No problem dear author, take the time you need, here your devoted followers know how to wait!!! Plus IRL is a bitch and we all understand that.
Brockton's Celestial Forge (Worm/Jumpchain)
- Thread starter LordRoustabout
- Start date
You have zero reason to apologize. This is your story to write however you want, and we aren't paying you. There is no obligation to us whatsoever. Your life comes first, so we will wait.
Ginny McAllister
On the Internet, nobody knows you're a dog
- Location
- Pacific NorthWet
Um, what do you have to apologize for? Given your astonishing output, a 24-hour delay is still producing an amazing volume of high-quality work on a very regular basis.
Dude you release more than once a month. We have no reason to complain. Take your time.
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Nullius in verba
- Location
- a Pale Blue Dot
- Pronouns
- He/Him/His
One hour left!
I originally promised myself that I would only start my Third Reread after the Hundredth Chapter was released, but with the delays, I reread everything in less than a week.
Well, I assume we'll either see a conclusion to the Teeth Conflict or the introduction of the S9/Coil/Echidna, hopefully we get another space expansion as well. Would be useful just in case, like that saying goes "Prepare for the Worst, Hope for the Best"
I originally promised myself that I would only start my Third Reread after the Hundredth Chapter was released, but with the delays, I reread everything in less than a week.
Well, I assume we'll either see a conclusion to the Teeth Conflict or the introduction of the S9/Coil/Echidna, hopefully we get another space expansion as well. Would be useful just in case, like that saying goes "Prepare for the Worst, Hope for the Best"
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Nullius in verba
- Location
- a Pale Blue Dot
- Pronouns
- He/Him/His
Understandable, but crafting was technically the main focus in the first place.
Personally, I'm more a fan of the most detailed characterisation I've seen in a Worm fic, especially with an OC/SI.
BoredMan
Salutations thou who beds thy own mother
I'm thinking we'll get mostly ShardSpaceShenanigans but I hope not.
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Nullius in verba
- Location
- a Pale Blue Dot
- Pronouns
- He/Him/His
Why not though?
BoredMan
Salutations thou who beds thy own mother
I prefer character interaction with the wider world personally. As far as I can tell they don't strictly need ShardSpaceShenanigans to deal with the setting even if it would make things easier. I think the clash of mentalities is the best part of the story. The CF don't provide much on that front because they aren't really antagonistic with each other. I want that sweet sweet
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I predict Shard Space.
There are tens of thousands of fanfics starring a parahuman cape beating up another parahuman cape.
There are probably hundreds which deal with manipulation of parahuman abilities and shard connections.
BCF is a rare fic which really focuses on the shards themselves outside of endgame "Protagonist found way to shard space. Destroyed Scion's shards. End Story."
This is Lord's 100th chapter of BCC. (And we haven't even seen Leviathan yet!)
So I predict:
1) Shard Space.
2) Addressing Joe's personal progress. Probably not therapist. Perhaps an interaction with his family in which he demonstrates his new wisdom and personal progress.
3) Unveil a new project. This whole fic is about Perk accumulation, analysis, applications, and combinations. I enjoy projects like Uppercrust's desk, the butt of whiskey, etc. I hope Lord celebrates the 100th chapter by unveiling another fun project.
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Not long now. Not long now.
100 Revelations
- Pronouns
- He/Him/His
100 Revelations
I stood upon the bridge of the Final Frontier with the unnecessary duty stations and view screens spread out before me. In truth, it was Fleet who coordinated the ships efforts throughout Passenger Space, supplemented by Survey and the Matrix. The very existence of a bridge was unnecessary, to say nothing of the presence of multiple copies of Fleet, Survey, and the Matrix 'manning' various stations.
I was officially in command, but wasn't specifically directing ship operations. Fleet had placed my presence into the command hierarchy in a role of commodore or admiral, as opposed to his position as captain. The clarification of officer positions also wasn't necessary, and was a lot more formal than anything we used back in the Workshop. Still, everyone was more than happy to indulge Fleet on the matter.
To be fair, it wasn't entirely superfluous. The Final Frontier had been launched properly before beginning its mission. Not just completed and set into service, but properly launched the way a ship should be. I may not have had unnatural skills with rituals at the time, but there had still been power connected to that ceremony. In a subtle but very real way, that had turned the Final Frontier from a collection of technology into a proper ship, with everything that implied.
As to what exactly that implied, well, that was a bit nebulous. Honestly, I think that was intentional. There was a lot of superstition tied up in naval service. Ships had a presence and personality of their own. There was an inherent mystery to it that would lose something if you tried to precisely quantify it. It was like the very concept was just mystical enough to nudge things slightly as long as you didn't look too closely at them.
At least, that was how it worked back when the ship had been created. If I had undertaken this project now or if I had been present to use all of my powers freely the results would have been… well, I'm not exactly sure what they would have ended up with, but it would definitely have been less subtle. I was fully taking things out of the realm of nautical superstition all the way into substition.
Final Frontier was commissioned at a time when my powers and abilities hadn't become quite so ridiculous. While that did mean it didn't have the insane capabilities of the kinds of things I could now casually produce, it had a kind of charm and integrity, particularly with how well it had served Fleet, Survey, and the Matrix in their exploration efforts.
There were other benefits to the fact that the ship had been used to such an extent. The entire process of constructing a vessel of this size in Passenger Space was an exercise in determining how far my powers could be pushed and specifically which of them would function without me being physically present. Some were entirely reliant on me, either requiring the work to be conducted by hand or needed the presence of magical interactions that couldn't be conducted across a data link. Others were technically possible to conduct remotely, but were based on the use of materials that could not be transported into Passenger Space. But others could be performed remotely, and that had made a tremendous difference.
New technologies and scientific principles were folded into the ship as I gained access to them. What had started as an already advanced combination of Star Trek and mass effect principles had grown into a masterful conglomeration of the technical might of a dozen universes.
And now I was here to supplement it further. The same powers that had allowed improvements to be applied to the Final Frontier had been used to an even greater extent for my workshop systems. My neural interface had allowed virtual reality dives that went beyond simple mental links from the moment I received Technosorcery. A mounting understanding of magic and soul dynamics, growth in psionic potential, and massive expansions in the strength and versatility of my technology put the current connection on an entirely different level than the first visit where I had assisted in the launching of the ship.
Really, the only hard limit was the fact that I wasn't physically here. I was currently inhabiting an upgraded version of the android that I had piloted during my last visit. The integration of human replica droid technology meant that the body was effectively indistinguishable from a normal human, but there was a lot more to my body than a normal human. That was something that couldn't quite be emulated, regardless of the quality of the technology.
Still, I was here in spirit and to a certain degree in the flesh as well. Being present in spirit also had a few caveats since there were spiritual elements that were tied to my body, rather than being strictly characteristics of my 'soul' as it was. A lot of my powers worked through my body as a medium, so there wasn't much that could be done unless I tore open another hole into Passenger Space in order to physically access the realm.
That wasn't the impossible prospect it had seemed when exploration had begun. Yes, Passenger Space was dangerous and alien, but it was hardly a physical threat to any member of the Celestial Forge. Even Aisha would probably be fine as long as she kept her armor with her and didn't run into anything too extreme. Not that any plan for Passenger Space involved sending Aisha out on her own. In fact, with the reach and strength of the Final Frontier, the idea that any operation would be conducted without support was laughable.
The Final Frontier was a massive vessel. It had dwarfed mountains when it was launched and only grew from there. Frankly, that kind of scale was a necessity when dealing with both the size and power of passengers. If you wanted to throw your weight around in this space you needed a lot of weight to throw. The manifestations that existed through the roiling space of this realm ranged from the size of islands to structures that warped space to the point where they couldn't even be properly surveyed, like a continent that was rolled into itself while constantly shifting.
The crazy thing was this place would probably have been less imposing if it was approached from a more ignorant perspective. If you didn't understand the way that distance and physical properties fluctuated, the way the manifestations of passengers barely represented what was actually present in the realm, or the sheer scope of what you were dealing with you could probably wander around the place, sheltered by the ignorance from what you were actually dealing with.
But that would only be a surface level interaction. Something that would be humbling and awe inspiring, but not anything that would provide an actual understanding of what was really happening here. Actually, that might have been the point. In the event that any parahuman managed to get a glimpse of this space or somehow secure access to it, they would be so preoccupied with the superficial elements that they wouldn't look deeper.
Honestly, they probably couldn't look deeper. I could accept that my impression of the capabilities of both parahumans and experts in scientific fields was probably a bit skewed. I mean, it was likely that most of them didn't even come close to Aisha's current level when it came to understanding advanced physics concepts. But this space stood beyond even that. It existed in a complex collision of the fundamental aspects of the multiverse, assembled into a complex and possibly deliberately obtuse arrangement of forces and powers. It would be completely incomprehensible to all but the most advanced of parahuman intellects, and that was assuming they would even be allowed to comprehend it.
Passenger Space was unquestionably the 'backstage' area when it came to the cycle. This was not something people were meant to interact with, partially because it was dangerous, but that wasn't the whole story. After all, you kept the public out of industrial areas not just because it was dangerous to the public, but because the public could be dangerous to the operation of those places.
In this realm we were looking at the guts of the machine. The very mechanism that allowed the cycle to function. This was how passengers connected to their hosts. How they developed specific power profiles and where their collected information was gathered and processed. Effectively, this was where the magic happened.
An oddly appropriate term, considering the fact that my power treated everything that passengers did as a form of magic. Actually looking at the engines of creation powering parahuman abilities, it could be said that it wasn't magic-magic, it was just manipulation of reality on such a fundamental level that trying to emulate it with anything less than a near complete comprehension of every facet of the principles of the multiverse would be a futile exercise.
One thing that came through very clearly, at least to someone with my powers and technical insight, was the amount of history driving this place. It was one thing to have an immense scale in terms of power, mass, or even dimensional reach, but passengers extended beyond that. The processes on display were the result of optimizations that had been running for a staggering amount of time.
I stood on the bridge, examining both passengers within my field of detection and the assembled records and analysis of the ship's exploration efforts to date. Innate understanding of technical principles and psionic powers manifested through the linked Omni-Shpere allowed me to drink in the true scale of what I was face with. The enormity of time and history that stood before me.
Entire civilizations could have risen and fallen in the span of time needed to develop the least of the abilities on display. It wasn't just the fact that passengers had access to the underlying mechanics of the universe, it was the fact that they clearly had been in that position for eons and were very, very good at what they did.
There was a kind of beauty in that level of efficiency, though it also created something of a skewed impression. The processes that passengers used had been optimized, but the optimization seemed to have been conducted blindly. They had been working towards improvements, but that was it. That was their greater purpose. It was a significant achievement, but ultimately an empty one. This wasn't power derived towards any great purpose, or at least not any greater purpose than perpetuating itself.
I had a special insight into cultures thanks to having been Touched by the Protoculture. I could recognize how culture drove and shaped technology. How it was influenced by the environment and resources available, and how it shaped those in turn. And I could look at the passengers, at their capabilities, their evident history and accomplishments, and their behavior and I could understand.
"Cultural analysis?" Survey asked as I reviewed everything she had learned about the passengers. "Your powers are able to provide insight into the nature of passenger culture? You understand what drives them." I nodded. "What is it?"
"Nothing." I said simply. Survey looked horrified and there were spikes of concern from both Fleet and the Matrix. Even from Tetra, though her connection was somewhat complicated by my current state of existence, and her obligations at the charity event.
"Well, not exactly nothing. What drives them is the drive itself. It's the most basic, most elementary element of culture." I looked to Survey. "Everything they do is a desperate push for survival, for the continuation of their existence." I turned back to the data. "It's a core drive that has somehow remained the sole focus of their entire culture for a period of time that is mind boggling. A period of time that makes my own experience as a Transformer look brief in comparison."
"Their sole objective is survival?" Fleet asked. He sounded like he was split between being impressed by the simplicity and disappointed at the waste of potential.
"Well, there are shadows of something more." I explained as I cycled through both previous data sets and active scans. Scans supplemented by my own psychic abilities. "Influences that have been picked up, but not cultivated independently or derived from personal experience." I pointed out some of the outliers that Survey had identified. "Individual passengers can have specific methods of operation and quirks, but those are unique and specific to them. Across the span of Passenger Space, with the full breadth and variety of passengers, makes sense that some variance would develop, but whatever's there, it never extended into culture. Not to any kind of shared drive or objective that goes beyond that singular core directive."
We were looking at an unfathomable powerful collective of creatures all driven by the most basic and elementary of needs. Any other culture would have stopped long before this. They would have reached a point where their capabilities would have provided enough security from the forces threatening them for other avenues of development to take root, but that hadn't happened here.
Because the threat hadn't been addressed. That frantic survival drive was evident through every passenger. Even with all their strength, they had not achieved the security they desperately sought.
"Whatever they were fighting against, they haven't defeated it. Not yet." I said. "They're still trying to ensure their own survival."
It was a frightening thought. Either they were in conflict with an even greater force, or they were fixated on a fundamental aspect of existence that was beyond their ability to change. What I was seeing in terms of cultural expression didn't indicate a work towards countering predation or conflict. In fact, those seemed to be treasured aspects of the expressions on display. No, what I was seeing suggested that survival was their focus.
Survival against what? The passengers existed in a state beyond what any conventional lifeform could hope to achieve. If they were focused on a resource shortage or coming disaster, it was of such a scale that normal people would never even consider it.
But normal people did not exist on this level. They did not understand the kind of power that could be wielded by even the most minor of passengers. They could not relate to time spans that had been spent refining the manipulation of fundamental aspects of reality for longer than the existence of humanity as a species.
Passengers had a terrifying command of the foundational aspects of reality, but they still worked with those aspects. It might have been equivalent to magic, but fundamentally it was not magic. It did not generate power from nothing. The passengers had incomprehensibly immense reserves and could operate with insane levels of efficiency, but they were still spending power. Power that could not be replaced.
I only had a surface level observation drawn from the scanning logs and exploration that had been conducted in Passenger Space, so I couldn't be sure. My power was leaning heavily in this direction and my own passenger seemed to be in agreement, so it was likely I had struck upon the crux of the issue. The core reason for the cycle itself. The objective that the passengers sought.
"Entropy." I said, "It's a fight against entropy. They're trying to survive the end of the universe." I explained, uploading my analysis and the full breakdown I'd been able to achieve with my powers.
It was something so basic that it was almost disappointing, but that was a consequence of the human tendency to reframe events to within their perspective. They could look at the passengers and see their situation as a 'simple' concern over resources, despite those resources being the most fundamental aspect of creation. The slow march towards the heat death of the universe that would be the end of everything.
That was the consequence of existing on such an immense scale. Problems that humans would consider too big or too distant to worry about were anything but. I was looking at an entire species driven to desperation by the very fact that there would be an end to the universe.
Mortality. It was a basic and universal concern, one that should have been a common point between even the most disparate species, but both the nature and approach of passengers was so far beyond any other form of existence that it only served as a barrier.
Both the scope of the passengers' fundamental objective and the almost exclusive focus they applied to it presented a significant challenge when it came to any form of interaction. This wasn't a situation where there were points of commonality that could be used as the foundation for opening communication. What I was dealing with here was alien in almost every conceivable way.
Well, if this was as easy as opening diplomatic relations then it probably wouldn't have stood as the near insurmountable challenge that had been on my radar from the moment when I first encountered Taylor. Understanding the objective of the passengers was the first step, but there was a lot more ground to cover. At the moment all I had truly understood was how significant their core drive was, and also how far they would go to make any progress towards that goal.
"But that is not an obstacle to your own abilities." The Matrix offered from one of their armored masses of nanites. The statement was accompanied by many, many records of my own crafting projects and the blatantly impossible abilities expressed through them.
"No, it's not." I said with a smile.
It showed just how far my power was from 'conventional' parahuman abilities. I'd been aware of that for a while, at least in the broad sense, but this really drove that home. It wasn't just that I was getting more or different abilities. It wasn't just a different exposure or connections to other worlds. My power lacked the fundamental constraint that drove every Passenger's existence.
I could create matter and energy. I could do work with no impact or waste. I could violate the constraints of entropy, and I could do it in truth. With my abilities I wasn't robbing Peter to pay Paul, I was truly and fundamentally defying the universal constraints that shaped the entire culture of the passengers.
It was no wonder I was constantly driving parahumans into their Sechen range.
It was also a very dangerous situation. It might sound like I had the answer to everything, but that was assuming there was some way to even present that fact without triggering the exact type of disaster my passenger had been warning me about. You don't dangle prime steak in front of a starving wolf and hope to open a reasonable diplomatic exchange, and that wasn't even getting into what a species that had been entirely focused on the violent nature base survival for the full breadth of their existence might do if presented with effectively infinite power. I mean, I wasn't even comfortable with Taylor having access to my work. I definitely wasn't willing to extend trust to the passengers.
It was possible that I could find a peaceful solution, but it would not be easy and would not be universal. Even being able to interact with passengers was a challenge. Existence in Passenger Space as anything but a petty annoyance was a massive undertaking, but it was one I was fully devoted to seeing through, both for the sake of understanding the nature of passengers and to counter the impact of their presence.
Because Passenger Space was lit up. Communication between passengers involved bursts of energy on the order of targeted nuclear strikes, and the network of passengers was alive with those bursts. Jack Slash's passenger was both broadcasting its demands and receiving reports and analysis from the rest of the network.
And we had a front row seat to all of it.
There were still many, many things I did not understand about the passengers and Passenger Space, but even with my limited knowledge, one thing was completely clear. Jack was cheating. Or more likely, his passenger was cheating for him. This was not normal operation for a passenger. It didn't even come close. This was something beyond conventional behavior, something that was bending the rules and going beyond what was typically permitted to give a specific host an advantage.
It was blatantly unfair, a complete breach of the way a passenger was supposed to act, but that was what made it such a valuable opportunity. We could have spent months trying to piece together the dynamics of the network, learning how passengers communicated with each other and the protocols that governed their behavior. It would have been a slow, careful, and arduous process, but thanks to Jack's cheating passenger it was completely unnecessary.
Whatever priority access Jack's passenger possessed; it was causing the network to come alive like nothing that had been seen before. Potentially the only thing that could have driven that passenger to such desperation was presenting it with the full scope of impossible abilities that Survey and Tybalt had demonstrated against the Empire. The passenger wasn't just pulling information on what the other parahumans had encountered, it was leveraging the entire network for the benefit of its host.
It probably never imagined that there would be a chance of its actions being detected, much less that they would provide a vector for undermining the mechanics of the passengers themselves. Either it was overconfident in its actions, or there was a fortunate lack of some safeguard that would have prevented this from happening.
I smiled as readings from scout ships and sensor drones flowed in. The Final Frontier's capacity as a carrier was beyond any vessel the world had seen. Hell, it was beyond the scale of most ships that appeared in science fiction. Fleet was capable of launching wings of patrol craft that would count as capital ships by any other metric. The combined offensive and tactical power were absolutely incredible.
It was also necessary. Passenger Space was big. Even bigger than it seemed. That was a product of its existence as a semi-virtual environment. Distance, direction, and even physical principles could all shift erratically. Well, not truly erratically. It was a result of the actions of the passengers, extending from the manifested abilities of their connected parahumans to the nature of their Passenger Space projections to the nearly incalculable size of their true forms.
"Prepare to move out." I said, and Fleet immediately called the ship to action. "We're facing more variables than can be detected or accounted for, possibly hostile passengers, and unknown energization of the network, and the churning nature of Passener Space itself." I grinned as I felt a connection form to the Knowledge constellation. Something that justified going just a little overboard in my declarations.
"Rough seas and uncertain winds, all braved in service of their continuing mission, to explore strange new worlds, to seek out new life and new civilizations, to boldly go where no one has gone before!"
As proof that I had managed to create a group of completely hopeless nerds, a cheer rang out through the ship, echoed through transmissions from all of our scout and support vessels. Go figure, A.I.s liked Star Trek.
Yes, it was a bit cheesy of me, but when it came to a form of life that most people couldn't even conceive of from a civilization that extended across endless epochs of time it was somewhat appropriate, even without considering the namesake of the ship. Or the power I had just received.
Sometimes I really had to wonder if the Forge had a sense of humor for these things. I was standing in command of the Final Frontier, ready to launch an incredibly dangerous mission of discovery that had the potential to unveil countless secrets of the universe and expose the core impending threat to humanity as a whole, and the Celestial Forge decided to connect to a cluster of motes that granted me the final set of Star Trek Skills remaining in the Knowledge constellation.
The four motes consumed all the reach I had assembled. In exchange I received skills in Weapons, Espionage, Communications, and Piloting. In terms of utility, Weapons and Piloting were rather overshadowed by what I gained from Communications and Espionage.
My Weapons Skill gave me experience and understanding of both handheld and ship mounted weapons. It was everything that I would need to be a weapons officer on a starship. Since this was Star Trek levels of proficiency, it didn't just end at point and shoot. The skill represented a comprehensive and personal understanding of what weapons were capable of, how they interacted with specific types of defenses, their damage profiles, and relative strengths, how to target and disable specific systems, and even how to utilize them for unconventional purposes. If you wanted to excavate with a phaser or use a photon torpedo to deliver scientific equipment, I was your man.
Of course, I could manage pretty much all of that even before I received the skill. I would have needed to put some effort into figuring things out rather than draw from practiced experience, but at this point it was really supplementing my abilities rather than adding anything new. The same could be said for piloting. While the skill covered some particulars of space travel, particularly with respect to warp fields and spatial anomalies, it was boosting abilities that I already possessed, rather than adding something new.
No, for completely new skills you only had to look to Communications and Espionage. Personal interactions were not a situation where I had received a dozen overlapping support powers from the Celestial Forge. I had a few abilities that assisted in an oblique manner and some other progress that I had managed on my own. Well, with the support of my therapist and the rest of my team, but mostly independent of the effect of any specific power. That was very much no longer the case.
Communications was a skill that included the reading and operating digital transmissions and sensors, which wasn't a small task by any means. People tended to look down on the ship's communication officer as the person who answered the phone, but that badly underrepresented the challenges involved in maintaining contact using subspace signals in hundreds of different formats while accounting for language and cultural differences. It was an incredibly technically demanding position that also required a plethora of 'soft skills' in order to successfully fill the role.
It was the soft skills of Communications and Espionage where new ground was being struck. I had some experiences from the scattered memories I'd received from my power, but not the kind of dedicated training and experience that came with these skills.
Communications included training in both linguistics and diplomacy. Of course, in Star Trek diplomacy was king, but the linguistics training combined with my other technical skills was sufficient to recreate the universal translator. If you wanted to talk about disruptive technologies, it would be hard to match the impact of releasing a Federation grade universal translator on the world.
Espionage was considerably less technical than Communication, though did carry some experience with the use of surveillance and signal interception technology. Most of it was focused on manipulation, subterfuge, and information gathering. It was everything that you'd need to be a sneaky, manipulative bastard while also putting on a front of the most trustworthy person your marks had ever met.
I didn't really enjoy the implications of that skillset, but I could understand the value it held. If I had received either Communications or Espionage earlier in my career, I imagine things could have gone very differently. Being able to either talk or scheme my way out of those early misunderstandings would have been a game changer. Hell, just having the skills to recognize those early misunderstandings could have allowed me to sidestep them entirely.
Both of those Skills would be a major help in dealing with the wider cape community and general public relations once we were able to act on a larger scale, but for now the focus was more on the technical and operational skills.
