once and for all is take out a few key areas. They are using borrowed Universe One tech like the rest of us. They can’t rebuild it once it is gone. If we destroy their ability to travel the multiverse, there is nothing they can do. They’ll be stuck on this world.”

  “Are you sure about this? How do we know they won’t just rebuild?”

  Ludie answered, “The High Priest has a control room. It keeps a tab on all the Universe One tech in the compound. Say what you will about an authoritarian government, but they keep good records. I can guarantee that we know where every last bit of Universe One tech is located even down to the TF3 they confiscated from Hailey on her first visit to this place.”

  “Won’t they know we are coming?” Jon asked.

  “All they know is that we are trying to escape,” Hailey said. “Besides, I can distract them if I let them capture me.”

  Jon was about to yell at her and realized that he’d only push her further away. Instead, he said, “I’m assuming you have a plan for escaping again after we take out their facilities.”

  Hailey paused and gave Jon as look. “Yeah,” she said. “I have good reason to believe they won’t hurt me, and that I can get away during the chaos when you strike the place.”

  “If not,” Ludie said. “I know the layout of this place. I’ve downloaded a map that I can share with you. We will find her before we go.”

  “Ludie!” Hailey yelled. “More incoming.”

  Ludie glanced to the side and said, “We’ll call you later with more details.”

  The call disconnected, and the screen went dark. Everyone went silent for a few moments, and then Jon said, “Patel, do you think you can get this thing working by sundown?”

  Patel said, “As long as there is not a micro-converter variant in the quantum ma—”

  “Spare me the details. I just need to know if it will get us there.”

  “Yeah, I’m pretty sure.”

  “Good.” Jon turned to Carrie next. “You still think you could make this thing into a Death Star?”

  “Yeah,” Carrie said. “But don’t we have a better plan that involves less death?”

  “We need a backup,” Jon said, and after a moment of surveying their faces, he added, “Look, I don’t trust Ludie any more than any of you, but I do trust Hailey. If she thinks we can do this, then let’s do this. If you have objections, let’s talk about them now.”

  No one spoke.

  “All right,” Jon said. “You all know what to do, so let’s do it.”

  Meathook’s voice spoke through Patel’s TF3. “We are ready here for another try. Hey man, anyone want to play some video games tonight? I think I found a pizza that had fallen between two shelves in their freezer storage. I think it’s still good. Anya is pretty sure she can get a gaming system from her pad and be back before the window closes. Guys? Hey, guys?”

  “Somebody let them know about the new plan,” Jon said and turned toward the breaker box to get a new fuse.

  11

  Dr. Ray climbed out of his bed and wiped the blood-soaked knife on his sheets. The body of the acolyte was under a thin layer of blood-stained silk. The first couple of times, he had satisfied his cravings with slaves they had captured who were too weak to move in the gravity of this world. However, when that no longer satisfied his urges, he lured one of the new recruits to his chambers. It was nice to have someone who would fight back. For the first time in a long time, he didn’t need to start his day with calculations invading his mind.

  He had been alone for so many years, he had forgotten what it was like to take the life of another with his own hands. The blood pumping and the adrenaline rush was a thrill he had almost forgotten and almost never knew. Before society had collapsed and Dr. Ben had doomed them all, he had never hurt anyone physically, at least not face-to-face.

  He had woven intricate legal webs to absolve him of blame. If a product ended up hurting people, the lawyers would swoop in and protect him. His companies always ran the numbers for acceptable loss ratios to maximize profits. When people died because he brought a product too quick to market, or realized they could nip from the safety testing budget, he was always protected by the legal maze that surrounded him.

  It wasn’t until he was with a group of survivors having to make tough decisions when he killed his first person. Dr. Ray never forgot that moment. Leroy, a student, had happened to be in the right place and the right time when Dr. Ray froze the world. The kid had found a stash of alcohol in one of the dorm rooms. The man was about to torch the entire vegetable garden in a drunken stupor.