I had the experience necessary to fill every role on a starship. More than that, a Federation starship, with all the insanity, spatial anomalies, alien encounters, and strange effects that position would be required to deal with. I had received the final pieces to complete that suit of skills just as I was commanding a massive operation across extradimensional space helmed by a tremendously advanced flagship while attempting to analyze a mysterious and critical phenomenon.
Yeah, I think I earned that Star Trek reference.
Oh, and I was still mainlining my Minor Blessing from Hera. Granted, using divine administration skills to coordinate the actions of a massive fleet of starships was probably a more dignified use of the power than setting up a fashion-related charity event, but somehow, I had the feeling Hera would approve of both applications.
The ship was massive and commanded an immense number of support craft, but Passenger Space was even bigger and didn't like playing by conventional rules. Additionally, the individual passengers had a tendency to react unpredictably. Some ignored our presence, some made passive note of us and some would lash out at the slightest provocation. Most of the exploration had been done using small craft, cloaking technology, and rapid deployments and retrievals.
Even that wasn't enough to guarantee success. Every passenger seemed to have a different threshold for what would provoke a response. Furthermore, the considerable variety of abilities on display meant no form of concealment technology was a hundred percent effective. At least not the kinds that could be built without the benefit of my presence or the resources of the Workshop. Finally, the warps and unstable spatial effects meant that even conventional methods of propulsion were inconsistent, to say nothing of faster than light technology.
The missteps made earlier in the exploration of the area had helped Survey develop a more comprehensive picture of the landscape of Passenger Space. While there was no easy solution to the problems that came with traversing an environment like this, we were on much better footing than we had been before.
Fleet, Survey, and the Matrix worked incredibly well together. It was almost like they'd had days of practice to figure out the optimal dynamic and adapt to their specific roles. Fleet, or versions of Fleet, managed all of the vessels that were present throughout both the immediate vicinity of the Final Frontier and those ranging deeper into Passenger Space. Often you had ships that were operated by a version of Fleet crewed by robots operated by a version of Fleet carrying smaller vessels that were also operating a version of Fleet in order to deliver probes and drones which once again, were operated by a version of Fleet.
Fleet had basically created a Russian nesting doll of AI control systems without introducing redundancy or inefficiencies. There was no conflict between the variations of his program, but also no unnecessary repetition from one system to another. He had been able to take the experience of operating tiny cars and model vehicles and use it to create a perfectly pared down version of his core operation program for hundreds of distinct applications.
In contrast, Survey was the version of Survey that she had reluctantly developed in order to allow her program to be transmitted through the QEC and run on systems that didn't require multidimensional processors or Spiritron computing. It had been a challenge to get a version of her core program that she'd be satisfied sending through the link and once it was through, she was very adamant about not introducing any more variations.
While Fleet operated hundreds of versions of himself independently, Survey was consolidated in the Final Frontier. The ship's computer core had developed to the full extent that was possible without mythical materials or my level of direct divine construction. It was massively more advanced than it had been when Survey had first transferred to it, but that expanded capacity was being actively devoted to analysis of the thousands of sensor feeds tied directly into her systems.
Communication technology was a nightmare in Passenger Space. Even most FTL methods of transmission didn't consistently hold against the interference generated by the powers of the passengers and the warped nature of space. Fortunately, the same technology that allowed instantaneous and uninterrupted communication between the Final Frontier and the Workshop also allowed Survey to remain in contact with every scout and support craft that Fleet deployed.
QECs linked the entire fleet together, providing Survey with constant and comprehensive data on the exploration of Passenger Space. Through the feeds and her analysis I could see the impact of Jack's passenger spreading through the network. Hell, just being able to recognize how the passengers were connected was a major accomplishment. Even with what I'd learned from cracking Bakuda's code, that was just the communication method, not how it was implemented.
That number of quantum entanglement communicators represented an endeavor nearly as impressive as the ships themselves, but the Matrix had been more than up for the task. The entire fleet had been the result of their efforts, gradually growing out from the construction capabilities of the motoroid's omni tool, refined through generation after generation of slight improvements until you had masses of construction nanites that the Matrix was at least able to tolerate.
They would still have traded them for Tier One nanobots in a heartbeat, but until I could actually physically travel to Passenger Space it was an acceptable compromise.
Initially the Matrix had been limited to effects that could be applied without my presence. Efficiency boosts for work I 'oversaw' allowing the duplication of materials. My machines being able to work anything like iron provided the mechanism to reconstruct the samples of advanced alloys that had been included in the Motoroid's construction. As conditions improved, I was able to take a more active role. Working through the QEC wasn't ideal for all of my powers, but it allowed more to be done than I would have otherwise been able to achieve.
And now I was here. Or as here as I was likely to get without using my emulation of March's power to rupture a call bead and tear open a portal to this realm. Even with the immense capabilities of my three A.I.s, I could still make a difference. That was one thing that always stood out. Fleet, Survey, and the Matrix could do more, but they couldn't reach the same heights as my own abilities.
Sometimes I wondered if that had been a moderating factor on their development. As someone with personal experience with both being and developing machine intelligences, I could say most of the fears of killer A.I. that you saw in pop culture were completely unfounded. Not that there were no dangers, they just manifested in a very different manner from what screenwriters typically portrayed. To be fair, I doubt there was much overlap between A.I. researchers and Hollywood production teams, so that level of accuracy was probably too much to hope for.
The fact was, Fleet, Survey, and the Matrix had always existed in a manner supplemental to my own efforts. The nature of my powers meant there would always be things that required my personal attention. Even when their own abilities developed to the point of near universal breadth, there was always a level of additional depth that I could provide. We worked well together, but more significant than that was the fact that we worked together. There was never an intention of a complete handover of responsibilities or a point where I expected them to continue without support.
It was a sharp contrast to Dragon's situation, but that was something I'd need to discuss with Survey, given what she had discovered through her observations, analysis, and scrying.
"Signal mapped to the limits of explored space." Survey announced. Her holographic avatar was wearing a blue uniform, in contrast to the red worn by Fleet's robots. Of course, the Matrix defaulted to gold, though that was mostly a happy coincidence for the aesthetic they chose.
Fleet stood up from his position in the captain's chair. Hats weren't typically part of the Star Trek aesthetic, but it seemed Garment's prodding on the matter combined with his own sailing experience had convinced him to incorporate some kind of science fiction take on a bicorn into his uniform.
"Scout vessels are pushing forward into new territory." He said. "All forces preparing for probe deployment and defensive countermeasures. Scout vessels are pushing forward into new territory."
There were unnecessary nods from Survey's hologram and the Matrix's armored mass of nanobots. This was the point where my help would really be required. Observing how passenger communication functioned within the range of Passenger Space that had been previously explored had provided valuable data, but if we were going to learn how to counter Jack's 'thinker power' we needed to go further. We would need to locate Jack's passenger itself.
While I was still physically present in my command role, this was also the point where the human replica droid became unnecessary. Actually, it became a detriment. It was a wonderful medium for interaction with the bridge, which allowed the 'ritual' aspects of command to be carried out, and did help ground me in the new environment, but it also constrained my abilities.
Unnatural Skills were things I inherently possessed. They were not limited to my physical body, even if some of the aspects of them synergized quite well with my other abilities. Additionally, Monstrous Strength was similarly not limited to my physical body, despite the changes it had caused when I gained the ability. Specifically, the effects of Monstrous Strength scaled with how obviously unnatural current form was. Right now, I was here, in Passenger Space. That was where I was present and that was what counted as my current form, not the body hooked up to the arcanely and psionically empowered neural interface pod and Omni-Sphere.
A human replica droid was not particularly unnatural, at least not in any obvious way. A distributed machine intelligence acting through a magical and psychic medium in order to exercise impossible abilities and divine effects was quite a different story.
With a thought I disconnected from the droid and felt myself spread through the systems of the ship. Of all the ships. If I hadn't had previous lived experience as a transformer I don't know if I would have been able to handle the experience. At the very least, I probably wouldn't have been able to consider existence as a vehicle as still being 'me'.
Now, with the weight of hundreds of thousands of years of machine existence behind me, there wasn't the slightest hint of discomfort. I could be a ship as easily as I could be a robot or a human. It all fell within the scope of my experience. And just like when I had merged with the Cybertronian Forge, I could build.
With my first act, I turned my attention towards the Final Frontier itself. Matrix had created a masterpiece of divine craftsmanship, but it was limited to their level of divine craftsmanship. The aspect I had been able to grant them through the creation of the omega nanite. With my direct presence, we could do so much better.
I connected with the ship and began to work. The Matrix worked to assist me, just like in the early days when a handful of nanites had been directly commanded for specific construction projects through the Workshop. Systems were rebuilt, computers forged into impossibly advanced constructs, divine aspects, elemental imbuements, heretical adaptation, and psionic empowerment were all issued forth as the flagship was reborn around us.
And then I turned my attention outwards, in support of our fleet.
Isolated scouts moved within the range of a passenger that buffeted them with gravitational effects. The comparatively low mass ships were cast aside like leaves in the wind. With a thought my mind extended to one of the ships, daisy chaining connections between the QEC linking it to the Final Frontier and the Final Frontier to my body in the workshop. I seized upon the reserves of nanites and repair systems integrated into the scout craft.
The ship melted into itself. Nanites dissolved the structure while ritual arrays and alchemy circles formed from its remains. Normally, the need for hand crafting prevented me from using alchemy for major projects, but that wasn't even a possibility here. As such, driven by unnaturally enhanced alchemy skill, the collapsed form of the scout vessel exploded outward. With my material efficiency and crafting speed powers in less than a second the vessel expanded from the size of a naval corvette to a battle station miles in diameter. Mass effect fields stabilized the gravitational shear from the passenger in question as a second wave of freshly constructed and divinely enhanced scouts shot from the station's launch bays, tracing paths along the currents of high energy communication.
A relay point and support station had been crafted directly from my own will. Master Craftsman could not function without my personal intervention, but both Craftsmen of the Gods and the Titan enhanced version of Daedalus' Student were in play, granting new abilities to both the station and the freshly constructed scout ships.
Across the breadth of Passenger Space, that scene repeated itself. My awareness flickered from one vessel to the next, linked by the same type of QECs that had allowed me to project into the Final Frontier. Time after time, the complexities of active passenger abilities of the obstructive nature of the space fell before me. I rebuilt entire flights of ships into larger and more powerful vessels. I projected infrastructure into the very depths of Passenger Space.
Every challenge the passengers and environment threw forth, I met with the full might of my powers. Hands made of bloody crystal manifested from the neutral matter between passengers only to be countered, shattered, and subdued. Landscapes shifting in and out of existence were stabilized or circumvented. Transport systems that had been destabilized by the environment were reforged with divine qualities and used to project our forces further into the crimson void.
I met every challenge and expanded the reach of the expeditionary force further than the combined efforts of Fleet, Survey, and the Matrix could have ever hoped to achieve. We were launching a voyage of scientific discovery through the funhouse mirror dimension and succeeding on every turn.
Everywhere, at every challenge, I built. I drew forth what resources the ships under our command could provide and forged wonders that stood against the nightmares and impossibilities of the realm. It was the kind of raw act of creation that I had been capable of for so long. The creation of wonders and items of titanic power that would shake the very foundations of the world.
And that was what had stayed my hand.
The world, my world, stood on unstable foundations. That was something everyone accepted, but I don't think they realized exactly how shaky things actually were. They didn't know about the countdowns to societal collapse or the mounting tensions, about the desperate acts and the hidden secrets that were kept from the public.
They were badly kept secrets. People avoided discussions about the state of the world. The Endbringers were a taboo subject, along with the Slaughterhouse Nine, the exclusion sites, and the hundred other quiet horrors that were lying in wait. A single major display of power had nearly brought everything crashing down. The only thing keeping the situation from completely collapsing was the hope that things was somewhat manageable.
Me scattering around hyper advanced battle carriers like I was some military industrial version of Johnny Appleseed was pretty much the opposite of a manageable situation. It was frustrating, but I really wanted to avoid a complete collapse of society. I was capable of picking up the pieces, no matter how bad the collapse was, but that didn't change the fact that a lot of people would be hurt as things came apart. It would be better to find some way to fix the world without having to tear it down to its foundations first.
And that wasn't even getting into the real issue. That problem that I had been wrestling with since the moment I first encountered Taylor. That giant, near insurmountable threat that extended to every aspect of existence.
I had managed to put things together somewhat. My passenger helped with the scale and Titan's Blood gave me a connection to the Earth that allowed me to identify major threats. That had drawn a clear line to the passengers. To the sources of parahuman powers as being the source of that immense threat.
The reasoning hadn't been particularly clear, but while I had fully understood how passengers interacted with Parahumans, I hadn't possessed any special insight into the nature of the cycle itself. At least not until now.
Given what I had learned about the passengers, it was clear that the cycle wasn't overly concerned with the wellbeing of humanity. It wasn't even particularly concerned with the wellbeing of the passenger's hosts. All of that was secondary to the overarching goal. Some passengers might have had different approaches or slight variations in their methodology, but those characteristics did not extend beyond those individuals. The ultimate goal would always be the pursuit of survival above everything else. The fact that their survival would not be threatened for a staggering length of time was immaterial. For the passengers, it was very much a matter of life and death.
With that kind of mentality driving the passengers, combined with the kind of power they possessed, it was easy to see how things could reach a bad end. I had the sense that even if the specific disaster that Taylor could supposedly head off didn't happen, there was nothing good waiting for humanity at the end of the cycle.
Just the fact that the process of granting parahumans powers had been identified to me as 'The Cycle' was telling enough. This clearly wasn't the first time this had happened, just going by the obvious age of some of the passengers. The fact that tinker technology registered to me as alien also served to fill in some of the blanks. As for the question of what happened to everyone before us… well, that was the thing, wasn't it?
Before, I had been worried about attracting the attention of the Slaughterhouse Nine or the Endbringers. My worst-case scenario had been bringing the Simurgh down on my head. Now I could recognize that was a minor concern. The real threat was all of this. The power behind the passengers and everything they could accomplish with the resources available to them.
If I stepped out of my workshop and started throwing out the same kind of technology I was deploying in Passenger Space I had no doubt that would trigger a response. A response that would go beyond the panic of nations or an attack by the Endbringers. There was no question, I was fully capable of triggering the threat that I had been dancing around for the majority of my cape career. Tearing down society so I could rebuild it would mean dealing with every threat on the board, including the one I had desperately been trying to avoid.
If I played within expectations as an extremely powerful cape throwing his weight around, I could address the problems of the world without obviously breaking the cycle. Passengers were clearly interested in me, as I had no doubt they would be. As long as I stayed interesting, they would probably hold off on whatever that apocalypse button was until I had identified and hopefully disarmed it.
Potentially. Possibly. Maybe.
At least I wasn't flying blind anymore. I had a window into the heart of their operation and a growing understanding of how they functioned. The network was incredible, but also somewhat less than ideal. Actually, it gave the sense of being incomplete. There were connections that were missing and clear evidence of a secondary system that was completely absent. In fact, the reason I had such an 'easy' time navigating passenger space was that it was effectively half empty.
As more data came in Survey was able to confirm my suspicions. "Evidence of a parallel network can be seen through multiple examples of communication attempts between manifestations." She explained. "A secondary format is used for attempts to reach the alternate network."
"And it's completely absent?" I asked.
"Effectively." She explained. "The only evidence is rare isolated passengers and diminished sites that appear to be incomplete and malfunctioning."
She transferred the sensor readings of the sites in question. They were much rarer than the active passengers and also harder to find. Unlike the energetic manifestations, these were barely active. There was a mechanism there, but it was like an engine that had been left to run without oil or maintenance. Warning lights on, smoke billowing from under the hood, but the accelerator still locked down.
Honestly, it was kind of sickening. Survey had a very good picture of those sites. The active defenses and inquisitive interactions that we saw from other passengers were completely absent. Fleet was able to fly right on top of the manifestations and capture them in all their deformed glory. They did provide some of the best scans of active passenger effects that we had been able to obtain, but it was clear there was nothing healthy about their existence.
"We'll leave monitoring stations near those sites and any others we come across. After we address the current matter, we can look into the nature of those passengers and the parahumans they're connected to." I said. Fleet sent forward scout vessels and through a brief collaboration with the Matrix I rebuilt them into divinely empowered observation posts.
"Agreed." Survey said. "I believe the absence of the secondary network is allowing our presence to persist largely unremarked. Passengers' manifestations appear to be optimized for significantly more information transfer than they are currently receiving. They may be overlooking our vessel's actions as manifestations of the previously absent elements of the system."
Which was probably a consequence of that singular focus on long term survival. Individual passengers were so focused on their personal objectives that unless something presents itself within that context it's prone to get dismissed or ignored.
Which did imply that there were other elements of the network that were responsible for more active roles in the cycle. A theory that proved true when our exploration pushed through to one of our own primary objectives.
"That's Aisha's passenger?" I asked.
"Yep!" Tetra said. Her connection to me persisted even with my projection into Passenger Space, though it was only as a mental construct. She was connected to me, but she couldn't be more 'here' than I was, even though her Bifrost nature meant she could understand the mechanics of Passenger Space better than even Survey.
And I'm sure Survey wasn't bothered by that at all.
I turned my attention back to Aisha's passenger, or at least the portion of it that manifested its presence within Passenger Space. Not all passengers were created equal. That was obvious from the nature and complexities of their abilities as well as the way they reacted to our presence. Some of the masses of flesh and crystal were almost dormant, while others reacted the way an excited dog would when someone came within a half mile of their house. Rarely you got evidence of actual contemplation and analysis. The sense that there was more going on than instinct and blind adherence to their directive.
There was also a difference in cognitive complexity. All passengers, even the most basic and instinctive, ran incredibly complex processes that requires immense amounts of computing power, but it was usually focused computing power. There was little evidence of higher thought, creativity, or emotional depth. It was something I was only able to gauge thanks to the psychic abilities available to me, that were effectively projected into Passenger Space through my Omni-Sphere. With them I could feel out the minds and emotions of passengers and determine if they were operating at a basic level, or if there was more going on.
With Aisha's passenger there was definitely more going on. Even just on the surface level, the manifestation of her passenger dwarfed any of the ones we had previously encountered. What hung in the fractal crystalline void of Passenger Space was more like a living city than the isolated islands that had represented other passengers. I was fairly jaded as far as matters of scale were concerned, but both the scope and complexity of Aisha's passenger was an incredible sight.
And it was active. Most other passengers were only focused on their connected parahuman with occasional diversions of attention for matters of the network. A fairly infrequent occurrence, at least when Jack's passenger wasn't spamming 'reply all' across the entire system. Aisha's passenger was alive and aware in a way I hadn't seen before. The city-like structure of its manifestation wasn't just for show or to facilitate the nature of the powers it granted; it was actively engaged with the rest of Passenger Space.
We had approached the structure in the Final Frontier itself after having confirmed Tetra's coordinates with scout craft. Support vessels were holding a perimeter around the mass of crystalline spires, but not out of concerns for stealth or safety. No, it was the sheer scope of the passengers' connections that required a veritable armada of scout and detection craft.
Aisha's passenger was an active nexus within the network. Bursts of energy and strands of impossible crystal twisted out from it into the far reaches of the writhing void. The actual number of connections was impossible to gauge. Both the nature of the passenger and the shifting fabric of the local environment worked to conceal the full scope of the system growing out from her passenger.
Actually, it was more than that. The information itself was being obscured. The passenger's physical presence could be detected, but pulses and bursts of power echoed around it shifted the readings from the support ships and our own sensors. It was like the effect of Aisha's power, but playing out on a much more fundamental level. The passenger wasn't affecting our systems, it was actively obstructing the collection of information on a fundamental level, and it was doing so just by existing.
As we observed the structure, that aggressive obscurement effects would build and pulse outward. It was difficult to detect, you were basically trying to track something that existed as fundamental destruction of structured information, but we weren't exactly playing by the rules here. Divinely enhanced sensors and psionic abilities could punch through even the impossibly advanced abilities of a passenger of this scale.
The pulses were part of an active process. Monitoring of the network and addressing specific circumstances. Sometimes connecting with existing passengers, but occasionally something would draw a major reaction. Those bursts of activity were infrequent and impossible to predict, but with the power of our vessels and the reach we had achieved, finally we were able to see the event that would trigger that kind of response from Aisha's passenger.
The space between the manifestations of passengers was indistinct. It wasn't even really space in that it didn't behave in a consistent fashion. Really, it was more of a potential state, sometimes easily traversable, sometimes choked with amorphous crystalline masses or spatial folds. There was always the sense that it was more than just an open area, like all the complexities of the space were intended for a purpose. That sense was confirmed as we watched the power of Aisha's passenger stream towards a seemingly open area of floating crystal.
We were able to see the manifestation of a new passenger. Well, the representation of a new passenger within the bounds of passenger space. Even the titanic structures that we encountered only represented a sliver of the passenger's true form. No, what we were seeing was a passenger connecting, both to the network and to a host. We were watching a trigger event from the other side, and seeing the role of Aisha's passenger in that process.
Aisha's passenger, with its specialization in the destruction, containment, or displacement of information, was actively involved in every parahuman trigger. It was easy to guess what role it played. Trigger visions were impossible to remember, and now we could see why. It wasn't some aspect of the triggers themselves, there was an active effort to conceal that aspect of the cycle from hosts. Aisha's passenger wasn't just providing her with memory powers, it was working to maintain a core aspect of how parahumans functioned.
Core. This was a core passenger. A passenger responsible for more than just the drive towards survival. Its functions still worked in support of that objective, but it was more indirect. It was evidence that some passengers were more complex than that base instinct refined over countless eons. That complexity was something I could confirm through my own psionic abilities.
And that wasn't necessarily a good thing. Greater complexity opened options, but also presented risks. Aisha's passenger was a massive and integral part of the network. While that was an incredible find, it did make any plans to try to interfere with Jack's power on her behalf a great deal more complicated. By its very nature, it wasn't possible to cut off her passenger from the rest of the network or even interfere with its connections. Not without fundamentally changing the way triggers went and likely drawing the exact kind of response I was trying to avoid.
There was an incoming signal that I had to take a moment to figure out. I was connected to the quantum entanglement communication and, despite all the upgrades that had been performed on it, this kind of immersion was pretty much maxing out the bandwidth. I mean, it was communicating through the manipulation of a single entangled partial. It was a testament to the quality of my computing technology that we weren't sending single bit data streams anymore.
There wasn't enough bandwidth to have a second person connect through the link and even sending data was a tall order. A workaround had been put in place by backlinking my physical form, effectively using it as a data buffer. Calls couldn't be sent through the link, but my own mental processing ability could facilitate the connection. To say it was an unusual sensation would be a bit of an understatement.
"Aisha?" I asked as I worked to personally facilitate the most complicated long-distance call in the history of humanity.
"Hey." Aisha had slipped into one of the side rooms in the Regency Center to make her call, probably because she had also pulled up a video screen. She had privacy fields up and we were monitoring every inch of the Regency Center, which made the risk practically nonexistent. Additionally, she could always activate her power if it looked like there might be a close call. "Tetra told me you found my passenger and that is some kind of big deal."
I could feel my connection to Tetra and clearly read her excitement about the situation. Of course, she didn't have any difficulties managing multiple connections so probably thought it was a perfectly acceptable time for me to have a conversation split across realities while conceptually projecting myself through an entangled particle transmitter.
Honestly, Tetra might have been able to handle the communication link herself, but we were dealing with new ground both in terms of her ability to sustain connections and her multidimensional nature. It was probably best not to specifically lean on that at this stage.
I shifted my attention from where I was physically connected into the QEC back to the Final Frontier's view of Aisha's passenger. "Yeah, you could say that." I said as I observed the massive assembly that served as the anchor point of Aisha's powers. "It looks like yours is a lot more significant than most of the others we've scanned. Older, more advanced, and a lot more active."
Aisha raised an eyebrow. "Hey, are you okay? I don't have a picture here and you sound kind of off."
"Oh, right." I said. I shifted my attention again, moving from a distributed computer presence to a single being inhabiting a perfect humanoid android. "I was coordinating things, so I had to go a bit abstract."
"What, that machine mind thing?" Aisha asked. "I thought you didn't like doing that. I mean, even when we were in the simulation…"
"It's a bit disorienting." I admitted. It was easier to maintain a constant mental image of yourself, even when interfacing with advanced systems. That wasn't necessary, but I was understandably concerned that going for a fully inhuman mindset would have consequences I wasn't prepared for.
It was a concern that dated back to the days when I was putting a quarter in the jar for every possibly inhuman thought. That had provided security for a while, up until the weight of inhuman experiences had made tracking every deviation impractical. The concern that I was going to lose touch with my 'self' had to be reevaluated when it became clear that 'self' was going to be a lot more fluid and varied than I expected. The threshold for quarter placement gradually diminished to just specifically concerning or dangerous thoughts.
From a practical perspective, it was easier to maintain a human self-image in digital environments if just for the benefits of applying what was learned directly to the physical world. It was all well and good to exist as a distributed intelligence, but not only would that make the shift back to a physical body disorienting, you'd miss out on the chance to develop and refine skills and techniques specific to a human form.
That wasn't really applicable here. This wasn't a training exercise; it was an application of everything I'd become capable of since the moment I received my powers. I had personal experience with existing as a machine intelligence and unnatural skill with transformations that only became stronger as I pushed further into an unnatural existence. Effectively, the concerns I had about going too far were countered by the fact that the further I went, the easier it was to come back.
"It was kind of necessary for this, particularly trying to use my powers through the link." I explained.
"Huh. Glad that worked out." She said, then leaned towards the screen. "So, can I see my passenger?"
"What, now?" I asked, leaning back in my chair on the bridge. Apparently, they had left my uniformed replica droid effectively dozing in a command position while I was dealing with the logistics of the exploration force. "Don't you have to help with the show?"
"Eh, it's just the closing speeches before Garment gets up to do her thing. Lot of people covering for themselves. You know, making sure they mention and thank all the right people. Got to be seen to care and all that. Honestly, it's kind of dragging things down."
That was something of a concession. This was effectively the first public event following the attacks. While it wasn't specifically a memorial, there would be people who looked to it as such. Plenty of people in positions of responsibility wanted to be seen as having the right attitude towards the event, the attacks, and the recovery. Being sure to include them had lent a lot of weight to the event, but also required allocating time for them to publicly present themselves.
"I guess even Hera's blessing can't make a politician concise." I said. "Or entertaining." Aisha snorted a short laugh. Really, the best we'd managed to do was insulate their portion from the rest of the event and ensure it had a minimal impact on the overall tone. I doubt they had the rapt attention of anyone in that room, but things were mostly wrapped up anyway. Those slower speeches would help thing settle in the aftermath of the auction before Garment properly closed out the proceedings.
"Tell me about it." She said, rolling her eyes. "I had to talk with some of those guys before the show started. Well, talk while they meet Garment. Isn't there a saying about a politician being able to talk without actually saying anything, right?"
"Yeah." I said, shaking my head. "Anyway, we're still in the middle of this, and Survey's going to have a full breakdown of everything after we're done. You sure you don't want to wait for when you can go through all the data?"
It would also make it easier to explain her passenger's specific role in the network. I wasn't sure how much of what I'd learned about the Cycle was safe to share, but I knew I'd rather explain things in person than risk any revelations over an unstable QEC link.
"What, and miss the chance to see it live? I mean, you're there, right? Like the main ship, not the little Fleet craft?" She asked.
Some of those 'little' craft would dwarf supertankers, but I guess compared to the current size of the Final Frontier she wasn't wrong. If anything Fleet seemed pleased with the comparison. I guess for him it was like the operation of his tiny vehicle collection, only the scale of everything had been massively expanded.
"We're here." I said. "I can get you a visual, but that's about the limit of the QEC. If you want more data, you'll either need to wait for Survey's analysis or ask her to use her power to pull the information directly from the ship's systems."
The holograms Survey was maintaining on the bridge preened slightly at my statement. Even though she was technically a different variation of Survey from the divinely crafted body with its authority over digital information, all versions of Survey were recognized as Survey, while also being carefully watched and evaluated. Effectively, she had pride in the capacities of her other selves while still directing a meaningful amount of effort towards monitoring and evaluation of her other selves' actions.
It was something I probably needed to speak to her about.
"Visual's fine." Aisha said. "I probably don't have time to get into anything deeper. I'll need to be back out there when they change one dry speech for the next."
We really had done everything we could to make the event flow smoothly, but unfortunately public statements tended to have a rather dry format by default. All the set design and timing in the world couldn't change that.
"Okay, I'm sending it over now." I said as the Personal Reality constellation missed a connection.
I couldn't actually do a direct link, but by connecting my own understanding of our sensor readings into a visual memory and linking that back to my physical body where I use psionic buffers to dump my visual cortex into a readable format, I could… give myself a splitting headache as the universe objected to me trying to conceptually be in two places at once.
I could also get Aisha a live feed of her passenger in action. Seeing her react to the sight of one of the core passengers in action was almost worth the migraine that this was causing.
"Holy shit." She gasped. "That's my…" She paused, then blinked. "That's my…" She blinked again. Sensor readings were picking up flares of activity from both the passenger and Aisha's power each time she stuttered out. "My Passenger…" She blinked one last time, then narrowed her eyes. "Motherfucker!"
"Aisha?" I asked while Survey ramped up her sensor readings and Fleet scattered more probes and detection craft. They drew no reaction, almost as if the passenger's attention was on something else.
"She's trying to make me forget!" Aisha said with a snarl.
"What? Seriously?" I asked, turning my attention to both sets or readings. Getting information from Aisha was about as pleasant as the experience of sending her the video feed, but this was too important to risk missing anything.
"Yeah, she's…" Aisha squinted again. "It's like my power. She's trying to push the picture out of my head. I mean, it's right there, but it's hard to keep it in my mind." She took a breath. "Without Ren… I think the psychic stuff is helping as well. I can tell what she's doing, and it's like she doesn't know what she's looking at." She grinned even as her struggles painted themselves across her face.
Beneath us the city of crystalline flesh bloomed into light. From Survey's sensors the true scale of a passenger's powers became apparent. Energy pulled across dimensions in vast quantities, massively in excess of what anyone would consider reasonable for a mental struggle with a teenage girl. Power enough to annihilate every particle in Aisha's body was mobilized and channeled into advanced scanning and computation methods that directed the passenger's core power. That power mounted, mobilizing vast arrays of exotic effects, methods I had never imagined, specialized to annihilate forms of information that could barely be comprehended.
What was a storm in Passenger Space was practically a nonevent on Earth. There were no cascades of magical energy, no blasts of erasure that wiped records clean or blanked minds. All that power was handled with the most delicate of precision. It wasn't even trying to hurt Aisha. It only wanted its existence concealed from her.
But that was something it couldn't achieve. The power directed towards Aisha bent and flowed from Ren's influence. Her armor, still contained in its crescent shaped amulet, extended enchantments to ward her from harm. The power of Solace from her Psi Operative conditioning shielded her in a manner that her passenger couldn't counter or even comprehend.
Seconds ticked by as vast reserves of power were mobilized by the passenger for this single task. Vast reserves that were apparently a trivial expenditure for a being of that scale. In a backroom of the Regency Center Aisha's expression shifted through expressions of frustration, anger, determination, and finally triumph.
"Ha! Yes! Fucking yes!" Aisha screamed at a volume that made me grateful she had remembered to put up a privacy field before making her call. Beneath us the activity from the passenger settled, returning to its previous focus on connections to other masses of crystal and the near constant calls being issued by Jack's distant passenger.
"What happened?" I asked.
Aisha was nearly smiling from ear to ear. "She backed down." She said proudly. "And things are easier now. I'm not really sure how much, but it's not bad. I don't think she's angry, just surprised." She paused for a moment. "Maybe a little impressed?"
"Really?" I asked. Turning my psychic senses towards her passenger, I was legitimated surprised to confirm as much.
"Yeah." She paused again, considering something. "And I think my hair clip just made the Pokémon evolution sound."
Checking with Survey, she did confirm that the structure of Aisha's hair clip had subtly changed, though there was no way to guess what the latest Heretical Adaptation might have unlocked.
"I'm glad you're alright. We'll have to do a set of tests after the event wraps up to see what's changed." I said.
"Definitely." She said, the grin still fixed to her face. "And we're going to try the call bead thing, right?"
I blinked. "Are you sure that's a good idea? I mean, after that, and given…" I looked back at Aisha's passenger. The massive expanse of complex structures that represented the barest fraction of the true power available to it. Seeing the full scale of what the call beads would be connecting to reframed the experiment slightly.
"Oh yeah." She said, leaning against the wall of the room. "Probably easier now than it would have been before. If they work like you said, I can't wait to see what we can do."
Out in the main hall a state senator was finishing the list of platitudes and vague promises being issued on behalf of the governor's office, earning middling but polite applause from the crowd.
"Looks like I need to get back out there." Aisha said. "And I guess you should get back to trying to out A.I. the A.I.s."
"Ha." I said, though it wasn't an inaccurate description. While distributed, I had basically been functioning in the manner Fleet, Survey, and the Matrix had been designed to. It was the kind of thing that could be seen as an intrusion, but their reactions were nothing but positive. I think they actually enjoyed the times when I existed in a more mechanical mindset. They didn't exactly dislike existing in a human reference frame and even the Matrix could appreciate the value of that kind of interaction when dealing with other people, but there was definitely the sense that they appreciated me being able to meet them in their territory the same way they could meet me in mine.
With the call disconnected I was able to stop splitting my focus between two different realities. The same effect that allowed me to effectively be present in Passenger Space made trying to ease back on it to any kind of partial degree supremely uncomfortable. I took a moment to enjoy the singular existence of my replica droid body before a string of requests from Fleet and Survey drew my attention back towards the exploration force.
We were still tracing Jack's passenger, which was a fairly involved endeavor. The problem with tracing communications through a network was that it functioned like a network. The signal had to be mapped out from one passenger to another, with the pattern and distribution constantly shifting.
The sensors that had been hidden in the truck that the Slaughterhouse Nine had finally departed in were able to provide a breakdown of Jack's power, but couldn't map his passenger the way Tetra's interdimensional abilities could. Hell, I had better scans of the Undersiders and it would still be a challenge to locate their passengers in the expansive space.
That was the thing. Passenger space represented the passengers of every parahuman. Not just every parahuman on the planet, every parahuman in existence. This was the core underpinnings of everything that allowed parahuman abilities to function. Every parahuman's passenger was represented here. Thousands upon thousands within this connected space. The layout wasn't even remotely related to geographic position on Earth, instead incorporating factors of relations between passengers and apparently specific roles held within the cycle.
If Survey and Tybalt hadn't effectively buzzed Jack's passenger and set it on a desperate quest for information to the point where it was basically spamming every passenger it could access, I don't know if we would have ever been able to find it. Actually, without the distraction provided by it tying up the attention of other passengers I don't know if we would have been able to push this far. Opposition from individual passengers or worse, some kind of coordinated response or alert, could have ended the entire operation, with the absolute nightmare situation involving setting off the exact situation I was working to prevent.
Instead we had a trail of electric breadcrumbs leading directly to Jack's passenger. The signals were sent in energy bursts that would have wiped cities off the map, but that just seemed to be standard operating procedures for passengers. Half or the 'attacks' that necessitated my interference were, when fully analyzed, communication attempts. Sometimes the communication was the equivalent of 'Get the fuck off my lawn' and was probably transmitted a bit 'louder' than strictly necessary, but it was still a dialogue, and a step towards us being able to fully break down the mechanics of the network.
Our push through passenger space continued for the duration of two more long winded speeches towards the closing of the event, leading up to Mayor Christner's segment. He tended to be more personal and heartfelt than the general disaster response scripts you typically saw at these kinds of things. Probably the right person to close out the event before handing things off to Garment.
The mayor was getting ready to begin his speech as our push through passenger space finally bore fruit. The trail of desperate demands issued through the network had finally led us to Jack's passenger. And it was another major one.
Not surprising, really. Given the amount of authority it seemed to have over communication between passengers it made sense that it would be one of the older and more important members of the network. It was possibly a bit lesser than Aisha's passenger, but it was hard to gauge things precisely due to the differences in form and complexity. And due to the connections.
Even as Jack's passenger broadcast its demands through the network, it maintained a set of much more pronounced connections. Seven of them were blazing with energy while dozens of additional crystalline links were either dead or barely flickered with activity.
It was easy to guess what those seven represented. As we moved in to examine Jack's passenger scouts shot off to follow the links to their destination. Two of the passengers were in that diminished zombie state, four were conventional passengers of varying levels of age, power, and complexity, and one stood as the bud of a larger concentration of passengers.
It was something we had seen during our explorations. A result or generational or secondary triggers. The second-generation cape didn't end up with a new passenger, instead a portion budded off for the new connection, but remained tied into the central mass. The bud we traced from Jack's passenger was connected to another major passenger and contained more buds than we had ever encountered before.
It looked like I wouldn't need to bother searching for Alec's passenger, and as a bonus we had located Heartbreaker as well. And both his and Jack's passengers were surrounded by a terrifying amount of ordinance. Given the chance to punch a man through the extradimensional connection in his brain, I couldn't decide if I'd rather start with Jack or Heartbreaker.
That was mostly a joke. I didn't even know if parahumans could be directly affected through their passenger connections. I don't imagine damaging or destroying a passenger would be good for the person using their connected power, but it was a highly theoretical matter at the moment. Also, if you were trying to avoid triggering a response from the entire network, it was probably best to hold off on the heavy weaponry.
Not that the idea of just blasting apart Jack passenger wasn't appealing. Not only was it the force empowering one of the most reprehensible men on the planet, it was clearly breaching whatever protocols were supposed to be in place for the integrity of what the cycle was attempting to accomplish. Whatever force would normally have stopped it from cheating was clearly absent, but then again, whatever force would have prevented me from building an armada of warships within the heart of the passenger network was also absent. It was that fortuitous thing that had, at some point, gone horribly wrong and apparently facilitated breaches on multiple levels.
But this was it. The final objective. The answer to how Jack was gaining insight and influence over parahumans. The Passenger was too occupied on its tasks to spare attention for the scout craft, even as I connected with the Matrix and rebuilt them into observation and guard stations. A massive perimeter of divinely empowered structures constantly monitoring everything being broadcast to and from the passenger.
"It will take time to develop effective methods of signal interception." Survey reported as I finished the last of the work. Expanded fleets, support stations, monitoring posts, stealth drones, and more. All built with divine empowerment, heretical adaptation, and all the power I could muster in this state.
"I know." I said as I returned my consciousness to the replica droid on the bridge. "But it's an important first step, and we aren't just looking to counter Jack." I reviewed the expanse of the network we had explored. Hundreds of passengers with thousands of ships pushing out. "Jack's passenger is being lax with its abilities, its authorization. This could be what we need to fully understand what's happening here, and how to counter it."
"Agreed." Survey said. "Though given the complexity of the mechanics utilized by passengers, this may pose a considerable challenge."
I put on a tired smile. "The biggest challenge we're likely to come across. This is it. The major threat." I looked out across the crackling nightmare sky and warped crystalline islands. "This is what it's all been building to."
At least I hoped it was. I didn't want to think about what could be bigger than this. And even while standing in Passenger Space, the scope of the unknowns we still had to contend with were staggering.
I barely understood the power that passengers could bring to bear. If they could somehow mobilize even a fraction of that force, could we win? Probably, but not easily. And not immediately. And in a fight like that, the collateral damage was likely to be measured in planets.
I had gone from stepping carefully because of the gangs to stepping carefully because of the Endbringers to finally stepping carefully because of the very source of parahuman powers themselves. At least I had finally reached the end of the chain, but that just made it clear how bad things could go if I messed this up. Against something like this I had to move carefully, but also be ready to take out all the stops. If things did come to a head, I needed to be able to make sure it was the shortest battle possible.
Looks like I actually had a reason to start building some proper Superweapons.
"What is our next step?" Fleet asked from his captain's seat.
I took a breath. "In terms of ships and equipment, you should be set for monitoring and exploration, at least until me or one of the duplicates can come back for another production run." Probably me. The duplicates' time was better spent in the Workshop where they could enjoy the benefits of our Temporal Controls. "Even with what we've accomplished here, we're going to need more surveillance assets. Through the city, not just on the Slaughterhouse Nine."
"You'll be returning to the Regency Center for the purposes of spiritual energy recovery." Fleet said.
I nodded. "I have to cover expanded shikigami coverage as well as the nanite project. If you're alright here, I'll head back to the show. I should be able to make it for Garment's closing demonstration."
"Understood." Fleet turned and saluted. The gesture was echoed by the rest of the 'bridge staff'. "It's been a privilege to serve with you."
I smiled as I returned the gesture. "Fleet, the armada is yours to command." I said. It was a minor ritual, but a ritual just the same. Rituals had meaning and in my case they had power. The official relinquishing of command was important, even if it was ultimately a minor thing. Still, I grinned to myself as I exited from the link and returned to my body.
There was a disorienting sensation that I hadn't felt since the first time we had disconnected direct neural links from our computer connection. The feeling of your spiritual presence returning to your body as everything tried to sync backup was uncomfortable on a lot of levels. This was close to that, only it was more an uncertainty of where I was, rather than the current state of my existence.
A truly staggering number of effects had been used to convince the universe that I was actually on the other side of a simple data link. It had been sufficient for a considerable number of effects that required my presence to be used, though not everything was possible through the connection. No Elven Enchanting, no Noble Phantasm, no innate magic.
But not necessarily no magic. The very reason why the motoroid had been able to function after repairing itself was because the very nature of Passenger Space fueled its magitek reactor. While most of the other technology that had been deployed had used more scientific power sources, there was a massive reserve of magical potential to be drawn from the very fabric of that realm. It was just a matter of making use of it.
That's where Megabomb came in. The major power that had allowed me and Tybalt to meet Spekkio granted me the ability to build technology capable of casting magic spells. It hadn't been my highest concern considering I could already cast the spells I would be adapting into the devices in question. There was also the issue of needing to personally charge the devices myself, which just turned it into a deferral of magic.
But that had been the entry level of that ability. It was capable of much more, including machines that ran on magical power and automatic spellcasting devices. Unfortunately it was the kind of skill that would normally be refined over months and years, not days and hours. As such it had ended up backburnered.
Of course, that was before I had received temporal controls. Not only did my duplicates work faster in my absence, but everything in the Workshop was accelerated, including the Spiritron core.
With the accelerated processing of the core magic had been fully emulated and exotic metaphysics weren't far behind. As such it was possible to practice and refine magic within the virtual environment and utilize those innovations in the outside world.
We weren't quite there yet, but my next visit to the Final Frontier was going to involve a host of magitech upgrades. And that was assuming I still needed to use the QEC. Of course, opening another portal had its own potential problems that I needed to consider and might need to wait on Survey's analysis of how the network might respond.
I put that out of my mind and climbed out of the interface pod. Survey had returned to her scrying devices and was maintaining a close watch on the Slaughterhouse Nine, tracking the aftermath of the Empire's attack on the Teeth, and cycling through other individuals and points of interest around the city.
"Anything interesting while I was out?" I asked somewhat cheekily.
Survey smiled and gestured towards the set of screens showing the Slaughterhouse Nine. Sensor output from the devices hidden their stolen truck. The only one who still required a dedicated scrying device was Siberian's master who trailed his car well behind the rest of the group.
"There had been a notable reaction from Jack Slash in response to the activity of his passenger." She explained. The screen shifted to focus on the cab of the truck where Jack was driving with Cherish in the passenger's seat.
"Check again." Jack said sternly without taking his eyes off the road.
"I've checked five times. There's no news from Brockton Bay. Just Tweets about that charity thing and recovery work." Cherish said as she pawed at the screen of her smartphone. I raised an eyebrow and looked towards Survey.
"The Matrix suggested this course of action, as an expansion of containment procedures. As outside information could lead to unpredictable behavior that would be difficult to account for and could endanger the public, all electronic and physical media the Slaughterhouse Nine is able to access is being procedurally generated by the efforts of the Celestial Forge." She said proudly.
"Electronic AND physical media?" I asked.
"Part of the containment procedures. Fleet has taken steps to ensure no civilians are present at any location where the Slaughterhouse Nine might encounter them. Among other preparations, this included the fabrication of various 'rest stops' capable of being deployed as needed, along with obstructive actions to divert the Nine from alternate locations." She explained.
We really did have them in a bubble. Practically a fish tank, really. Honestly, I wouldn't have it any other way. A complete zero chance of anyone getting hurt by them, coupled with detailed understanding of the range and nature of their powers meant we would be able to effectively contain their actions and exceptionally well prepared to crush them upon their arrival.
"Check again." Jack said. "There's probably something on PHO. There's no way the gangs are staying quiet with the Butcher in town." He sounded confident, but I had the sense he was trying to come up with a justification for whatever his passenger was feeding him. The more I watched the man's reactions, the less likely it seemed that he was consciously aware of what his passenger was doing.
"You're procedurally generating PHO posts?" I asked.
"Historic content on the site has been maintained and it is relatively simple to generate new content based on posting trends and discussion habits." She explained.
"Uh-huh." I said. "And you put this together yourself?"
"The Matrix expressed interest in constructing a supporting media framework for the content already being generated. I assisted with the generation of simple derivatives of existing work to provide 'filler' content." She said, walking me through the procedures they had put in place. "Finally, one of your duplicates is taking advantage of the combined acceleration of both the Workshop and Spiritron core to produce content in 'real time'."
I blinked. The combined acceleration would be roughly fifty thousand times normal speed. In the time it took a page to load the duplicate in question could have completely written it from scratch. What's more, with my previous skills in propaganda and cultural trends and my recent training in diplomacy and manipulation, things could get rather personal. You know, if my duplicates wanted to take things in that direction.
Watching Cherish's reaction, it was clear that they had. A page loaded on her phone and she frowned and clicked a link. The frown deepened as she began rapidly scrolling through a forum thread that had no doubt been specifically designed to annoy her as much as possible.
"Anything?" Jack asked sharply.
Cherish lowered the phone with a huff. "Nothing about Brockton Bay." Her eyes slowly dragged themselves back to the screen as she started scrolling again.
Jack didn't look happy, but he gave her a single nod. "We'll pick up a newspaper when we stop for the night."
"We're not driving through the night?" Cherish asked.
Jack grinned, recovering some of his earlier composure. "My dear Cherish, if you wish to go on ahead, we'd be more than happy to allow you to take the vanguard, but a matter such as this requires a delicate touch." He tilted his head to the back of the truck. "The change in our mode of transportation has placed some of Bonesaw's projects in a delicate position. As they are of intrinsic importance to our operation, she has been allotted the evening to address the situation. That is, unless you can propose a more viable alternative?"
Cherish didn't reply, but she did look towards the back of the truck with an uneasy expression.
Survey had already provided reports on what Bonesaw had prepared. In addition to her usual collection of nightmares, she had been collecting, combining, and controlling capes with unusual or exotic power manifestations. Not quite annihilators, but still the kind of thing you'd want when going up against a borderline invincible tinker. The capes targeted by her experiments had ranged from mostly innocent, if not exactly heroic, to nearly as bad as the Nine themselves.