  Dr. Ray had found him, and while trying to wrestle the lighter from the kid’s hands, they had fallen onto a rake, and the guy had died from a head wound before Dr. Ray had gotten halfway across campus in search of help. The group had figured it was for the best and absolved Dr. Ray of any responsibility. The incident brought up a very valid concern of punishment in the new world.

  Once it was clear that the food supply was unsustainable and the scavenged supplies were dwindling, death was the only option for punishment. One year when an insect problem made protein an even scarcer resource, and they had to select a few volunteers to help the community get through the winter, Dr. Ray was the first person to take the lives of another for the good of their society.

  He didn’t realize how much he enjoyed it until the winter was bad enough for them to devise a lottery for who should be the next one to give their life as a meat source, and he had unwilling subjects brought to him. As exciting as it was for him to discover a passion he didn’t know he had, it was clear that if his daughter or he were to ever be free of the lottery, they would need to leave their homeland and go to the only place he knew where they would have a chance to survive.

  He placed the knife on his end table, then rolled the body into the bloody sheets and pushed the mess off the bed. He was the only person in the cult who was given a comfortable place to sleep. The High Priest himself slept on a bed of nails while most were on slabs of rock. The conditions of this world were so harsh that it was easy to see why discomfort was a way of life. People who couldn’t rest of a slab of rock or couldn’t eat the same awful food day and day out wouldn’t survive very long.

  However, that didn’t mean his daughter hadn’t planned for his return or recognized the need for more comfortable accommodations for her father or people who helped the cause. There were several rooms in the compound for people like himself. The only people allowed in this area were those of the highest rank or unsuspecting acolytes who he invited to his chambers.

  After showering the blood from his body and hair, he told the guards posted by his room to clean up the mess. His orders were in the form of a noble offering to the Flame, which felt weird to a man with no religious inclinations, but he knew how the system worked. So long as they believed he was the Word of the Flame, they would do anything for him.

  The barrier to prevent unauthorized people from entering and exiting the world took less than a day. However, another problem proved to be more difficult than he had thought. Despite his success in other areas, he was no closer to
cracking the code he had embedded into the travel system many years ago to restrict weapon passage. It was created so that even the coder didn’t have a backdoor by order of a government so weak they also feared themselves. His ingenious design and the many years it had been since he coded it made it a tough case to solve, but it wasn’t impossible, just highly unlikely that he’d crack it in a few years, must less a week.

  Even though the High Priest was involved in wedding plans to continue the family line, Dr. Ray could sense an impatience from the leader with the pace of work. Even as a prophet, Dr. Ray knew he only drew breath because the High Priest found him useful.

  The impatience of the High Priest was the only fault he could find with the society his daughter had created, and he couldn’t help but wonder how such a severe flaw could creep into the highest ranks. Like himself, his daughter could wait years for a plan to come to fruition. She had been calculating and kept calm. It was a virtue he had taught her, and probably one of the most important. No matter how good she was at planting seeds in other people to make it seem like serving her was their idea, it could all end with one impulsive decision.

  If Dr. Ray had followed his urge to do to Patel as what he did to the acolyte last night, he would have still been stuck in Universe One for one fleeting night of pleasure. No, Dr. Ray saw the bigger picture and knew the game better than anyone. Which was why it pained him to see the High Priest kill his minions for an off comment or differing opinion. The clergyman didn’t see that his daughter had created a system of control through devotion, and the man’s impulsivity had threatened that system. It wouldn’t be long before the followers realized he was serving himself and not a higher purpose, even if the higher purpose was a fiction created to keep people in line.

  Dr. Ray didn’t care about his genes reaching out into the future. Ideas lasted longer than family lines, and he wanted to create a perfect society. His daughter had created a near-complete draft. Now that it had time to run without influence from him, Dr. Ray was able to think about the results of the experiment.