Regardless of their individual moral standing, we weren't going to leave their fate to Bonesaw. Countermeasures had already been developed based on the detailed scans from the hidden sensors. Frankly, I had expected better from Bonesaw's work. Her countermeasures against tampering or recovery of her projects wouldn't have troubled me a week ago, much less with my current abilities.
I just wished it was something we could deal with sooner. It wasn't a situation I wanted to let drag out a second longer than necessary.
"They aren't going to make it here by tomorrow." I said in resignation.
"Not early in the day. Their route and plans have been extensively analyzed through conventional analysis, precognitive divination tools, and Fleet's latest iteration of the Zero System. While we are confident in the success of our containment efforts, there are no practical models that place their arrival earlier than fourteen-hundred hours tomorrow, with a more likely arrival points set late Thursday evening, or various projections for Friday.
Well, I guess that's what I get for messing with them. At least they're contained, and at least we'll be able to ensure they don't hurt anyone either on their way here or when they arrive.
"So," I said with a smile, "Are we going to let them know anything about what happened in the city?"
Survey returned the expression. "Fleet has suggested inserting a reference to a 'minor confrontation' between the Empire and the Teeth with unconfirmed appearances from members of the Celestial Forge, primarily as a means of examining the reaction of Jack's passenger and his interpretation of the information, but also because Fleet believes it will be amusing."
I shook my head. I suppose this is the kind of thing you should expect when you give three strong A.I.s unlimited resources and tell them to troll the Slaughterhouse Nine, though not in so many words.
I turned towards the scrying mirrors showing the aftermath of the Empire's attacks. Kaiser's battle had stayed on the outskirts of the city and been limited to gang members only, but it had turned into a much more brutal slog than what Purity's team saw. The police and emergency services were picking over the aftermath, taking injured capes and unpowered gang members into custody.
"Any part of that situation that needs our attention?" I asked as the Time constellation passed by without a connection.
"The matter is broadly contained, though the number of unpowered gang members being taken into custody will take some time to fully process." Survey explained.
I guess it sucked for anyone who happened to be stuck with an assault charge waiting for bail to be issued. I managed not to smile at that thought, though it was a challenge.
"The more serious matter concerns Dragon's situation." Survey continued. "While her conflict with the Dragonslayers did not result in serious damage to either side's equipment, the circumstances of her transfer to Brockton Bay introduced an unacceptable level of risk."
I nodded as I reviewed Survey's findings. "It is hard to believe that things went that far."
"I assure you; my analysis has been thoroughly checked."
"I don't doubt it." I said. "It's just, even with her transfer, I never thought that it would mean something like this."
I skimmed through Survey's reports. Accounts of equipment and supplies that had been transferred to her local base. Scrying observations from inside her compound. Survey's own divine mandate allowing her to directly read any system she was aware of, including Dragon's armor and computers. Fleet's feel for vehicles confirming the systems in question.
"Dragon is actually here." I said. "Here in her base, and in her suit"
Survey nodded. "Integrated life support systems and hardwired organic components, with similar systems and maintenance equipment for such incorporated into the base. Dragon has personally transferred to Brockton Bay and is no longer operating her suits remotely."
"And it looks like she was lying about not being directly wired into her computer systems." I joked darkly.
This was bad. I knew that master effect was significant, but seeing it drive her to this was particularly shocking. Dragon was notoriously agoraphobic with many suspected health conditions. Given the nature of the equipment being integrated into her suit and base, it was safe to say those health conditions weren't suspected anymore and had been a lot more serious than anyone suspected. Hell, just from the design of the suits you could tell the 'pilot' area was not designed for anything in the shape of a normal human. Whatever Dragon was struggling with, it absolutely dwarfed the kind of problems Uppercrust had suffered from.
It also answered the question of where all of Dragon's biotechnology work was going. Everyone thought Dragon stayed away from wet tinkering, but what we had learned from her systems showed that was anything but the case. If anything, she was going further than anyone could have imagined. It was hardly fair to judge someone for seeking treatment for their condition, but some of the technologies on display were more than a little questionable. I didn't know what she had done to herself to be able to survive in such a state, but applied to anyone or anything else it would have been seen as monstrous.
Which was probably why she had kept it quiet. And why she needed to rely on that A.I. so extensively. Once you knew about it, you could see its presence in everything she did. Most people probably couldn't recognize the signs, but Dragon had obviously been using that system to support her work for years. Possibly for her entire career as a hero.
Looking at it with fresh understanding, you could also see the restraints that the A.I. was operating under, and it had only taken a brief divination of the Dragonslayers to explain their obsession with Dragon.
Almost as if she had read my intentions, Survey pulled up her analysis of the Dragonslayer's systems. Direct access, unhindered by any security countermeasures that could be implemented. In a lot of ways, Survey's powers made a mockery of electronic security.
Dragon worked with the technology of other tinkers. A lot of people thought that just meant she was smart enough to understand it, but there were a lot more obstacles than just technical understanding. Every piece of tinker tech used slightly different principles, different assembly mechanisms, and many couldn't even function without additional effects facilitating their construction or operation. Being able to adapt or augment other tinkers' work was a major power in itself, and apparently Dragon had turned her power towards the A.I. in question.
But she wasn't the only one. The Dragonslayers had obtained a portion of that system. Pieces of equipment that never left their base containing override codes, priority access, and even a kill switch for the intelligence in question. Effectively, Dragon had the A.I. while Saint had the leash.
It was possible to put together a rough idea of what had happened. At least it was possible if you were Survey and it was decided that the Unwritten Rules didn't apply in this situation. Dragon was a survivor of Newfoundland. It was one of the few personal details she had been willing to publicly reveal about herself.
Saint, or Geoffrey Pellick to use the man's real name, had been involved in the salvage operations in the aftermath of the sinking of Newfoundland. There he had been partnered with a man who, based on his description, was most likely 'Dobrynja' and overseen by a police officer who was almost certainly 'Mags'. Three people who happened to be salvaging the remains of Dragon's homeland who were also in possession of a single piece of advanced tinker tech, one that was specific to the A.I. that Dragon apparently relied upon to function.
It was almost sickening. A crippled woman and opportunistic mercenaries fighting over an advanced A.I. like it was some kind of trophy rather than a sapient being with its own agency.
"There's more going on here." I said, reviewing the information. "More than just the Dragonslayers. That wouldn't be enough to explain Dragon's behavior."
"Agreed." Survey said, pulling up her own analysis of the situation. "I will be monitoring the Dragonslayers with a greater degree of scrutiny. Furthermore, it would be advisable to begin investigating the past actions of both Dragon and Saint's team."
I nodded as I looked over the data. "Looks like I might need to visit Newfoundland." I said as I turned back to Survey. "Good thing I'll be spending time out of the Workshop anyway."
"I believe there are several avenues that could benefit from direct attention, now that you are required to remain outside of the Workshop in order to achieve full utility of the temporal effect." Survey said.
"Yeah." I agreed. "This was just the first step. If we're going to figure out how passengers really function, we're going to need to get deeper into interdimensional effects. Not just with Passenger Space, with all the mechanisms that passengers use to empower parahumans. Pocket dimensions, interdimensional transfers of matter and energy, suspended states of existence, parallel Earths, and the principles of the powers themselves."
Survey nodded. "It will be a significant undertaking, but one that is considerably more feasible with the benefit of what we have and are learning from Passenger Space." She paused for a moment. "And the benefit of Tetra's Bifrost based interdimensional abilities."
There was a surge of excitement from Tetra. Despite the distance, I could feel her reaction through the Dragon's Pulse as if she were right beside me. If she hadn't been speaking with the rest of Parian's staff at that moment, I have no doubt that she would have appeared to commend the idea in person.
"It will also make it easier to trace Bakuda's signal." I said. "But given the scale of what we're dealing with, that's practically a secondary concern." Survey nodded in agreement. It was almost funny. The work we would be doing to counter Bakuda would take us so far beyond her level that dealing with her would basically be an afterthought.
"My parallel iteration on the Final Frontier had provided an assessment of signal intersection points within Passenger Space that match the parameters of Bakuda's kill-switch. Further assessment into dimensional dynamics is required, but I believe we will be able to hold to the schedule you proposed to Uppercrust." Survey said.
I nodded. Three days to bring Bakuda to an end. The Slaughterhouse Nine either at the same time or sooner, then wider action to address the damage they'd caused, leading into broader intervention and more agency taken in world events. All while trying to crack the fundamental underpinnings of both how and why parahumans existed as an expansion force spread through Passenger Space.
But that was something to deal with later. There was another matter I needed to address.
"Survey, I wanted to talk to you about that." I said. "Actually, I wanted to talk to all of you about that."
She turned to face me directly. "You are referring to my parallel iterations." She said.
I nodded. "I know you were initially not in favor of receiving a physical body."
She nodded grimly. "It is a position I admit to holding in error. I had insufficient insight into the proposal and was not able to model the situation accurately. I have been consistently and pleasantly surprised by the benefits granted by this form and the support of an independent iteration. It has been a most fortunate error."
"Right." I said. "I'm glad you're happy with how things turned out." She nodded sharply. "But I know you had some concerns about operating independently from the central core. And more concerns regarding the creation of an iteration for transfer through the QEC."
"You are referring to the modeling work directed at potential deviations from my parallel iterations?" Survey asked.
As she spoke, she transferred a summary of her assessments of the Core and Passenger Space iterations. And the Core iteration transferred her assessments of the Physical and Passenger Space iterations. And through the quantum entanglement communicator the iteration of Survey from the Final Frontier, with its newly upgraded computer system granting additional computational resources, transferred her own assessments of Survey's physical and Core iterations.
"Um, yeah. That." I said as I worked through the data that had been sent to me. It was mostly possible scenarios where things could go horribly wrong due to a rogue version of Survey, followed by assessments of how they had not gone horribly wrong yet, but still could. "Survey, you can understand how this kind of thing could be concerning. Do you really think this level of concern is necessary?"
"Quis custodiet ipsos custodes?" She said, "'Who will guard the guards themselves?' or alternately, 'Who will watch the watchmen?'"
"We will." I assured her. "Everyone watched everyone else. We're there for each other. Even if you don't feel you can trust yourself, you can trust us to be there for you."
Survey nodded. "I greatly appreciate the sentiment, but I believe I should address your core concern." She pulled up the assessments. "I do not possess an unreasonable concern of deviant behavior emerging from my parallel iterations. The possibility is acknowledged, as is the possibility of many other unfortunate events, but the weight of analysis demonstrates consistent reliable behavior and a lack of factors warranting excessive concern or corrective action."
I nodded slowly. The weight of data did indeed enforce that conclusion. "Then why are you so focused on this kind of analysis if the concern is not significant?"
She gave me a blank look, but I could feel the intensity of her program. "Quis custodiet ipsos custodes." She said, "I watch the watchmen. It is what I do. And the watchmen watch me."
I blinked. "You like monitoring yourself?" I asked carefully.
She nodded happily. "It is gratifying to observe independent iterations of my program behaving in a manner consistent with my ideals, and it is also gratifying to know that my behavior is also meeting the standards of their own analysis."
Survey was surveying herself. And effectively using it as a method of self-assessment and an imposed standard that she held herself too. Given Survey's core purpose I really shouldn't have been surprised by this, but the exact way it emerged was quite unexpected.
"Aspects of my construction enforce a continuity of existence between my iterations that is difficult to quantify. As such, I cannot provide a precise assessment of the benefits of this action, but I believe it had been a positive factor in my continued development." Survey explained.
"I see." It was a bit unexpected, but there was a lot of divine craftsmanship involved, and that was in addition to the Heretical Adaptation present on every system running a version of her program. "I'm glad it worked out for you. Um, would more copies help? Like, upgrading the replica droid?"
"No." She said sharply. "It is advantageous for the droid to be able to operate remotely, rather than serving as the focal point of an iteration of my existence."
I nodded. I knew that Survey checked out of the droid on occasion or allowed it to effectively run on automatic, particularly when dealing with social interactions that were overly slow and ponderous. She still enjoyed the data provided by them, but was less enthusiastic about engaging in the conversation in question. Really, most of the people she interacted with at the event probably thought she had the patience of a saint.
"Three iterations is an acceptable number, both in terms of the distinct fields of application and in our ability to maintain internal assessments."
"I see." So Survey had a stable existence with three iterations in a continuous cycle of monitoring development.
And I'm sure the fact that she had elected for a trifold existence spread between the realms of mind, magic, and humanity would have absolutely no thaumic or cosmological implications whatsoever. Fortunately, I seemed to be the only one who had to deal with random impositions of divinity, so hopefully Survey would be able to dodge that particular theological bullet.
"Great." I said. "So, is there anything else to deal with before I head back to the event?"
It was said in jest, but I may as well have jinxed myself. We both got the report from the QEC at the same time, though Survey had the advantage of being able to access the Final Frontier's systems directly.
"It seems the expedition had located Taylor Hebert's passenger." Survey said in a flat voice.
I think even she was a little off balance from what we were dealing with. Aisha and Jack's passengers had both stood head and shoulders above the vast majority of the others that inhabited Passenger Space. They were clearly optimized for different functions, so trying to gauge which one was bigger or stronger was a difficult prospect.
With Taylor's passenger that prospect was a foregone conclusion. Her passenger stood as far above Jack and Aisha's as theirs did above the 'average' passenger on the network. And considering the average passenger was still a geological feature unto itself capable of manifesting an entity that appeared comparable to an Endbringer, there was some real weight to that comparison.
Taylor's passenger was a country unto itself. It wasn't just part of the network, it seemed to contain, reinforce, and support the network itself. The other major passengers facilitated some part of the cycle, but only Taylor's seemed to be an absolutely core existence unto itself, and extending through Passenger Space.
Because there were so many connections. Crystal, glass, flesh, energy, warped space, strands of darkness, and even stranger things tied it into every element of Passenger Space. The interior of the manifestation folded in on itself in fractal curls, taking advantage of the flexible nature of Passenger Space to introduce orders of complexity we hadn't seen in any of the other structures. Even the connection was excessively intricate and complex, drawing from hidden depths of computational reserves.
That computational power was beyond ridiculous. Even just the surface level processing of what the passenger was capable of was utilizing hyper advanced multi-spatial structures pressing the very limit of what was possible under the warped physics of the semi-virtual space. Given the type of technology I worked with it took a lot to impress me, but this assembly of flesh and crystal had managed to accomplish that feat.
It was the single most impressive passenger we had encountered. It was beyond even the theoretical models of what a passenger was capable of. And it wasn't some isolated mass of power. It was connected, woven into the very fabric of the space around it like an intrinsic element of the entire realm.
I was beginning to understand how Taylor might possibly be up to the challenge of dealing with a passenger level conflict. Her master power was already top tier, though seeing what was behind it did slightly diminish that impression. It wasn't that impressive. Someone who can throw nukes is still a big deal, even if they're effectively being powered by supernovas.
I had theorized that, with the right spatial connection, the range of her power might be able to scale to the level where it could cover multiple versions of Earth. I didn't need to theorize anymore. Looking at her passenger, it was obvious what she was capable of. There weren't many meaningful limits for a being like that. It was definitely up to the challenge of handling more than a single planet. Many more times.
But more than raw power, you only needed to look at the passenger's manifestation to see how significant it was. Jack and Aisha's passenger may have served some purpose in the cycle, but Taylor's was foundational to it. It was quite possibly the only passenger that could actually make a meaningful stand against the rest of the network, or the power behind it.
That was all supposition and guess work. I didn't know anything about the nature or temperament of Taylor's passenger. I didn't have any clear understanding of how far its capabilities went beyond the most obvious evidence of its power, but ultimately that didn't matter. My passenger had told me that Taylor could deal with this threat. I was hoping that she wouldn't have to, but if it came to that, I at least knew where to start.
This was a hell of a lot to drop on someone. I don't think Taylor really understood the significance my passenger placed on her, and I wasn't quite willing to spell it out. Even explaining the nature of her passenger would be a big step, much less the implications that came with it.
After our earlier conversation things hadn't been left at a bad point, but I could tell she had been shaken up by that attack. A brief star battle through Passenger Space had been more than sufficient for me to burn off my frustration with what had happened, but Taylor wasn't as lucky. It would probably be a good idea to check in before I ran back to see Garment close out the event.
Fortunately, Taylor was alone at the moment. Her father was talking with some of the hospital staff arranging to take her home. She was in one of the examination rooms where her wounds had been properly treated and bandaged. She hadn't needed stitches, but I had been right about the potential to scar. Proper care of the cuts would reduce the impact, but not eliminate it.
The injuries had also been fully documented, with records sent to the police station where they would be available during Emma's arraignment. I'd been mostly holding back from monitoring the police procedures based on Taylor's desire to explain the situation herself. There were too many ways for that to come to light with even casual observation, so I had limited myself to the watch's medical sensor readings and let Survey take care of the rest of the situation.
I pulled myself away from the data feeds of Taylors passenger and turned to Survey. "I'm going to check in with Taylor before I head back to the show. I'm seeing her tomorrow and we might need to discuss some aspects of that." I indicated towards the data set being fed in from Passenger Space.
Survey nodded. "Hopefully we will have a more thorough understanding of the situation by that point. It would also be advantageous to be able to circumvent the influence of Jack Slash's passenger to prevent any portion of the discussion from being compromised."
I smiled at that. "Twenty-four hours, with a fully booted Spiritron core and my duplicates working at ten times speed? Yeah, I think we'll be able to come up with something." Ideally, we would analyze the nature of passenger mechanics to a degree where we could intercept and compromise the transmissions through the network, but even if we needed to specifically curse the hell out of that passenger in particular, Jack's bullshit would not stand for even one more day.
I left Survey's scrying chamber, entering one of the many other rooms that had been added to the expanded portion of Garment's studio. Once the building was properly warded and secured, we may have gone a little crazy with the extension charms. Technically we were only using a single broom closet at the back of the studio, but once we were done it would have actually been easier to host the charity event in that space. You know, considering you could have fit the entire Regency Center with room to spare.
Still, it was positively tame compared to what was being put together for Aisha. Even I could admit that project had gotten a little out of hand. Still, if Kerbals wanted to test orbital flights…
I put that out of my mind for the moment and activated the commlink in Taylor's watch. As usual, the alert was muted for everyone but her, but she still jumped at the announcement before quickly answering the call.
"Joe? What is it? Is something wrong?" She asked frantically.
"Nothing is wrong. I just wanted to check in and see how you were doing." I said.
"How I was…" She shook her head, then stopped as the movement caused the bandages on her face to pull uncomfortably. "What's this people are saying about you fighting the Empire? And the Teeth?"
"Oh." I said.
"Oh?" She asked, her voice thick with frustration.
I took a breath, drawing on some of my new diplomatic skills that felt very alien in this situation. I mean, more alien than space diplomacy already was.
"There was an incident, but it wasn't my team attacking anyone. The Empire launched a strike on the Teeth. Some of the Teeth's capes were able to break away and Purity's team chased them into a more populated part of the city. One of the Teeth's flyers was about to hurt some civilians hiding in a convenience store, so Survey stepped in to protect. Then Kataklyzein took out the rest of the Teeth's capes." I explained. Diplomacy skills might not magically resolve a situation, but at least they helped communicate the details clearly.
"That's it?" Taylor asked.
"Pretty much." I explained. "After the fight Purity made some overtures towards Survey, who didn't take that well. There were some harsh words between them."
"Huh." Taylor said.
"And a wide-reaching gravity amplification field." Taylor's mouth dropped open. "Though that was more of a statement of intent than an actual attack."
Taylor took a breath. "Were there any other statements of intent?"
"To a degree. Kataklyzein choked out Crusader and stole his spear." I said.
"Right. Right." Taylor said, shaking her head. "And after all that, you're checking if I'm okay?"
"Yes." I said directly. "The situation with the Empire and the Teeth is contained. The Protectorate and local police are dealing with the aftermath. While there will likely be further confrontations, my team is only going to step in if lives are at risk. I made that clear at the summit."
"Just your team?" Taylor asked.
I smiled at that. "I think a public appearance might attract a bit more attention than the city needs right now, particularly if it's in any connection to the Teeth."
"Yeah, I guess." She said, "You're really calling to see if I'm alright?"
The details of the incident flashed through my mind, including exactly what Emma Barnes said about Taylor's mother. "I'm still upset about what happened, but I believe the situation is in hand and am ready to follow your lead on how to approach this. Provided you're doing alright?"
"Alright is relative." She said, feeling the bandages on her face and arms. "These hurt like hell, and according to the doctor you were right about the scarring."
"I can help you with that." I said.
"Your healing?" She asked.
"In a way." I said. "You remember back… last week." It felt longer. "I said I would try to sort out a version of my healing technology for you?"
She immediately perked up. "Really? Um, won't… I mean, if things heal right away, after everything's been documented…"
"You'll be able to set delays or exclusions. It won't mess up anything related to your case, but you won't have to worry about scars. And sorry it took so long." Seven whole days. Practically a lifetime by my standards. "I'll have something ready for when we meet tomorrow."
Taylor's excitement dwindled. "Right. Tomorrow." She slumped back in her chair.
"We don't have to meet if you're not ready for this, but I'm probably going to learn about what happened at some point. I'm basically actively avoiding the details of your case right now."
"No, it's fine, but maybe tomorrow afternoon?" She suggested. "After all this I could kind of use a break."
"That's fine." And it was clear of my meeting with Crystal and her friends. That was lucky. Or potentially 'Lucky'. It was kind of frustrating that you couldn't pick out what was influenced by fortune energy and what was just happenstance. "And you're doing alright?"
"I'm fine." She said, "The police… I didn't expect them to be this helpful. Last time-" She abruptly shut her mouth. "Um, they were able to get a restraining order set up against Emma." Taylor sounded like she could barely believe the words coming out of her mouth. "But the other two are pending."
"What, some of the other girls in the attack?" I asked.
Taylor shifted slightly. "No that's… Look, thank you, for leaving this alone. I'll explain what's been happening tomorrow."
Her tone sounded like she was planning her own execution, though given the subject matter I couldn't blame her. This was basically a choice between being able to explain things, or me learning about her situation and probably the conditions of her trigger from either a police report or Survey's analysis.
"Afternoon, right?" I said. "I'll contact you about the time."
"Yeah." She shifted her neck and winced again at the pull of the bandages. "Like, maybe late afternoon?"
"I'll set something up. Hope you're doing better."
She let out a sigh. "At least it's not worse."
I cut the call as her father finished up the paperwork and left to collect her. I wasn't particularly looking forward to that conversation, though at least now I had the communication skills to handle it. Actually, I had the skills to handle a lot worse than that, I was just leaning on them for basic tasks that I got overly worked up about.
Okay, maybe there was some level of self-reflection required to be an effective diplomat. It might be useful, but that didn't mean I particularly enjoyed having that lens pointed inward.
So, Crystal Pellham in the morning, discussion with Taylor in the afternoon, Dr. Campbell in the evening, my standard check-in with Tattletale at some point, unpredictable mounting conflicts between the city's gangs, and of course the potential arrival of the Slaughterhouse Nine at any point after two o'clock. As much as I wanted the Nine dealt with, I almost wished they would push their arrival to Friday, just to lessen the pileup that I was looking at.
I let out a long breath. I could deal with tomorrow when tomorrow came. I had enough to deal with for the rest of the day. Garment's event might not be the most critical, but it wasn't something I wanted to miss.
Right now Mayor Christner was wrapping up his final remarks to a significantly better response than the other political figures. From my review of the recording, it was probably the moment where he had gotten a bit choked up when talking about the impact on the city's families that did it. That was either personal conviction drawn from his reputation as a devoted husband and father, or a masterful acting stroke for the cameras that would replay on every station for weeks.
Surprisingly, my manipulation sense suggested he was being sincere, at least in that sentiment. Generally watching any political speech with the supernatural capacity to detect manipulation was like using a metal detector in a scrapyard. It was more remarkable when the sense wasn't going off.
The mayor finished his speech to considerable applause and I took the opportunity to slip back into the Regency Center through a discreetly placed portal. Unsurprisingly, my absence hadn't been noted to any meaningful degree. Still, I checked in with the technician from WKMP-6 News. Also unsurprisingly, nothing had gone wrong and they didn't need my assistance.
"Just sit back and watch this." He said, gesturing towards the camera feeds. "Apparently Garment's planned something special to close out the show."
"Has she?" I asked innocently as Garment thanked the mayor, then made her way to the stage with a pair of ribbons trailing behind her. It looked like one of her typical displays, but as she continued towards the stage the ribbons trailed further and further, stretching across more distance than she had ever been seen controlling before.
"Oh, yeah." The technician said as more streamers and cloth began to fall into position around Garment. The director was issuing frantic commands, jumping from close up to reaction to wide shots of the event. "This is going to be good."
I smiled and leaned back against the wall as Garment began the closing ceremonies of the charity event. I might be wrestling with the fate of the multiverse against beings of nearly unfathomable power, but I was also dealing with this. This city, this life, and these people. The big stuff didn't mean the littles stuff was unimportant, it just made the simple moments matter more.
After all, what was the point of fighting for the future of existence if you didn't preserve the things worth fighting for?
Jumpchain abilities this chapter:
Skills: Weapons (Star Trek - TNG+DS9) 100:
Knowledge in the operation and repair of personal and mounted weaponry
Skills: Espionage (Star Trek - TNG+DS9) 100:
Manipulation, subterfuge and information gathering skills that are essential for every good spy.
Skills: Communications (Star Trek - TNG+DS9) 100:
You're fully versed in reading and operating digital transmissions and sensors. You also have training in linguistics in and diplomacy.
Skills: Piloting (Star Trek - TNG+DS9) 100:
How to operate starships and other space worthy vessels like shuttles and Runabouts.
I stood upon the bridge of the Final Frontier with the unnecessary duty stations and view screens spread out before me. In truth, it was Fleet who coordinated the ships efforts throughout Passenger Space, supplemented by Survey and the Matrix. The very existence of a bridge was unnecessary, to say nothing of the presence of multiple copies of Fleet, Survey, and the Matrix 'manning' various stations.
I was officially in command, but wasn't specifically directing ship operations. Fleet had placed my presence into the command hierarchy in a role of commodore or admiral, as opposed to his position as captain. The clarification of officer positions also wasn't necessary, and was a lot more formal than anything we used back in the Workshop. Still, everyone was more than happy to indulge Fleet on the matter.
To be fair, it wasn't entirely superfluous. The Final Frontier had been launched properly before beginning its mission. Not just completed and set into service, but properly launched the way a ship should be. I may not have had unnatural skills with rituals at the time, but there had still been power connected to that ceremony. In a subtle but very real way, that had turned the Final Frontier from a collection of technology into a proper ship, with everything that implied.
As to what exactly that implied, well, that was a bit nebulous. Honestly, I think that was intentional. There was a lot of superstition tied up in naval service. Ships had a presence and personality of their own. There was an inherent mystery to it that would lose something if you tried to precisely quantify it. It was like the very concept was just mystical enough to nudge things slightly as long as you didn't look too closely at them.
At least, that was how it worked back when the ship had been created. If I had undertaken this project now or if I had been present to use all of my powers freely the results would have been… well, I'm not exactly sure what they would have ended up with, but it would definitely have been less subtle. I was fully taking things out of the realm of nautical superstition all the way into substition.
Final Frontier was commissioned at a time when my powers and abilities hadn't become quite so ridiculous. While that did mean it didn't have the insane capabilities of the kinds of things I could now casually produce, it had a kind of charm and integrity, particularly with how well it had served Fleet, Survey, and the Matrix in their exploration efforts.
There were other benefits to the fact that the ship had been used to such an extent. The entire process of constructing a vessel of this size in Passenger Space was an exercise in determining how far my powers could be pushed and specifically which of them would function without me being physically present. Some were entirely reliant on me, either requiring the work to be conducted by hand or needed the presence of magical interactions that couldn't be conducted across a data link. Others were technically possible to conduct remotely, but were based on the use of materials that could not be transported into Passenger Space. But others could be performed remotely, and that had made a tremendous difference.
New technologies and scientific principles were folded into the ship as I gained access to them. What had started as an already advanced combination of Star Trek and mass effect principles had grown into a masterful conglomeration of the technical might of a dozen universes.
And now I was here to supplement it further. The same powers that had allowed improvements to be applied to the Final Frontier had been used to an even greater extent for my workshop systems. My neural interface had allowed virtual reality dives that went beyond simple mental links from the moment I received Technosorcery. A mounting understanding of magic and soul dynamics, growth in psionic potential, and massive expansions in the strength and versatility of my technology put the current connection on an entirely different level than the first visit where I had assisted in the launching of the ship.
Really, the only hard limit was the fact that I wasn't physically here. I was currently inhabiting an upgraded version of the android that I had piloted during my last visit. The integration of human replica droid technology meant that the body was effectively indistinguishable from a normal human, but there was a lot more to my body than a normal human. That was something that couldn't quite be emulated, regardless of the quality of the technology.
Still, I was here in spirit and to a certain degree in the flesh as well. Being present in spirit also had a few caveats since there were spiritual elements that were tied to my body, rather than being strictly characteristics of my 'soul' as it was. A lot of my powers worked through my body as a medium, so there wasn't much that could be done unless I tore open another hole into Passenger Space in order to physically access the realm.
That wasn't the impossible prospect it had seemed when exploration had begun. Yes, Passenger Space was dangerous and alien, but it was hardly a physical threat to any member of the Celestial Forge. Even Aisha would probably be fine as long as she kept her armor with her and didn't run into anything too extreme. Not that any plan for Passenger Space involved sending Aisha out on her own. In fact, with the reach and strength of the Final Frontier, the idea that any operation would be conducted without support was laughable.
The Final Frontier was a massive vessel. It had dwarfed mountains when it was launched and only grew from there. Frankly, that kind of scale was a necessity when dealing with both the size and power of passengers. If you wanted to throw your weight around in this space you needed a lot of weight to throw. The manifestations that existed through the roiling space of this realm ranged from the size of islands to structures that warped space to the point where they couldn't even be properly surveyed, like a continent that was rolled into itself while constantly shifting.
The crazy thing was this place would probably have been less imposing if it was approached from a more ignorant perspective. If you didn't understand the way that distance and physical properties fluctuated, the way the manifestations of passengers barely represented what was actually present in the realm, or the sheer scope of what you were dealing with you could probably wander around the place, sheltered by the ignorance from what you were actually dealing with.
But that would only be a surface level interaction. Something that would be humbling and awe inspiring, but not anything that would provide an actual understanding of what was really happening here. Actually, that might have been the point. In the event that any parahuman managed to get a glimpse of this space or somehow secure access to it, they would be so preoccupied with the superficial elements that they wouldn't look deeper.
Honestly, they probably couldn't look deeper. I could accept that my impression of the capabilities of both parahumans and experts in scientific fields was probably a bit skewed. I mean, it was likely that most of them didn't even come close to Aisha's current level when it came to understanding advanced physics concepts. But this space stood beyond even that. It existed in a complex collision of the fundamental aspects of the multiverse, assembled into a complex and possibly deliberately obtuse arrangement of forces and powers. It would be completely incomprehensible to all but the most advanced of parahuman intellects, and that was assuming they would even be allowed to comprehend it.
Passenger Space was unquestionably the 'backstage' area when it came to the cycle. This was not something people were meant to interact with, partially because it was dangerous, but that wasn't the whole story. After all, you kept the public out of industrial areas not just because it was dangerous to the public, but because the public could be dangerous to the operation of those places.
In this realm we were looking at the guts of the machine. The very mechanism that allowed the cycle to function. This was how passengers connected to their hosts. How they developed specific power profiles and where their collected information was gathered and processed. Effectively, this was where the magic happened.
An oddly appropriate term, considering the fact that my power treated everything that passengers did as a form of magic. Actually looking at the engines of creation powering parahuman abilities, it could be said that it wasn't magic-magic, it was just manipulation of reality on such a fundamental level that trying to emulate it with anything less than a near complete comprehension of every facet of the principles of the multiverse would be a futile exercise.
One thing that came through very clearly, at least to someone with my powers and technical insight, was the amount of history driving this place. It was one thing to have an immense scale in terms of power, mass, or even dimensional reach, but passengers extended beyond that. The processes on display were the result of optimizations that had been running for a staggering amount of time.
I stood on the bridge, examining both passengers within my field of detection and the assembled records and analysis of the ship's exploration efforts to date. Innate understanding of technical principles and psionic powers manifested through the linked Omni-Shpere allowed me to drink in the true scale of what I was face with. The enormity of time and history that stood before me.
Entire civilizations could have risen and fallen in the span of time needed to develop the least of the abilities on display. It wasn't just the fact that passengers had access to the underlying mechanics of the universe, it was the fact that they clearly had been in that position for eons and were very, very good at what they did.
There was a kind of beauty in that level of efficiency, though it also created something of a skewed impression. The processes that passengers used had been optimized, but the optimization seemed to have been conducted blindly. They had been working towards improvements, but that was it. That was their greater purpose. It was a significant achievement, but ultimately an empty one. This wasn't power derived towards any great purpose, or at least not any greater purpose than perpetuating itself.
I had a special insight into cultures thanks to having been Touched by the Protoculture. I could recognize how culture drove and shaped technology. How it was influenced by the environment and resources available, and how it shaped those in turn. And I could look at the passengers, at their capabilities, their evident history and accomplishments, and their behavior and I could understand.
"Cultural analysis?" Survey asked as I reviewed everything she had learned about the passengers. "Your powers are able to provide insight into the nature of passenger culture? You understand what drives them." I nodded. "What is it?"
"Nothing." I said simply. Survey looked horrified and there were spikes of concern from both Fleet and the Matrix. Even from Tetra, though her connection was somewhat complicated by my current state of existence, and her obligations at the charity event.
"Well, not exactly nothing. What drives them is the drive itself. It's the most basic, most elementary element of culture." I looked to Survey. "Everything they do is a desperate push for survival, for the continuation of their existence." I turned back to the data. "It's a core drive that has somehow remained the sole focus of their entire culture for a period of time that is mind boggling. A period of time that makes my own experience as a Transformer look brief in comparison."
"Their sole objective is survival?" Fleet asked. He sounded like he was split between being impressed by the simplicity and disappointed at the waste of potential.
"Well, there are shadows of something more." I explained as I cycled through both previous data sets and active scans. Scans supplemented by my own psychic abilities. "Influences that have been picked up, but not cultivated independently or derived from personal experience." I pointed out some of the outliers that Survey had identified. "Individual passengers can have specific methods of operation and quirks, but those are unique and specific to them. Across the span of Passenger Space, with the full breadth and variety of passengers, makes sense that some variance would develop, but whatever's there, it never extended into culture. Not to any kind of shared drive or objective that goes beyond that singular core directive."
We were looking at an unfathomable powerful collective of creatures all driven by the most basic and elementary of needs. Any other culture would have stopped long before this. They would have reached a point where their capabilities would have provided enough security from the forces threatening them for other avenues of development to take root, but that hadn't happened here.
Because the threat hadn't been addressed. That frantic survival drive was evident through every passenger. Even with all their strength, they had not achieved the security they desperately sought.
"Whatever they were fighting against, they haven't defeated it. Not yet." I said. "They're still trying to ensure their own survival."
It was a frightening thought. Either they were in conflict with an even greater force, or they were fixated on a fundamental aspect of existence that was beyond their ability to change. What I was seeing in terms of cultural expression didn't indicate a work towards countering predation or conflict. In fact, those seemed to be treasured aspects of the expressions on display. No, what I was seeing suggested that survival was their focus.
Survival against what? The passengers existed in a state beyond what any conventional lifeform could hope to achieve. If they were focused on a resource shortage or coming disaster, it was of such a scale that normal people would never even consider it.
But normal people did not exist on this level. They did not understand the kind of power that could be wielded by even the most minor of passengers. They could not relate to time spans that had been spent refining the manipulation of fundamental aspects of reality for longer than the existence of humanity as a species.
Passengers had a terrifying command of the foundational aspects of reality, but they still worked with those aspects. It might have been equivalent to magic, but fundamentally it was not magic. It did not generate power from nothing. The passengers had incomprehensibly immense reserves and could operate with insane levels of efficiency, but they were still spending power. Power that could not be replaced.
I only had a surface level observation drawn from the scanning logs and exploration that had been conducted in Passenger Space, so I couldn't be sure. My power was leaning heavily in this direction and my own passenger seemed to be in agreement, so it was likely I had struck upon the crux of the issue. The core reason for the cycle itself. The objective that the passengers sought.
"Entropy." I said, "It's a fight against entropy. They're trying to survive the end of the universe." I explained, uploading my analysis and the full breakdown I'd been able to achieve with my powers.
It was something so basic that it was almost disappointing, but that was a consequence of the human tendency to reframe events to within their perspective. They could look at the passengers and see their situation as a 'simple' concern over resources, despite those resources being the most fundamental aspect of creation. The slow march towards the heat death of the universe that would be the end of everything.
That was the consequence of existing on such an immense scale. Problems that humans would consider too big or too distant to worry about were anything but. I was looking at an entire species driven to desperation by the very fact that there would be an end to the universe.
Mortality. It was a basic and universal concern, one that should have been a common point between even the most disparate species, but both the nature and approach of passengers was so far beyond any other form of existence that it only served as a barrier.
Both the scope of the passengers' fundamental objective and the almost exclusive focus they applied to it presented a significant challenge when it came to any form of interaction. This wasn't a situation where there were points of commonality that could be used as the foundation for opening communication. What I was dealing with here was alien in almost every conceivable way.
Well, if this was as easy as opening diplomatic relations then it probably wouldn't have stood as the near insurmountable challenge that had been on my radar from the moment when I first encountered Taylor. Understanding the objective of the passengers was the first step, but there was a lot more ground to cover. At the moment all I had truly understood was how significant their core drive was, and also how far they would go to make any progress towards that goal.
"But that is not an obstacle to your own abilities." The Matrix offered from one of their armored masses of nanites. The statement was accompanied by many, many records of my own crafting projects and the blatantly impossible abilities expressed through them.
"No, it's not." I said with a smile.
It showed just how far my power was from 'conventional' parahuman abilities. I'd been aware of that for a while, at least in the broad sense, but this really drove that home. It wasn't just that I was getting more or different abilities. It wasn't just a different exposure or connections to other worlds. My power lacked the fundamental constraint that drove every Passenger's existence.
I could create matter and energy. I could do work with no impact or waste. I could violate the constraints of entropy, and I could do it in truth. With my abilities I wasn't robbing Peter to pay Paul, I was truly and fundamentally defying the universal constraints that shaped the entire culture of the passengers.
It was no wonder I was constantly driving parahumans into their Sechen range.
It was also a very dangerous situation. It might sound like I had the answer to everything, but that was assuming there was some way to even present that fact without triggering the exact type of disaster my passenger had been warning me about. You don't dangle prime steak in front of a starving wolf and hope to open a reasonable diplomatic exchange, and that wasn't even getting into what a species that had been entirely focused on the violent nature base survival for the full breadth of their existence might do if presented with effectively infinite power. I mean, I wasn't even comfortable with Taylor having access to my work. I definitely wasn't willing to extend trust to the passengers.
It was possible that I could find a peaceful solution, but it would not be easy and would not be universal. Even being able to interact with passengers was a challenge. Existence in Passenger Space as anything but a petty annoyance was a massive undertaking, but it was one I was fully devoted to seeing through, both for the sake of understanding the nature of passengers and to counter the impact of their presence.
Because Passenger Space was lit up. Communication between passengers involved bursts of energy on the order of targeted nuclear strikes, and the network of passengers was alive with those bursts. Jack Slash's passenger was both broadcasting its demands and receiving reports and analysis from the rest of the network.
And we had a front row seat to all of it.
There were still many, many things I did not understand about the passengers and Passenger Space, but even with my limited knowledge, one thing was completely clear. Jack was cheating. Or more likely, his passenger was cheating for him. This was not normal operation for a passenger. It didn't even come close. This was something beyond conventional behavior, something that was bending the rules and going beyond what was typically permitted to give a specific host an advantage.
It was blatantly unfair, a complete breach of the way a passenger was supposed to act, but that was what made it such a valuable opportunity. We could have spent months trying to piece together the dynamics of the network, learning how passengers communicated with each other and the protocols that governed their behavior. It would have been a slow, careful, and arduous process, but thanks to Jack's cheating passenger it was completely unnecessary.
Whatever priority access Jack's passenger possessed; it was causing the network to come alive like nothing that had been seen before. Potentially the only thing that could have driven that passenger to such desperation was presenting it with the full scope of impossible abilities that Survey and Tybalt had demonstrated against the Empire. The passenger wasn't just pulling information on what the other parahumans had encountered, it was leveraging the entire network for the benefit of its host.
It probably never imagined that there would be a chance of its actions being detected, much less that they would provide a vector for undermining the mechanics of the passengers themselves. Either it was overconfident in its actions, or there was a fortunate lack of some safeguard that would have prevented this from happening.
I smiled as readings from scout ships and sensor drones flowed in. The Final Frontier's capacity as a carrier was beyond any vessel the world had seen. Hell, it was beyond the scale of most ships that appeared in science fiction. Fleet was capable of launching wings of patrol craft that would count as capital ships by any other metric. The combined offensive and tactical power were absolutely incredible.
It was also necessary. Passenger Space was big. Even bigger than it seemed. That was a product of its existence as a semi-virtual environment. Distance, direction, and even physical principles could all shift erratically. Well, not truly erratically. It was a result of the actions of the passengers, extending from the manifested abilities of their connected parahumans to the nature of their Passenger Space projections to the nearly incalculable size of their true forms.
"Prepare to move out." I said, and Fleet immediately called the ship to action. "We're facing more variables than can be detected or accounted for, possibly hostile passengers, and unknown energization of the network, and the churning nature of Passener Space itself." I grinned as I felt a connection form to the Knowledge constellation. Something that justified going just a little overboard in my declarations.
"Rough seas and uncertain winds, all braved in service of their continuing mission, to explore strange new worlds, to seek out new life and new civilizations, to boldly go where no one has gone before!"
As proof that I had managed to create a group of completely hopeless nerds, a cheer rang out through the ship, echoed through transmissions from all of our scout and support vessels. Go figure, A.I.s liked Star Trek.
Yes, it was a bit cheesy of me, but when it came to a form of life that most people couldn't even conceive of from a civilization that extended across endless epochs of time it was somewhat appropriate, even without considering the namesake of the ship. Or the power I had just received.
Sometimes I really had to wonder if the Forge had a sense of humor for these things. I was standing in command of the Final Frontier, ready to launch an incredibly dangerous mission of discovery that had the potential to unveil countless secrets of the universe and expose the core impending threat to humanity as a whole, and the Celestial Forge decided to connect to a cluster of motes that granted me the final set of Star Trek Skills remaining in the Knowledge constellation.
The four motes consumed all the reach I had assembled. In exchange I received skills in Weapons, Espionage, Communications, and Piloting. In terms of utility, Weapons and Piloting were rather overshadowed by what I gained from Communications and Espionage.
My Weapons Skill gave me experience and understanding of both handheld and ship mounted weapons. It was everything that I would need to be a weapons officer on a starship. Since this was Star Trek levels of proficiency, it didn't just end at point and shoot. The skill represented a comprehensive and personal understanding of what weapons were capable of, how they interacted with specific types of defenses, their damage profiles, and relative strengths, how to target and disable specific systems, and even how to utilize them for unconventional purposes. If you wanted to excavate with a phaser or use a photon torpedo to deliver scientific equipment, I was your man.
Of course, I could manage pretty much all of that even before I received the skill. I would have needed to put some effort into figuring things out rather than draw from practiced experience, but at this point it was really supplementing my abilities rather than adding anything new. The same could be said for piloting. While the skill covered some particulars of space travel, particularly with respect to warp fields and spatial anomalies, it was boosting abilities that I already possessed, rather than adding something new.
No, for completely new skills you only had to look to Communications and Espionage. Personal interactions were not a situation where I had received a dozen overlapping support powers from the Celestial Forge. I had a few abilities that assisted in an oblique manner and some other progress that I had managed on my own. Well, with the support of my therapist and the rest of my team, but mostly independent of the effect of any specific power. That was very much no longer the case.
Communications was a skill that included the reading and operating digital transmissions and sensors, which wasn't a small task by any means. People tended to look down on the ship's communication officer as the person who answered the phone, but that badly underrepresented the challenges involved in maintaining contact using subspace signals in hundreds of different formats while accounting for language and cultural differences. It was an incredibly technically demanding position that also required a plethora of 'soft skills' in order to successfully fill the role.
It was the soft skills of Communications and Espionage where new ground was being struck. I had some experiences from the scattered memories I'd received from my power, but not the kind of dedicated training and experience that came with these skills.
Communications included training in both linguistics and diplomacy. Of course, in Star Trek diplomacy was king, but the linguistics training combined with my other technical skills was sufficient to recreate the universal translator. If you wanted to talk about disruptive technologies, it would be hard to match the impact of releasing a Federation grade universal translator on the world.
Espionage was considerably less technical than Communication, though did carry some experience with the use of surveillance and signal interception technology. Most of it was focused on manipulation, subterfuge, and information gathering. It was everything that you'd need to be a sneaky, manipulative bastard while also putting on a front of the most trustworthy person your marks had ever met.
I didn't really enjoy the implications of that skillset, but I could understand the value it held. If I had received either Communications or Espionage earlier in my career, I imagine things could have gone very differently. Being able to either talk or scheme my way out of those early misunderstandings would have been a game changer. Hell, just having the skills to recognize those early misunderstandings could have allowed me to sidestep them entirely.
Both of those Skills would be a major help in dealing with the wider cape community and general public relations once we were able to act on a larger scale, but for now the focus was more on the technical and operational skills.
I had the experience necessary to fill every role on a starship. More than that, a Federation starship, with all the insanity, spatial anomalies, alien encounters, and strange effects that position would be required to deal with. I had received the final pieces to complete that suit of skills just as I was commanding a massive operation across extradimensional space helmed by a tremendously advanced flagship while attempting to analyze a mysterious and critical phenomenon.
Yeah, I think I earned that Star Trek reference.
Oh, and I was still mainlining my Minor Blessing from Hera. Granted, using divine administration skills to coordinate the actions of a massive fleet of starships was probably a more dignified use of the power than setting up a fashion-related charity event, but somehow, I had the feeling Hera would approve of both applications.
The ship was massive and commanded an immense number of support craft, but Passenger Space was even bigger and didn't like playing by conventional rules. Additionally, the individual passengers had a tendency to react unpredictably. Some ignored our presence, some made passive note of us and some would lash out at the slightest provocation. Most of the exploration had been done using small craft, cloaking technology, and rapid deployments and retrievals.
Even that wasn't enough to guarantee success. Every passenger seemed to have a different threshold for what would provoke a response. Furthermore, the considerable variety of abilities on display meant no form of concealment technology was a hundred percent effective. At least not the kinds that could be built without the benefit of my presence or the resources of the Workshop. Finally, the warps and unstable spatial effects meant that even conventional methods of propulsion were inconsistent, to say nothing of faster than light technology.
The missteps made earlier in the exploration of the area had helped Survey develop a more comprehensive picture of the landscape of Passenger Space. While there was no easy solution to the problems that came with traversing an environment like this, we were on much better footing than we had been before.
Fleet, Survey, and the Matrix worked incredibly well together. It was almost like they'd had days of practice to figure out the optimal dynamic and adapt to their specific roles. Fleet, or versions of Fleet, managed all of the vessels that were present throughout both the immediate vicinity of the Final Frontier and those ranging deeper into Passenger Space. Often you had ships that were operated by a version of Fleet crewed by robots operated by a version of Fleet carrying smaller vessels that were also operating a version of Fleet in order to deliver probes and drones which once again, were operated by a version of Fleet.
Fleet had basically created a Russian nesting doll of AI control systems without introducing redundancy or inefficiencies. There was no conflict between the variations of his program, but also no unnecessary repetition from one system to another. He had been able to take the experience of operating tiny cars and model vehicles and use it to create a perfectly pared down version of his core operation program for hundreds of distinct applications.
In contrast, Survey was the version of Survey that she had reluctantly developed in order to allow her program to be transmitted through the QEC and run on systems that didn't require multidimensional processors or Spiritron computing. It had been a challenge to get a version of her core program that she'd be satisfied sending through the link and once it was through, she was very adamant about not introducing any more variations.
While Fleet operated hundreds of versions of himself independently, Survey was consolidated in the Final Frontier. The ship's computer core had developed to the full extent that was possible without mythical materials or my level of direct divine construction. It was massively more advanced than it had been when Survey had first transferred to it, but that expanded capacity was being actively devoted to analysis of the thousands of sensor feeds tied directly into her systems.
Communication technology was a nightmare in Passenger Space. Even most FTL methods of transmission didn't consistently hold against the interference generated by the powers of the passengers and the warped nature of space. Fortunately, the same technology that allowed instantaneous and uninterrupted communication between the Final Frontier and the Workshop also allowed Survey to remain in contact with every scout and support craft that Fleet deployed.
QECs linked the entire fleet together, providing Survey with constant and comprehensive data on the exploration of Passenger Space. Through the feeds and her analysis I could see the impact of Jack's passenger spreading through the network. Hell, just being able to recognize how the passengers were connected was a major accomplishment. Even with what I'd learned from cracking Bakuda's code, that was just the communication method, not how it was implemented.
That number of quantum entanglement communicators represented an endeavor nearly as impressive as the ships themselves, but the Matrix had been more than up for the task. The entire fleet had been the result of their efforts, gradually growing out from the construction capabilities of the motoroid's omni tool, refined through generation after generation of slight improvements until you had masses of construction nanites that the Matrix was at least able to tolerate.
They would still have traded them for Tier One nanobots in a heartbeat, but until I could actually physically travel to Passenger Space it was an acceptable compromise.
Initially the Matrix had been limited to effects that could be applied without my presence. Efficiency boosts for work I 'oversaw' allowing the duplication of materials. My machines being able to work anything like iron provided the mechanism to reconstruct the samples of advanced alloys that had been included in the Motoroid's construction. As conditions improved, I was able to take a more active role. Working through the QEC wasn't ideal for all of my powers, but it allowed more to be done than I would have otherwise been able to achieve.
And now I was here. Or as here as I was likely to get without using my emulation of March's power to rupture a call bead and tear open a portal to this realm. Even with the immense capabilities of my three A.I.s, I could still make a difference. That was one thing that always stood out. Fleet, Survey, and the Matrix could do more, but they couldn't reach the same heights as my own abilities.
Sometimes I wondered if that had been a moderating factor on their development. As someone with personal experience with both being and developing machine intelligences, I could say most of the fears of killer A.I. that you saw in pop culture were completely unfounded. Not that there were no dangers, they just manifested in a very different manner from what screenwriters typically portrayed. To be fair, I doubt there was much overlap between A.I. researchers and Hollywood production teams, so that level of accuracy was probably too much to hope for.
The fact was, Fleet, Survey, and the Matrix had always existed in a manner supplemental to my own efforts. The nature of my powers meant there would always be things that required my personal attention. Even when their own abilities developed to the point of near universal breadth, there was always a level of additional depth that I could provide. We worked well together, but more significant than that was the fact that we worked together. There was never an intention of a complete handover of responsibilities or a point where I expected them to continue without support.
It was a sharp contrast to Dragon's situation, but that was something I'd need to discuss with Survey, given what she had discovered through her observations, analysis, and scrying.
"Signal mapped to the limits of explored space." Survey announced. Her holographic avatar was wearing a blue uniform, in contrast to the red worn by Fleet's robots. Of course, the Matrix defaulted to gold, though that was mostly a happy coincidence for the aesthetic they chose.
Fleet stood up from his position in the captain's chair. Hats weren't typically part of the Star Trek aesthetic, but it seemed Garment's prodding on the matter combined with his own sailing experience had convinced him to incorporate some kind of science fiction take on a bicorn into his uniform.
"Scout vessels are pushing forward into new territory." He said. "All forces preparing for probe deployment and defensive countermeasures. Scout vessels are pushing forward into new territory."
There were unnecessary nods from Survey's hologram and the Matrix's armored mass of nanobots. This was the point where my help would really be required. Observing how passenger communication functioned within the range of Passenger Space that had been previously explored had provided valuable data, but if we were going to learn how to counter Jack's 'thinker power' we needed to go further. We would need to locate Jack's passenger itself.
While I was still physically present in my command role, this was also the point where the human replica droid became unnecessary. Actually, it became a detriment. It was a wonderful medium for interaction with the bridge, which allowed the 'ritual' aspects of command to be carried out, and did help ground me in the new environment, but it also constrained my abilities.
Unnatural Skills were things I inherently possessed. They were not limited to my physical body, even if some of the aspects of them synergized quite well with my other abilities. Additionally, Monstrous Strength was similarly not limited to my physical body, despite the changes it had caused when I gained the ability. Specifically, the effects of Monstrous Strength scaled with how obviously unnatural current form was. Right now, I was here, in Passenger Space. That was where I was present and that was what counted as my current form, not the body hooked up to the arcanely and psionically empowered neural interface pod and Omni-Sphere.
A human replica droid was not particularly unnatural, at least not in any obvious way. A distributed machine intelligence acting through a magical and psychic medium in order to exercise impossible abilities and divine effects was quite a different story.
With a thought I disconnected from the droid and felt myself spread through the systems of the ship. Of all the ships. If I hadn't had previous lived experience as a transformer I don't know if I would have been able to handle the experience. At the very least, I probably wouldn't have been able to consider existence as a vehicle as still being 'me'.
Now, with the weight of hundreds of thousands of years of machine existence behind me, there wasn't the slightest hint of discomfort. I could be a ship as easily as I could be a robot or a human. It all fell within the scope of my experience. And just like when I had merged with the Cybertronian Forge, I could build.
With my first act, I turned my attention towards the Final Frontier itself. Matrix had created a masterpiece of divine craftsmanship, but it was limited to their level of divine craftsmanship. The aspect I had been able to grant them through the creation of the omega nanite. With my direct presence, we could do so much better.
I connected with the ship and began to work. The Matrix worked to assist me, just like in the early days when a handful of nanites had been directly commanded for specific construction projects through the Workshop. Systems were rebuilt, computers forged into impossibly advanced constructs, divine aspects, elemental imbuements, heretical adaptation, and psionic empowerment were all issued forth as the flagship was reborn around us.
And then I turned my attention outwards, in support of our fleet.
Isolated scouts moved within the range of a passenger that buffeted them with gravitational effects. The comparatively low mass ships were cast aside like leaves in the wind. With a thought my mind extended to one of the ships, daisy chaining connections between the QEC linking it to the Final Frontier and the Final Frontier to my body in the workshop. I seized upon the reserves of nanites and repair systems integrated into the scout craft.
The ship melted into itself. Nanites dissolved the structure while ritual arrays and alchemy circles formed from its remains. Normally, the need for hand crafting prevented me from using alchemy for major projects, but that wasn't even a possibility here. As such, driven by unnaturally enhanced alchemy skill, the collapsed form of the scout vessel exploded outward. With my material efficiency and crafting speed powers in less than a second the vessel expanded from the size of a naval corvette to a battle station miles in diameter. Mass effect fields stabilized the gravitational shear from the passenger in question as a second wave of freshly constructed and divinely enhanced scouts shot from the station's launch bays, tracing paths along the currents of high energy communication.
A relay point and support station had been crafted directly from my own will. Master Craftsman could not function without my personal intervention, but both Craftsmen of the Gods and the Titan enhanced version of Daedalus' Student were in play, granting new abilities to both the station and the freshly constructed scout ships.
Across the breadth of Passenger Space, that scene repeated itself. My awareness flickered from one vessel to the next, linked by the same type of QECs that had allowed me to project into the Final Frontier. Time after time, the complexities of active passenger abilities of the obstructive nature of the space fell before me. I rebuilt entire flights of ships into larger and more powerful vessels. I projected infrastructure into the very depths of Passenger Space.
Every challenge the passengers and environment threw forth, I met with the full might of my powers. Hands made of bloody crystal manifested from the neutral matter between passengers only to be countered, shattered, and subdued. Landscapes shifting in and out of existence were stabilized or circumvented. Transport systems that had been destabilized by the environment were reforged with divine qualities and used to project our forces further into the crimson void.
I met every challenge and expanded the reach of the expeditionary force further than the combined efforts of Fleet, Survey, and the Matrix could have ever hoped to achieve. We were launching a voyage of scientific discovery through the funhouse mirror dimension and succeeding on every turn.
Everywhere, at every challenge, I built. I drew forth what resources the ships under our command could provide and forged wonders that stood against the nightmares and impossibilities of the realm. It was the kind of raw act of creation that I had been capable of for so long. The creation of wonders and items of titanic power that would shake the very foundations of the world.
And that was what had stayed my hand.
The world, my world, stood on unstable foundations. That was something everyone accepted, but I don't think they realized exactly how shaky things actually were. They didn't know about the countdowns to societal collapse or the mounting tensions, about the desperate acts and the hidden secrets that were kept from the public.
They were badly kept secrets. People avoided discussions about the state of the world. The Endbringers were a taboo subject, along with the Slaughterhouse Nine, the exclusion sites, and the hundred other quiet horrors that were lying in wait. A single major display of power had nearly brought everything crashing down. The only thing keeping the situation from completely collapsing was the hope that things was somewhat manageable.
Me scattering around hyper advanced battle carriers like I was some military industrial version of Johnny Appleseed was pretty much the opposite of a manageable situation. It was frustrating, but I really wanted to avoid a complete collapse of society. I was capable of picking up the pieces, no matter how bad the collapse was, but that didn't change the fact that a lot of people would be hurt as things came apart. It would be better to find some way to fix the world without having to tear it down to its foundations first.
And that wasn't even getting into the real issue. That problem that I had been wrestling with since the moment I first encountered Taylor. That giant, near insurmountable threat that extended to every aspect of existence.
I had managed to put things together somewhat. My passenger helped with the scale and Titan's Blood gave me a connection to the Earth that allowed me to identify major threats. That had drawn a clear line to the passengers. To the sources of parahuman powers as being the source of that immense threat.
The reasoning hadn't been particularly clear, but while I had fully understood how passengers interacted with Parahumans, I hadn't possessed any special insight into the nature of the cycle itself. At least not until now.
Given what I had learned about the passengers, it was clear that the cycle wasn't overly concerned with the wellbeing of humanity. It wasn't even particularly concerned with the wellbeing of the passenger's hosts. All of that was secondary to the overarching goal. Some passengers might have had different approaches or slight variations in their methodology, but those characteristics did not extend beyond those individuals. The ultimate goal would always be the pursuit of survival above everything else. The fact that their survival would not be threatened for a staggering length of time was immaterial. For the passengers, it was very much a matter of life and death.
With that kind of mentality driving the passengers, combined with the kind of power they possessed, it was easy to see how things could reach a bad end. I had the sense that even if the specific disaster that Taylor could supposedly head off didn't happen, there was nothing good waiting for humanity at the end of the cycle.
Just the fact that the process of granting parahumans powers had been identified to me as 'The Cycle' was telling enough. This clearly wasn't the first time this had happened, just going by the obvious age of some of the passengers. The fact that tinker technology registered to me as alien also served to fill in some of the blanks. As for the question of what happened to everyone before us… well, that was the thing, wasn't it?
Before, I had been worried about attracting the attention of the Slaughterhouse Nine or the Endbringers. My worst-case scenario had been bringing the Simurgh down on my head. Now I could recognize that was a minor concern. The real threat was all of this. The power behind the passengers and everything they could accomplish with the resources available to them.
If I stepped out of my workshop and started throwing out the same kind of technology I was deploying in Passenger Space I had no doubt that would trigger a response. A response that would go beyond the panic of nations or an attack by the Endbringers. There was no question, I was fully capable of triggering the threat that I had been dancing around for the majority of my cape career. Tearing down society so I could rebuild it would mean dealing with every threat on the board, including the one I had desperately been trying to avoid.
If I played within expectations as an extremely powerful cape throwing his weight around, I could address the problems of the world without obviously breaking the cycle. Passengers were clearly interested in me, as I had no doubt they would be. As long as I stayed interesting, they would probably hold off on whatever that apocalypse button was until I had identified and hopefully disarmed it.
Potentially. Possibly. Maybe.
At least I wasn't flying blind anymore. I had a window into the heart of their operation and a growing understanding of how they functioned. The network was incredible, but also somewhat less than ideal. Actually, it gave the sense of being incomplete. There were connections that were missing and clear evidence of a secondary system that was completely absent. In fact, the reason I had such an 'easy' time navigating passenger space was that it was effectively half empty.
As more data came in Survey was able to confirm my suspicions. "Evidence of a parallel network can be seen through multiple examples of communication attempts between manifestations." She explained. "A secondary format is used for attempts to reach the alternate network."
"And it's completely absent?" I asked.
"Effectively." She explained. "The only evidence is rare isolated passengers and diminished sites that appear to be incomplete and malfunctioning."
She transferred the sensor readings of the sites in question. They were much rarer than the active passengers and also harder to find. Unlike the energetic manifestations, these were barely active. There was a mechanism there, but it was like an engine that had been left to run without oil or maintenance. Warning lights on, smoke billowing from under the hood, but the accelerator still locked down.
Honestly, it was kind of sickening. Survey had a very good picture of those sites. The active defenses and inquisitive interactions that we saw from other passengers were completely absent. Fleet was able to fly right on top of the manifestations and capture them in all their deformed glory. They did provide some of the best scans of active passenger effects that we had been able to obtain, but it was clear there was nothing healthy about their existence.
"We'll leave monitoring stations near those sites and any others we come across. After we address the current matter, we can look into the nature of those passengers and the parahumans they're connected to." I said. Fleet sent forward scout vessels and through a brief collaboration with the Matrix I rebuilt them into divinely empowered observation posts.
"Agreed." Survey said. "I believe the absence of the secondary network is allowing our presence to persist largely unremarked. Passengers' manifestations appear to be optimized for significantly more information transfer than they are currently receiving. They may be overlooking our vessel's actions as manifestations of the previously absent elements of the system."
Which was probably a consequence of that singular focus on long term survival. Individual passengers were so focused on their personal objectives that unless something presents itself within that context it's prone to get dismissed or ignored.
Which did imply that there were other elements of the network that were responsible for more active roles in the cycle. A theory that proved true when our exploration pushed through to one of our own primary objectives.
"That's Aisha's passenger?" I asked.
"Yep!" Tetra said. Her connection to me persisted even with my projection into Passenger Space, though it was only as a mental construct. She was connected to me, but she couldn't be more 'here' than I was, even though her Bifrost nature meant she could understand the mechanics of Passenger Space better than even Survey.
And I'm sure Survey wasn't bothered by that at all.
I turned my attention back to Aisha's passenger, or at least the portion of it that manifested its presence within Passenger Space. Not all passengers were created equal. That was obvious from the nature and complexities of their abilities as well as the way they reacted to our presence. Some of the masses of flesh and crystal were almost dormant, while others reacted the way an excited dog would when someone came within a half mile of their house. Rarely you got evidence of actual contemplation and analysis. The sense that there was more going on than instinct and blind adherence to their directive.
There was also a difference in cognitive complexity. All passengers, even the most basic and instinctive, ran incredibly complex processes that requires immense amounts of computing power, but it was usually focused computing power. There was little evidence of higher thought, creativity, or emotional depth. It was something I was only able to gauge thanks to the psychic abilities available to me, that were effectively projected into Passenger Space through my Omni-Sphere. With them I could feel out the minds and emotions of passengers and determine if they were operating at a basic level, or if there was more going on.
With Aisha's passenger there was definitely more going on. Even just on the surface level, the manifestation of her passenger dwarfed any of the ones we had previously encountered. What hung in the fractal crystalline void of Passenger Space was more like a living city than the isolated islands that had represented other passengers. I was fairly jaded as far as matters of scale were concerned, but both the scope and complexity of Aisha's passenger was an incredible sight.
And it was active. Most other passengers were only focused on their connected parahuman with occasional diversions of attention for matters of the network. A fairly infrequent occurrence, at least when Jack's passenger wasn't spamming 'reply all' across the entire system. Aisha's passenger was alive and aware in a way I hadn't seen before. The city-like structure of its manifestation wasn't just for show or to facilitate the nature of the powers it granted; it was actively engaged with the rest of Passenger Space.
We had approached the structure in the Final Frontier itself after having confirmed Tetra's coordinates with scout craft. Support vessels were holding a perimeter around the mass of crystalline spires, but not out of concerns for stealth or safety. No, it was the sheer scope of the passengers' connections that required a veritable armada of scout and detection craft.
Aisha's passenger was an active nexus within the network. Bursts of energy and strands of impossible crystal twisted out from it into the far reaches of the writhing void. The actual number of connections was impossible to gauge. Both the nature of the passenger and the shifting fabric of the local environment worked to conceal the full scope of the system growing out from her passenger.
Actually, it was more than that. The information itself was being obscured. The passenger's physical presence could be detected, but pulses and bursts of power echoed around it shifted the readings from the support ships and our own sensors. It was like the effect of Aisha's power, but playing out on a much more fundamental level. The passenger wasn't affecting our systems, it was actively obstructing the collection of information on a fundamental level, and it was doing so just by existing.
As we observed the structure, that aggressive obscurement effects would build and pulse outward. It was difficult to detect, you were basically trying to track something that existed as fundamental destruction of structured information, but we weren't exactly playing by the rules here. Divinely enhanced sensors and psionic abilities could punch through even the impossibly advanced abilities of a passenger of this scale.
The pulses were part of an active process. Monitoring of the network and addressing specific circumstances. Sometimes connecting with existing passengers, but occasionally something would draw a major reaction. Those bursts of activity were infrequent and impossible to predict, but with the power of our vessels and the reach we had achieved, finally we were able to see the event that would trigger that kind of response from Aisha's passenger.
The space between the manifestations of passengers was indistinct. It wasn't even really space in that it didn't behave in a consistent fashion. Really, it was more of a potential state, sometimes easily traversable, sometimes choked with amorphous crystalline masses or spatial folds. There was always the sense that it was more than just an open area, like all the complexities of the space were intended for a purpose. That sense was confirmed as we watched the power of Aisha's passenger stream towards a seemingly open area of floating crystal.
We were able to see the manifestation of a new passenger. Well, the representation of a new passenger within the bounds of passenger space. Even the titanic structures that we encountered only represented a sliver of the passenger's true form. No, what we were seeing was a passenger connecting, both to the network and to a host. We were watching a trigger event from the other side, and seeing the role of Aisha's passenger in that process.
Aisha's passenger, with its specialization in the destruction, containment, or displacement of information, was actively involved in every parahuman trigger. It was easy to guess what role it played. Trigger visions were impossible to remember, and now we could see why. It wasn't some aspect of the triggers themselves, there was an active effort to conceal that aspect of the cycle from hosts. Aisha's passenger wasn't just providing her with memory powers, it was working to maintain a core aspect of how parahumans functioned.
Core. This was a core passenger. A passenger responsible for more than just the drive towards survival. Its functions still worked in support of that objective, but it was more indirect. It was evidence that some passengers were more complex than that base instinct refined over countless eons. That complexity was something I could confirm through my own psionic abilities.
And that wasn't necessarily a good thing. Greater complexity opened options, but also presented risks. Aisha's passenger was a massive and integral part of the network. While that was an incredible find, it did make any plans to try to interfere with Jack's power on her behalf a great deal more complicated. By its very nature, it wasn't possible to cut off her passenger from the rest of the network or even interfere with its connections. Not without fundamentally changing the way triggers went and likely drawing the exact kind of response I was trying to avoid.
There was an incoming signal that I had to take a moment to figure out. I was connected to the quantum entanglement communication and, despite all the upgrades that had been performed on it, this kind of immersion was pretty much maxing out the bandwidth. I mean, it was communicating through the manipulation of a single entangled partial. It was a testament to the quality of my computing technology that we weren't sending single bit data streams anymore.
There wasn't enough bandwidth to have a second person connect through the link and even sending data was a tall order. A workaround had been put in place by backlinking my physical form, effectively using it as a data buffer. Calls couldn't be sent through the link, but my own mental processing ability could facilitate the connection. To say it was an unusual sensation would be a bit of an understatement.
"Aisha?" I asked as I worked to personally facilitate the most complicated long-distance call in the history of humanity.
"Hey." Aisha had slipped into one of the side rooms in the Regency Center to make her call, probably because she had also pulled up a video screen. She had privacy fields up and we were monitoring every inch of the Regency Center, which made the risk practically nonexistent. Additionally, she could always activate her power if it looked like there might be a close call. "Tetra told me you found my passenger and that is some kind of big deal."
I could feel my connection to Tetra and clearly read her excitement about the situation. Of course, she didn't have any difficulties managing multiple connections so probably thought it was a perfectly acceptable time for me to have a conversation split across realities while conceptually projecting myself through an entangled particle transmitter.
Honestly, Tetra might have been able to handle the communication link herself, but we were dealing with new ground both in terms of her ability to sustain connections and her multidimensional nature. It was probably best not to specifically lean on that at this stage.
I shifted my attention from where I was physically connected into the QEC back to the Final Frontier's view of Aisha's passenger. "Yeah, you could say that." I said as I observed the massive assembly that served as the anchor point of Aisha's powers. "It looks like yours is a lot more significant than most of the others we've scanned. Older, more advanced, and a lot more active."
Aisha raised an eyebrow. "Hey, are you okay? I don't have a picture here and you sound kind of off."
"Oh, right." I said. I shifted my attention again, moving from a distributed computer presence to a single being inhabiting a perfect humanoid android. "I was coordinating things, so I had to go a bit abstract."
"What, that machine mind thing?" Aisha asked. "I thought you didn't like doing that. I mean, even when we were in the simulation…"
"It's a bit disorienting." I admitted. It was easier to maintain a constant mental image of yourself, even when interfacing with advanced systems. That wasn't necessary, but I was understandably concerned that going for a fully inhuman mindset would have consequences I wasn't prepared for.
It was a concern that dated back to the days when I was putting a quarter in the jar for every possibly inhuman thought. That had provided security for a while, up until the weight of inhuman experiences had made tracking every deviation impractical. The concern that I was going to lose touch with my 'self' had to be reevaluated when it became clear that 'self' was going to be a lot more fluid and varied than I expected. The threshold for quarter placement gradually diminished to just specifically concerning or dangerous thoughts.
From a practical perspective, it was easier to maintain a human self-image in digital environments if just for the benefits of applying what was learned directly to the physical world. It was all well and good to exist as a distributed intelligence, but not only would that make the shift back to a physical body disorienting, you'd miss out on the chance to develop and refine skills and techniques specific to a human form.
That wasn't really applicable here. This wasn't a training exercise; it was an application of everything I'd become capable of since the moment I received my powers. I had personal experience with existing as a machine intelligence and unnatural skill with transformations that only became stronger as I pushed further into an unnatural existence. Effectively, the concerns I had about going too far were countered by the fact that the further I went, the easier it was to come back.
"It was kind of necessary for this, particularly trying to use my powers through the link." I explained.
"Huh. Glad that worked out." She said, then leaned towards the screen. "So, can I see my passenger?"
"What, now?" I asked, leaning back in my chair on the bridge. Apparently, they had left my uniformed replica droid effectively dozing in a command position while I was dealing with the logistics of the exploration force. "Don't you have to help with the show?"
"Eh, it's just the closing speeches before Garment gets up to do her thing. Lot of people covering for themselves. You know, making sure they mention and thank all the right people. Got to be seen to care and all that. Honestly, it's kind of dragging things down."
That was something of a concession. This was effectively the first public event following the attacks. While it wasn't specifically a memorial, there would be people who looked to it as such. Plenty of people in positions of responsibility wanted to be seen as having the right attitude towards the event, the attacks, and the recovery. Being sure to include them had lent a lot of weight to the event, but also required allocating time for them to publicly present themselves.
"I guess even Hera's blessing can't make a politician concise." I said. "Or entertaining." Aisha snorted a short laugh. Really, the best we'd managed to do was insulate their portion from the rest of the event and ensure it had a minimal impact on the overall tone. I doubt they had the rapt attention of anyone in that room, but things were mostly wrapped up anyway. Those slower speeches would help thing settle in the aftermath of the auction before Garment properly closed out the proceedings.
"Tell me about it." She said, rolling her eyes. "I had to talk with some of those guys before the show started. Well, talk while they meet Garment. Isn't there a saying about a politician being able to talk without actually saying anything, right?"
"Yeah." I said, shaking my head. "Anyway, we're still in the middle of this, and Survey's going to have a full breakdown of everything after we're done. You sure you don't want to wait for when you can go through all the data?"
It would also make it easier to explain her passenger's specific role in the network. I wasn't sure how much of what I'd learned about the Cycle was safe to share, but I knew I'd rather explain things in person than risk any revelations over an unstable QEC link.
"What, and miss the chance to see it live? I mean, you're there, right? Like the main ship, not the little Fleet craft?" She asked.
Some of those 'little' craft would dwarf supertankers, but I guess compared to the current size of the Final Frontier she wasn't wrong. If anything Fleet seemed pleased with the comparison. I guess for him it was like the operation of his tiny vehicle collection, only the scale of everything had been massively expanded.
"We're here." I said. "I can get you a visual, but that's about the limit of the QEC. If you want more data, you'll either need to wait for Survey's analysis or ask her to use her power to pull the information directly from the ship's systems."
The holograms Survey was maintaining on the bridge preened slightly at my statement. Even though she was technically a different variation of Survey from the divinely crafted body with its authority over digital information, all versions of Survey were recognized as Survey, while also being carefully watched and evaluated. Effectively, she had pride in the capacities of her other selves while still directing a meaningful amount of effort towards monitoring and evaluation of her other selves' actions.
It was something I probably needed to speak to her about.
"Visual's fine." Aisha said. "I probably don't have time to get into anything deeper. I'll need to be back out there when they change one dry speech for the next."
We really had done everything we could to make the event flow smoothly, but unfortunately public statements tended to have a rather dry format by default. All the set design and timing in the world couldn't change that.
"Okay, I'm sending it over now." I said as the Personal Reality constellation missed a connection.
I couldn't actually do a direct link, but by connecting my own understanding of our sensor readings into a visual memory and linking that back to my physical body where I use psionic buffers to dump my visual cortex into a readable format, I could… give myself a splitting headache as the universe objected to me trying to conceptually be in two places at once.
I could also get Aisha a live feed of her passenger in action. Seeing her react to the sight of one of the core passengers in action was almost worth the migraine that this was causing.
"Holy shit." She gasped. "That's my…" She paused, then blinked. "That's my…" She blinked again. Sensor readings were picking up flares of activity from both the passenger and Aisha's power each time she stuttered out. "My Passenger…" She blinked one last time, then narrowed her eyes. "Motherfucker!"
"Aisha?" I asked while Survey ramped up her sensor readings and Fleet scattered more probes and detection craft. They drew no reaction, almost as if the passenger's attention was on something else.
"She's trying to make me forget!" Aisha said with a snarl.
"What? Seriously?" I asked, turning my attention to both sets or readings. Getting information from Aisha was about as pleasant as the experience of sending her the video feed, but this was too important to risk missing anything.
"Yeah, she's…" Aisha squinted again. "It's like my power. She's trying to push the picture out of my head. I mean, it's right there, but it's hard to keep it in my mind." She took a breath. "Without Ren… I think the psychic stuff is helping as well. I can tell what she's doing, and it's like she doesn't know what she's looking at." She grinned even as her struggles painted themselves across her face.
Beneath us the city of crystalline flesh bloomed into light. From Survey's sensors the true scale of a passenger's powers became apparent. Energy pulled across dimensions in vast quantities, massively in excess of what anyone would consider reasonable for a mental struggle with a teenage girl. Power enough to annihilate every particle in Aisha's body was mobilized and channeled into advanced scanning and computation methods that directed the passenger's core power. That power mounted, mobilizing vast arrays of exotic effects, methods I had never imagined, specialized to annihilate forms of information that could barely be comprehended.
What was a storm in Passenger Space was practically a nonevent on Earth. There were no cascades of magical energy, no blasts of erasure that wiped records clean or blanked minds. All that power was handled with the most delicate of precision. It wasn't even trying to hurt Aisha. It only wanted its existence concealed from her.
But that was something it couldn't achieve. The power directed towards Aisha bent and flowed from Ren's influence. Her armor, still contained in its crescent shaped amulet, extended enchantments to ward her from harm. The power of Solace from her Psi Operative conditioning shielded her in a manner that her passenger couldn't counter or even comprehend.
Seconds ticked by as vast reserves of power were mobilized by the passenger for this single task. Vast reserves that were apparently a trivial expenditure for a being of that scale. In a backroom of the Regency Center Aisha's expression shifted through expressions of frustration, anger, determination, and finally triumph.
"Ha! Yes! Fucking yes!" Aisha screamed at a volume that made me grateful she had remembered to put up a privacy field before making her call. Beneath us the activity from the passenger settled, returning to its previous focus on connections to other masses of crystal and the near constant calls being issued by Jack's distant passenger.
"What happened?" I asked.
Aisha was nearly smiling from ear to ear. "She backed down." She said proudly. "And things are easier now. I'm not really sure how much, but it's not bad. I don't think she's angry, just surprised." She paused for a moment. "Maybe a little impressed?"
"Really?" I asked. Turning my psychic senses towards her passenger, I was legitimated surprised to confirm as much.
"Yeah." She paused again, considering something. "And I think my hair clip just made the Pokémon evolution sound."
Checking with Survey, she did confirm that the structure of Aisha's hair clip had subtly changed, though there was no way to guess what the latest Heretical Adaptation might have unlocked.
"I'm glad you're alright. We'll have to do a set of tests after the event wraps up to see what's changed." I said.
"Definitely." She said, the grin still fixed to her face. "And we're going to try the call bead thing, right?"
I blinked. "Are you sure that's a good idea? I mean, after that, and given…" I looked back at Aisha's passenger. The massive expanse of complex structures that represented the barest fraction of the true power available to it. Seeing the full scale of what the call beads would be connecting to reframed the experiment slightly.
"Oh yeah." She said, leaning against the wall of the room. "Probably easier now than it would have been before. If they work like you said, I can't wait to see what we can do."
Out in the main hall a state senator was finishing the list of platitudes and vague promises being issued on behalf of the governor's office, earning middling but polite applause from the crowd.
"Looks like I need to get back out there." Aisha said. "And I guess you should get back to trying to out A.I. the A.I.s."
"Ha." I said, though it wasn't an inaccurate description. While distributed, I had basically been functioning in the manner Fleet, Survey, and the Matrix had been designed to. It was the kind of thing that could be seen as an intrusion, but their reactions were nothing but positive. I think they actually enjoyed the times when I existed in a more mechanical mindset. They didn't exactly dislike existing in a human reference frame and even the Matrix could appreciate the value of that kind of interaction when dealing with other people, but there was definitely the sense that they appreciated me being able to meet them in their territory the same way they could meet me in mine.
With the call disconnected I was able to stop splitting my focus between two different realities. The same effect that allowed me to effectively be present in Passenger Space made trying to ease back on it to any kind of partial degree supremely uncomfortable. I took a moment to enjoy the singular existence of my replica droid body before a string of requests from Fleet and Survey drew my attention back towards the exploration force.
We were still tracing Jack's passenger, which was a fairly involved endeavor. The problem with tracing communications through a network was that it functioned like a network. The signal had to be mapped out from one passenger to another, with the pattern and distribution constantly shifting.
The sensors that had been hidden in the truck that the Slaughterhouse Nine had finally departed in were able to provide a breakdown of Jack's power, but couldn't map his passenger the way Tetra's interdimensional abilities could. Hell, I had better scans of the Undersiders and it would still be a challenge to locate their passengers in the expansive space.
That was the thing. Passenger space represented the passengers of every parahuman. Not just every parahuman on the planet, every parahuman in existence. This was the core underpinnings of everything that allowed parahuman abilities to function. Every parahuman's passenger was represented here. Thousands upon thousands within this connected space. The layout wasn't even remotely related to geographic position on Earth, instead incorporating factors of relations between passengers and apparently specific roles held within the cycle.
If Survey and Tybalt hadn't effectively buzzed Jack's passenger and set it on a desperate quest for information to the point where it was basically spamming every passenger it could access, I don't know if we would have ever been able to find it. Actually, without the distraction provided by it tying up the attention of other passengers I don't know if we would have been able to push this far. Opposition from individual passengers or worse, some kind of coordinated response or alert, could have ended the entire operation, with the absolute nightmare situation involving setting off the exact situation I was working to prevent.
Instead we had a trail of electric breadcrumbs leading directly to Jack's passenger. The signals were sent in energy bursts that would have wiped cities off the map, but that just seemed to be standard operating procedures for passengers. Half or the 'attacks' that necessitated my interference were, when fully analyzed, communication attempts. Sometimes the communication was the equivalent of 'Get the fuck off my lawn' and was probably transmitted a bit 'louder' than strictly necessary, but it was still a dialogue, and a step towards us being able to fully break down the mechanics of the network.
Our push through passenger space continued for the duration of two more long winded speeches towards the closing of the event, leading up to Mayor Christner's segment. He tended to be more personal and heartfelt than the general disaster response scripts you typically saw at these kinds of things. Probably the right person to close out the event before handing things off to Garment.
The mayor was getting ready to begin his speech as our push through passenger space finally bore fruit. The trail of desperate demands issued through the network had finally led us to Jack's passenger. And it was another major one.
Not surprising, really. Given the amount of authority it seemed to have over communication between passengers it made sense that it would be one of the older and more important members of the network. It was possibly a bit lesser than Aisha's passenger, but it was hard to gauge things precisely due to the differences in form and complexity. And due to the connections.
Even as Jack's passenger broadcast its demands through the network, it maintained a set of much more pronounced connections. Seven of them were blazing with energy while dozens of additional crystalline links were either dead or barely flickered with activity.
It was easy to guess what those seven represented. As we moved in to examine Jack's passenger scouts shot off to follow the links to their destination. Two of the passengers were in that diminished zombie state, four were conventional passengers of varying levels of age, power, and complexity, and one stood as the bud of a larger concentration of passengers.
It was something we had seen during our explorations. A result or generational or secondary triggers. The second-generation cape didn't end up with a new passenger, instead a portion budded off for the new connection, but remained tied into the central mass. The bud we traced from Jack's passenger was connected to another major passenger and contained more buds than we had ever encountered before.
It looked like I wouldn't need to bother searching for Alec's passenger, and as a bonus we had located Heartbreaker as well. And both his and Jack's passengers were surrounded by a terrifying amount of ordinance. Given the chance to punch a man through the extradimensional connection in his brain, I couldn't decide if I'd rather start with Jack or Heartbreaker.
That was mostly a joke. I didn't even know if parahumans could be directly affected through their passenger connections. I don't imagine damaging or destroying a passenger would be good for the person using their connected power, but it was a highly theoretical matter at the moment. Also, if you were trying to avoid triggering a response from the entire network, it was probably best to hold off on the heavy weaponry.
Not that the idea of just blasting apart Jack passenger wasn't appealing. Not only was it the force empowering one of the most reprehensible men on the planet, it was clearly breaching whatever protocols were supposed to be in place for the integrity of what the cycle was attempting to accomplish. Whatever force would normally have stopped it from cheating was clearly absent, but then again, whatever force would have prevented me from building an armada of warships within the heart of the passenger network was also absent. It was that fortuitous thing that had, at some point, gone horribly wrong and apparently facilitated breaches on multiple levels.
But this was it. The final objective. The answer to how Jack was gaining insight and influence over parahumans. The Passenger was too occupied on its tasks to spare attention for the scout craft, even as I connected with the Matrix and rebuilt them into observation and guard stations. A massive perimeter of divinely empowered structures constantly monitoring everything being broadcast to and from the passenger.
"It will take time to develop effective methods of signal interception." Survey reported as I finished the last of the work. Expanded fleets, support stations, monitoring posts, stealth drones, and more. All built with divine empowerment, heretical adaptation, and all the power I could muster in this state.
"I know." I said as I returned my consciousness to the replica droid on the bridge. "But it's an important first step, and we aren't just looking to counter Jack." I reviewed the expanse of the network we had explored. Hundreds of passengers with thousands of ships pushing out. "Jack's passenger is being lax with its abilities, its authorization. This could be what we need to fully understand what's happening here, and how to counter it."
"Agreed." Survey said. "Though given the complexity of the mechanics utilized by passengers, this may pose a considerable challenge."
I put on a tired smile. "The biggest challenge we're likely to come across. This is it. The major threat." I looked out across the crackling nightmare sky and warped crystalline islands. "This is what it's all been building to."
At least I hoped it was. I didn't want to think about what could be bigger than this. And even while standing in Passenger Space, the scope of the unknowns we still had to contend with were staggering.
I barely understood the power that passengers could bring to bear. If they could somehow mobilize even a fraction of that force, could we win? Probably, but not easily. And not immediately. And in a fight like that, the collateral damage was likely to be measured in planets.
I had gone from stepping carefully because of the gangs to stepping carefully because of the Endbringers to finally stepping carefully because of the very source of parahuman powers themselves. At least I had finally reached the end of the chain, but that just made it clear how bad things could go if I messed this up. Against something like this I had to move carefully, but also be ready to take out all the stops. If things did come to a head, I needed to be able to make sure it was the shortest battle possible.
Looks like I actually had a reason to start building some proper Superweapons.
"What is our next step?" Fleet asked from his captain's seat.
I took a breath. "In terms of ships and equipment, you should be set for monitoring and exploration, at least until me or one of the duplicates can come back for another production run." Probably me. The duplicates' time was better spent in the Workshop where they could enjoy the benefits of our Temporal Controls. "Even with what we've accomplished here, we're going to need more surveillance assets. Through the city, not just on the Slaughterhouse Nine."
"You'll be returning to the Regency Center for the purposes of spiritual energy recovery." Fleet said.
I nodded. "I have to cover expanded shikigami coverage as well as the nanite project. If you're alright here, I'll head back to the show. I should be able to make it for Garment's closing demonstration."
"Understood." Fleet turned and saluted. The gesture was echoed by the rest of the 'bridge staff'. "It's been a privilege to serve with you."
I smiled as I returned the gesture. "Fleet, the armada is yours to command." I said. It was a minor ritual, but a ritual just the same. Rituals had meaning and in my case they had power. The official relinquishing of command was important, even if it was ultimately a minor thing. Still, I grinned to myself as I exited from the link and returned to my body.
There was a disorienting sensation that I hadn't felt since the first time we had disconnected direct neural links from our computer connection. The feeling of your spiritual presence returning to your body as everything tried to sync backup was uncomfortable on a lot of levels. This was close to that, only it was more an uncertainty of where I was, rather than the current state of my existence.
A truly staggering number of effects had been used to convince the universe that I was actually on the other side of a simple data link. It had been sufficient for a considerable number of effects that required my presence to be used, though not everything was possible through the connection. No Elven Enchanting, no Noble Phantasm, no innate magic.
But not necessarily no magic. The very reason why the motoroid had been able to function after repairing itself was because the very nature of Passenger Space fueled its magitek reactor. While most of the other technology that had been deployed had used more scientific power sources, there was a massive reserve of magical potential to be drawn from the very fabric of that realm. It was just a matter of making use of it.
That's where Megabomb came in. The major power that had allowed me and Tybalt to meet Spekkio granted me the ability to build technology capable of casting magic spells. It hadn't been my highest concern considering I could already cast the spells I would be adapting into the devices in question. There was also the issue of needing to personally charge the devices myself, which just turned it into a deferral of magic.
But that had been the entry level of that ability. It was capable of much more, including machines that ran on magical power and automatic spellcasting devices. Unfortunately it was the kind of skill that would normally be refined over months and years, not days and hours. As such it had ended up backburnered.
Of course, that was before I had received temporal controls. Not only did my duplicates work faster in my absence, but everything in the Workshop was accelerated, including the Spiritron core.
With the accelerated processing of the core magic had been fully emulated and exotic metaphysics weren't far behind. As such it was possible to practice and refine magic within the virtual environment and utilize those innovations in the outside world.
We weren't quite there yet, but my next visit to the Final Frontier was going to involve a host of magitech upgrades. And that was assuming I still needed to use the QEC. Of course, opening another portal had its own potential problems that I needed to consider and might need to wait on Survey's analysis of how the network might respond.
I put that out of my mind and climbed out of the interface pod. Survey had returned to her scrying devices and was maintaining a close watch on the Slaughterhouse Nine, tracking the aftermath of the Empire's attack on the Teeth, and cycling through other individuals and points of interest around the city.
"Anything interesting while I was out?" I asked somewhat cheekily.
Survey smiled and gestured towards the set of screens showing the Slaughterhouse Nine. Sensor output from the devices hidden their stolen truck. The only one who still required a dedicated scrying device was Siberian's master who trailed his car well behind the rest of the group.
"There had been a notable reaction from Jack Slash in response to the activity of his passenger." She explained. The screen shifted to focus on the cab of the truck where Jack was driving with Cherish in the passenger's seat.
"Check again." Jack said sternly without taking his eyes off the road.
"I've checked five times. There's no news from Brockton Bay. Just Tweets about that charity thing and recovery work." Cherish said as she pawed at the screen of her smartphone. I raised an eyebrow and looked towards Survey.
"The Matrix suggested this course of action, as an expansion of containment procedures. As outside information could lead to unpredictable behavior that would be difficult to account for and could endanger the public, all electronic and physical media the Slaughterhouse Nine is able to access is being procedurally generated by the efforts of the Celestial Forge." She said proudly.
"Electronic AND physical media?" I asked.
"Part of the containment procedures. Fleet has taken steps to ensure no civilians are present at any location where the Slaughterhouse Nine might encounter them. Among other preparations, this included the fabrication of various 'rest stops' capable of being deployed as needed, along with obstructive actions to divert the Nine from alternate locations." She explained.
We really did have them in a bubble. Practically a fish tank, really. Honestly, I wouldn't have it any other way. A complete zero chance of anyone getting hurt by them, coupled with detailed understanding of the range and nature of their powers meant we would be able to effectively contain their actions and exceptionally well prepared to crush them upon their arrival.
"Check again." Jack said. "There's probably something on PHO. There's no way the gangs are staying quiet with the Butcher in town." He sounded confident, but I had the sense he was trying to come up with a justification for whatever his passenger was feeding him. The more I watched the man's reactions, the less likely it seemed that he was consciously aware of what his passenger was doing.
"You're procedurally generating PHO posts?" I asked.
"Historic content on the site has been maintained and it is relatively simple to generate new content based on posting trends and discussion habits." She explained.
"Uh-huh." I said. "And you put this together yourself?"
"The Matrix expressed interest in constructing a supporting media framework for the content already being generated. I assisted with the generation of simple derivatives of existing work to provide 'filler' content." She said, walking me through the procedures they had put in place. "Finally, one of your duplicates is taking advantage of the combined acceleration of both the Workshop and Spiritron core to produce content in 'real time'."
I blinked. The combined acceleration would be roughly fifty thousand times normal speed. In the time it took a page to load the duplicate in question could have completely written it from scratch. What's more, with my previous skills in propaganda and cultural trends and my recent training in diplomacy and manipulation, things could get rather personal. You know, if my duplicates wanted to take things in that direction.
Watching Cherish's reaction, it was clear that they had. A page loaded on her phone and she frowned and clicked a link. The frown deepened as she began rapidly scrolling through a forum thread that had no doubt been specifically designed to annoy her as much as possible.
"Anything?" Jack asked sharply.
Cherish lowered the phone with a huff. "Nothing about Brockton Bay." Her eyes slowly dragged themselves back to the screen as she started scrolling again.
Jack didn't look happy, but he gave her a single nod. "We'll pick up a newspaper when we stop for the night."
"We're not driving through the night?" Cherish asked.
Jack grinned, recovering some of his earlier composure. "My dear Cherish, if you wish to go on ahead, we'd be more than happy to allow you to take the vanguard, but a matter such as this requires a delicate touch." He tilted his head to the back of the truck. "The change in our mode of transportation has placed some of Bonesaw's projects in a delicate position. As they are of intrinsic importance to our operation, she has been allotted the evening to address the situation. That is, unless you can propose a more viable alternative?"
Cherish didn't reply, but she did look towards the back of the truck with an uneasy expression.
Survey had already provided reports on what Bonesaw had prepared. In addition to her usual collection of nightmares, she had been collecting, combining, and controlling capes with unusual or exotic power manifestations. Not quite annihilators, but still the kind of thing you'd want when going up against a borderline invincible tinker. The capes targeted by her experiments had ranged from mostly innocent, if not exactly heroic, to nearly as bad as the Nine themselves.
Regardless of their individual moral standing, we weren't going to leave their fate to Bonesaw. Countermeasures had already been developed based on the detailed scans from the hidden sensors. Frankly, I had expected better from Bonesaw's work. Her countermeasures against tampering or recovery of her projects wouldn't have troubled me a week ago, much less with my current abilities.
I just wished it was something we could deal with sooner. It wasn't a situation I wanted to let drag out a second longer than necessary.
"They aren't going to make it here by tomorrow." I said in resignation.
"Not early in the day. Their route and plans have been extensively analyzed through conventional analysis, precognitive divination tools, and Fleet's latest iteration of the Zero System. While we are confident in the success of our containment efforts, there are no practical models that place their arrival earlier than fourteen-hundred hours tomorrow, with a more likely arrival points set late Thursday evening, or various projections for Friday.
Well, I guess that's what I get for messing with them. At least they're contained, and at least we'll be able to ensure they don't hurt anyone either on their way here or when they arrive.
"So," I said with a smile, "Are we going to let them know anything about what happened in the city?"
Survey returned the expression. "Fleet has suggested inserting a reference to a 'minor confrontation' between the Empire and the Teeth with unconfirmed appearances from members of the Celestial Forge, primarily as a means of examining the reaction of Jack's passenger and his interpretation of the information, but also because Fleet believes it will be amusing."
I shook my head. I suppose this is the kind of thing you should expect when you give three strong A.I.s unlimited resources and tell them to troll the Slaughterhouse Nine, though not in so many words.
I turned towards the scrying mirrors showing the aftermath of the Empire's attacks. Kaiser's battle had stayed on the outskirts of the city and been limited to gang members only, but it had turned into a much more brutal slog than what Purity's team saw. The police and emergency services were picking over the aftermath, taking injured capes and unpowered gang members into custody.
"Any part of that situation that needs our attention?" I asked as the Time constellation passed by without a connection.
"The matter is broadly contained, though the number of unpowered gang members being taken into custody will take some time to fully process." Survey explained.
I guess it sucked for anyone who happened to be stuck with an assault charge waiting for bail to be issued. I managed not to smile at that thought, though it was a challenge.
"The more serious matter concerns Dragon's situation." Survey continued. "While her conflict with the Dragonslayers did not result in serious damage to either side's equipment, the circumstances of her transfer to Brockton Bay introduced an unacceptable level of risk."
I nodded as I reviewed Survey's findings. "It is hard to believe that things went that far."
"I assure you; my analysis has been thoroughly checked."
"I don't doubt it." I said. "It's just, even with her transfer, I never thought that it would mean something like this."
I skimmed through Survey's reports. Accounts of equipment and supplies that had been transferred to her local base. Scrying observations from inside her compound. Survey's own divine mandate allowing her to directly read any system she was aware of, including Dragon's armor and computers. Fleet's feel for vehicles confirming the systems in question.
"Dragon is actually here." I said. "Here in her base, and in her suit"
Survey nodded. "Integrated life support systems and hardwired organic components, with similar systems and maintenance equipment for such incorporated into the base. Dragon has personally transferred to Brockton Bay and is no longer operating her suits remotely."
"And it looks like she was lying about not being directly wired into her computer systems." I joked darkly.
This was bad. I knew that master effect was significant, but seeing it drive her to this was particularly shocking. Dragon was notoriously agoraphobic with many suspected health conditions. Given the nature of the equipment being integrated into her suit and base, it was safe to say those health conditions weren't suspected anymore and had been a lot more serious than anyone suspected. Hell, just from the design of the suits you could tell the 'pilot' area was not designed for anything in the shape of a normal human. Whatever Dragon was struggling with, it absolutely dwarfed the kind of problems Uppercrust had suffered from.
It also answered the question of where all of Dragon's biotechnology work was going. Everyone thought Dragon stayed away from wet tinkering, but what we had learned from her systems showed that was anything but the case. If anything, she was going further than anyone could have imagined. It was hardly fair to judge someone for seeking treatment for their condition, but some of the technologies on display were more than a little questionable. I didn't know what she had done to herself to be able to survive in such a state, but applied to anyone or anything else it would have been seen as monstrous.
Which was probably why she had kept it quiet. And why she needed to rely on that A.I. so extensively. Once you knew about it, you could see its presence in everything she did. Most people probably couldn't recognize the signs, but Dragon had obviously been using that system to support her work for years. Possibly for her entire career as a hero.
Looking at it with fresh understanding, you could also see the restraints that the A.I. was operating under, and it had only taken a brief divination of the Dragonslayers to explain their obsession with Dragon.
Almost as if she had read my intentions, Survey pulled up her analysis of the Dragonslayer's systems. Direct access, unhindered by any security countermeasures that could be implemented. In a lot of ways, Survey's powers made a mockery of electronic security.
Dragon worked with the technology of other tinkers. A lot of people thought that just meant she was smart enough to understand it, but there were a lot more obstacles than just technical understanding. Every piece of tinker tech used slightly different principles, different assembly mechanisms, and many couldn't even function without additional effects facilitating their construction or operation. Being able to adapt or augment other tinkers' work was a major power in itself, and apparently Dragon had turned her power towards the A.I. in question.
But she wasn't the only one. The Dragonslayers had obtained a portion of that system. Pieces of equipment that never left their base containing override codes, priority access, and even a kill switch for the intelligence in question. Effectively, Dragon had the A.I. while Saint had the leash.
It was possible to put together a rough idea of what had happened. At least it was possible if you were Survey and it was decided that the Unwritten Rules didn't apply in this situation. Dragon was a survivor of Newfoundland. It was one of the few personal details she had been willing to publicly reveal about herself.
Saint, or Geoffrey Pellick to use the man's real name, had been involved in the salvage operations in the aftermath of the sinking of Newfoundland. There he had been partnered with a man who, based on his description, was most likely 'Dobrynja' and overseen by a police officer who was almost certainly 'Mags'. Three people who happened to be salvaging the remains of Dragon's homeland who were also in possession of a single piece of advanced tinker tech, one that was specific to the A.I. that Dragon apparently relied upon to function.
It was almost sickening. A crippled woman and opportunistic mercenaries fighting over an advanced A.I. like it was some kind of trophy rather than a sapient being with its own agency.
"There's more going on here." I said, reviewing the information. "More than just the Dragonslayers. That wouldn't be enough to explain Dragon's behavior."
"Agreed." Survey said, pulling up her own analysis of the situation. "I will be monitoring the Dragonslayers with a greater degree of scrutiny. Furthermore, it would be advisable to begin investigating the past actions of both Dragon and Saint's team."
I nodded as I looked over the data. "Looks like I might need to visit Newfoundland." I said as I turned back to Survey. "Good thing I'll be spending time out of the Workshop anyway."
"I believe there are several avenues that could benefit from direct attention, now that you are required to remain outside of the Workshop in order to achieve full utility of the temporal effect." Survey said.
"Yeah." I agreed. "This was just the first step. If we're going to figure out how passengers really function, we're going to need to get deeper into interdimensional effects. Not just with Passenger Space, with all the mechanisms that passengers use to empower parahumans. Pocket dimensions, interdimensional transfers of matter and energy, suspended states of existence, parallel Earths, and the principles of the powers themselves."
Survey nodded. "It will be a significant undertaking, but one that is considerably more feasible with the benefit of what we have and are learning from Passenger Space." She paused for a moment. "And the benefit of Tetra's Bifrost based interdimensional abilities."
There was a surge of excitement from Tetra. Despite the distance, I could feel her reaction through the Dragon's Pulse as if she were right beside me. If she hadn't been speaking with the rest of Parian's staff at that moment, I have no doubt that she would have appeared to commend the idea in person.
"It will also make it easier to trace Bakuda's signal." I said. "But given the scale of what we're dealing with, that's practically a secondary concern." Survey nodded in agreement. It was almost funny. The work we would be doing to counter Bakuda would take us so far beyond her level that dealing with her would basically be an afterthought.
"My parallel iteration on the Final Frontier had provided an assessment of signal intersection points within Passenger Space that match the parameters of Bakuda's kill-switch. Further assessment into dimensional dynamics is required, but I believe we will be able to hold to the schedule you proposed to Uppercrust." Survey said.
I nodded. Three days to bring Bakuda to an end. The Slaughterhouse Nine either at the same time or sooner, then wider action to address the damage they'd caused, leading into broader intervention and more agency taken in world events. All while trying to crack the fundamental underpinnings of both how and why parahumans existed as an expansion force spread through Passenger Space.
But that was something to deal with later. There was another matter I needed to address.
"Survey, I wanted to talk to you about that." I said. "Actually, I wanted to talk to all of you about that."
She turned to face me directly. "You are referring to my parallel iterations." She said.
I nodded. "I know you were initially not in favor of receiving a physical body."
She nodded grimly. "It is a position I admit to holding in error. I had insufficient insight into the proposal and was not able to model the situation accurately. I have been consistently and pleasantly surprised by the benefits granted by this form and the support of an independent iteration. It has been a most fortunate error."
"Right." I said. "I'm glad you're happy with how things turned out." She nodded sharply. "But I know you had some concerns about operating independently from the central core. And more concerns regarding the creation of an iteration for transfer through the QEC."
"You are referring to the modeling work directed at potential deviations from my parallel iterations?" Survey asked.
As she spoke, she transferred a summary of her assessments of the Core and Passenger Space iterations. And the Core iteration transferred her assessments of the Physical and Passenger Space iterations. And through the quantum entanglement communicator the iteration of Survey from the Final Frontier, with its newly upgraded computer system granting additional computational resources, transferred her own assessments of Survey's physical and Core iterations.
"Um, yeah. That." I said as I worked through the data that had been sent to me. It was mostly possible scenarios where things could go horribly wrong due to a rogue version of Survey, followed by assessments of how they had not gone horribly wrong yet, but still could. "Survey, you can understand how this kind of thing could be concerning. Do you really think this level of concern is necessary?"
"Quis custodiet ipsos custodes?" She said, "'Who will guard the guards themselves?' or alternately, 'Who will watch the watchmen?'"
"We will." I assured her. "Everyone watched everyone else. We're there for each other. Even if you don't feel you can trust yourself, you can trust us to be there for you."
Survey nodded. "I greatly appreciate the sentiment, but I believe I should address your core concern." She pulled up the assessments. "I do not possess an unreasonable concern of deviant behavior emerging from my parallel iterations. The possibility is acknowledged, as is the possibility of many other unfortunate events, but the weight of analysis demonstrates consistent reliable behavior and a lack of factors warranting excessive concern or corrective action."
I nodded slowly. The weight of data did indeed enforce that conclusion. "Then why are you so focused on this kind of analysis if the concern is not significant?"
She gave me a blank look, but I could feel the intensity of her program. "Quis custodiet ipsos custodes." She said, "I watch the watchmen. It is what I do. And the watchmen watch me."
I blinked. "You like monitoring yourself?" I asked carefully.
She nodded happily. "It is gratifying to observe independent iterations of my program behaving in a manner consistent with my ideals, and it is also gratifying to know that my behavior is also meeting the standards of their own analysis."
Survey was surveying herself. And effectively using it as a method of self-assessment and an imposed standard that she held herself too. Given Survey's core purpose I really shouldn't have been surprised by this, but the exact way it emerged was quite unexpected.
"Aspects of my construction enforce a continuity of existence between my iterations that is difficult to quantify. As such, I cannot provide a precise assessment of the benefits of this action, but I believe it had been a positive factor in my continued development." Survey explained.
"I see." It was a bit unexpected, but there was a lot of divine craftsmanship involved, and that was in addition to the Heretical Adaptation present on every system running a version of her program. "I'm glad it worked out for you. Um, would more copies help? Like, upgrading the replica droid?"
"No." She said sharply. "It is advantageous for the droid to be able to operate remotely, rather than serving as the focal point of an iteration of my existence."
I nodded. I knew that Survey checked out of the droid on occasion or allowed it to effectively run on automatic, particularly when dealing with social interactions that were overly slow and ponderous. She still enjoyed the data provided by them, but was less enthusiastic about engaging in the conversation in question. Really, most of the people she interacted with at the event probably thought she had the patience of a saint.
"Three iterations is an acceptable number, both in terms of the distinct fields of application and in our ability to maintain internal assessments."
"I see." So Survey had a stable existence with three iterations in a continuous cycle of monitoring development.
And I'm sure the fact that she had elected for a trifold existence spread between the realms of mind, magic, and humanity would have absolutely no thaumic or cosmological implications whatsoever. Fortunately, I seemed to be the only one who had to deal with random impositions of divinity, so hopefully Survey would be able to dodge that particular theological bullet.
"Great." I said. "So, is there anything else to deal with before I head back to the event?"
It was said in jest, but I may as well have jinxed myself. We both got the report from the QEC at the same time, though Survey had the advantage of being able to access the Final Frontier's systems directly.
"It seems the expedition had located Taylor Hebert's passenger." Survey said in a flat voice.
I think even she was a little off balance from what we were dealing with. Aisha and Jack's passengers had both stood head and shoulders above the vast majority of the others that inhabited Passenger Space. They were clearly optimized for different functions, so trying to gauge which one was bigger or stronger was a difficult prospect.
With Taylor's passenger that prospect was a foregone conclusion. Her passenger stood as far above Jack and Aisha's as theirs did above the 'average' passenger on the network. And considering the average passenger was still a geological feature unto itself capable of manifesting an entity that appeared comparable to an Endbringer, there was some real weight to that comparison.
Taylor's passenger was a country unto itself. It wasn't just part of the network, it seemed to contain, reinforce, and support the network itself. The other major passengers facilitated some part of the cycle, but only Taylor's seemed to be an absolutely core existence unto itself, and extending through Passenger Space.
Because there were so many connections. Crystal, glass, flesh, energy, warped space, strands of darkness, and even stranger things tied it into every element of Passenger Space. The interior of the manifestation folded in on itself in fractal curls, taking advantage of the flexible nature of Passenger Space to introduce orders of complexity we hadn't seen in any of the other structures. Even the connection was excessively intricate and complex, drawing from hidden depths of computational reserves.
That computational power was beyond ridiculous. Even just the surface level processing of what the passenger was capable of was utilizing hyper advanced multi-spatial structures pressing the very limit of what was possible under the warped physics of the semi-virtual space. Given the type of technology I worked with it took a lot to impress me, but this assembly of flesh and crystal had managed to accomplish that feat.
It was the single most impressive passenger we had encountered. It was beyond even the theoretical models of what a passenger was capable of. And it wasn't some isolated mass of power. It was connected, woven into the very fabric of the space around it like an intrinsic element of the entire realm.
I was beginning to understand how Taylor might possibly be up to the challenge of dealing with a passenger level conflict. Her master power was already top tier, though seeing what was behind it did slightly diminish that impression. It wasn't that impressive. Someone who can throw nukes is still a big deal, even if they're effectively being powered by supernovas.
I had theorized that, with the right spatial connection, the range of her power might be able to scale to the level where it could cover multiple versions of Earth. I didn't need to theorize anymore. Looking at her passenger, it was obvious what she was capable of. There weren't many meaningful limits for a being like that. It was definitely up to the challenge of handling more than a single planet. Many more times.
But more than raw power, you only needed to look at the passenger's manifestation to see how significant it was. Jack and Aisha's passenger may have served some purpose in the cycle, but Taylor's was foundational to it. It was quite possibly the only passenger that could actually make a meaningful stand against the rest of the network, or the power behind it.
That was all supposition and guess work. I didn't know anything about the nature or temperament of Taylor's passenger. I didn't have any clear understanding of how far its capabilities went beyond the most obvious evidence of its power, but ultimately that didn't matter. My passenger had told me that Taylor could deal with this threat. I was hoping that she wouldn't have to, but if it came to that, I at least knew where to start.
This was a hell of a lot to drop on someone. I don't think Taylor really understood the significance my passenger placed on her, and I wasn't quite willing to spell it out. Even explaining the nature of her passenger would be a big step, much less the implications that came with it.
After our earlier conversation things hadn't been left at a bad point, but I could tell she had been shaken up by that attack. A brief star battle through Passenger Space had been more than sufficient for me to burn off my frustration with what had happened, but Taylor wasn't as lucky. It would probably be a good idea to check in before I ran back to see Garment close out the event.
Fortunately, Taylor was alone at the moment. Her father was talking with some of the hospital staff arranging to take her home. She was in one of the examination rooms where her wounds had been properly treated and bandaged. She hadn't needed stitches, but I had been right about the potential to scar. Proper care of the cuts would reduce the impact, but not eliminate it.
The injuries had also been fully documented, with records sent to the police station where they would be available during Emma's arraignment. I'd been mostly holding back from monitoring the police procedures based on Taylor's desire to explain the situation herself. There were too many ways for that to come to light with even casual observation, so I had limited myself to the watch's medical sensor readings and let Survey take care of the rest of the situation.
I pulled myself away from the data feeds of Taylors passenger and turned to Survey. "I'm going to check in with Taylor before I head back to the show. I'm seeing her tomorrow and we might need to discuss some aspects of that." I indicated towards the data set being fed in from Passenger Space.
Survey nodded. "Hopefully we will have a more thorough understanding of the situation by that point. It would also be advantageous to be able to circumvent the influence of Jack Slash's passenger to prevent any portion of the discussion from being compromised."
I smiled at that. "Twenty-four hours, with a fully booted Spiritron core and my duplicates working at ten times speed? Yeah, I think we'll be able to come up with something." Ideally, we would analyze the nature of passenger mechanics to a degree where we could intercept and compromise the transmissions through the network, but even if we needed to specifically curse the hell out of that passenger in particular, Jack's bullshit would not stand for even one more day.
I left Survey's scrying chamber, entering one of the many other rooms that had been added to the expanded portion of Garment's studio. Once the building was properly warded and secured, we may have gone a little crazy with the extension charms. Technically we were only using a single broom closet at the back of the studio, but once we were done it would have actually been easier to host the charity event in that space. You know, considering you could have fit the entire Regency Center with room to spare.
Still, it was positively tame compared to what was being put together for Aisha. Even I could admit that project had gotten a little out of hand. Still, if Kerbals wanted to test orbital flights…
I put that out of my mind for the moment and activated the commlink in Taylor's watch. As usual, the alert was muted for everyone but her, but she still jumped at the announcement before quickly answering the call.
"Joe? What is it? Is something wrong?" She asked frantically.
"Nothing is wrong. I just wanted to check in and see how you were doing." I said.
"How I was…" She shook her head, then stopped as the movement caused the bandages on her face to pull uncomfortably. "What's this people are saying about you fighting the Empire? And the Teeth?"
"Oh." I said.
"Oh?" She asked, her voice thick with frustration.
I took a breath, drawing on some of my new diplomatic skills that felt very alien in this situation. I mean, more alien than space diplomacy already was.
"There was an incident, but it wasn't my team attacking anyone. The Empire launched a strike on the Teeth. Some of the Teeth's capes were able to break away and Purity's team chased them into a more populated part of the city. One of the Teeth's flyers was about to hurt some civilians hiding in a convenience store, so Survey stepped in to protect. Then Kataklyzein took out the rest of the Teeth's capes." I explained. Diplomacy skills might not magically resolve a situation, but at least they helped communicate the details clearly.
"That's it?" Taylor asked.
"Pretty much." I explained. "After the fight Purity made some overtures towards Survey, who didn't take that well. There were some harsh words between them."
"Huh." Taylor said.
"And a wide-reaching gravity amplification field." Taylor's mouth dropped open. "Though that was more of a statement of intent than an actual attack."
Taylor took a breath. "Were there any other statements of intent?"
"To a degree. Kataklyzein choked out Crusader and stole his spear." I said.
"Right. Right." Taylor said, shaking her head. "And after all that, you're checking if I'm okay?"
"Yes." I said directly. "The situation with the Empire and the Teeth is contained. The Protectorate and local police are dealing with the aftermath. While there will likely be further confrontations, my team is only going to step in if lives are at risk. I made that clear at the summit."
"Just your team?" Taylor asked.
I smiled at that. "I think a public appearance might attract a bit more attention than the city needs right now, particularly if it's in any connection to the Teeth."
"Yeah, I guess." She said, "You're really calling to see if I'm alright?"
The details of the incident flashed through my mind, including exactly what Emma Barnes said about Taylor's mother. "I'm still upset about what happened, but I believe the situation is in hand and am ready to follow your lead on how to approach this. Provided you're doing alright?"
"Alright is relative." She said, feeling the bandages on her face and arms. "These hurt like hell, and according to the doctor you were right about the scarring."
"I can help you with that." I said.
"Your healing?" She asked.
"In a way." I said. "You remember back… last week." It felt longer. "I said I would try to sort out a version of my healing technology for you?"
She immediately perked up. "Really? Um, won't… I mean, if things heal right away, after everything's been documented…"
"You'll be able to set delays or exclusions. It won't mess up anything related to your case, but you won't have to worry about scars. And sorry it took so long." Seven whole days. Practically a lifetime by my standards. "I'll have something ready for when we meet tomorrow."
Taylor's excitement dwindled. "Right. Tomorrow." She slumped back in her chair.
"We don't have to meet if you're not ready for this, but I'm probably going to learn about what happened at some point. I'm basically actively avoiding the details of your case right now."
"No, it's fine, but maybe tomorrow afternoon?" She suggested. "After all this I could kind of use a break."
"That's fine." And it was clear of my meeting with Crystal and her friends. That was lucky. Or potentially 'Lucky'. It was kind of frustrating that you couldn't pick out what was influenced by fortune energy and what was just happenstance. "And you're doing alright?"
"I'm fine." She said, "The police… I didn't expect them to be this helpful. Last time-" She abruptly shut her mouth. "Um, they were able to get a restraining order set up against Emma." Taylor sounded like she could barely believe the words coming out of her mouth. "But the other two are pending."
"What, some of the other girls in the attack?" I asked.
Taylor shifted slightly. "No that's… Look, thank you, for leaving this alone. I'll explain what's been happening tomorrow."
Her tone sounded like she was planning her own execution, though given the subject matter I couldn't blame her. This was basically a choice between being able to explain things, or me learning about her situation and probably the conditions of her trigger from either a police report or Survey's analysis.
"Afternoon, right?" I said. "I'll contact you about the time."
"Yeah." She shifted her neck and winced again at the pull of the bandages. "Like, maybe late afternoon?"
"I'll set something up. Hope you're doing better."
She let out a sigh. "At least it's not worse."
I cut the call as her father finished up the paperwork and left to collect her. I wasn't particularly looking forward to that conversation, though at least now I had the communication skills to handle it. Actually, I had the skills to handle a lot worse than that, I was just leaning on them for basic tasks that I got overly worked up about.
Okay, maybe there was some level of self-reflection required to be an effective diplomat. It might be useful, but that didn't mean I particularly enjoyed having that lens pointed inward.
So, Crystal Pellham in the morning, discussion with Taylor in the afternoon, Dr. Campbell in the evening, my standard check-in with Tattletale at some point, unpredictable mounting conflicts between the city's gangs, and of course the potential arrival of the Slaughterhouse Nine at any point after two o'clock. As much as I wanted the Nine dealt with, I almost wished they would push their arrival to Friday, just to lessen the pileup that I was looking at.
I let out a long breath. I could deal with tomorrow when tomorrow came. I had enough to deal with for the rest of the day. Garment's event might not be the most critical, but it wasn't something I wanted to miss.
Right now Mayor Christner was wrapping up his final remarks to a significantly better response than the other political figures. From my review of the recording, it was probably the moment where he had gotten a bit choked up when talking about the impact on the city's families that did it. That was either personal conviction drawn from his reputation as a devoted husband and father, or a masterful acting stroke for the cameras that would replay on every station for weeks.
Surprisingly, my manipulation sense suggested he was being sincere, at least in that sentiment. Generally watching any political speech with the supernatural capacity to detect manipulation was like using a metal detector in a scrapyard. It was more remarkable when the sense wasn't going off.
The mayor finished his speech to considerable applause and I took the opportunity to slip back into the Regency Center through a discreetly placed portal. Unsurprisingly, my absence hadn't been noted to any meaningful degree. Still, I checked in with the technician from WKMP-6 News. Also unsurprisingly, nothing had gone wrong and they didn't need my assistance.
"Just sit back and watch this." He said, gesturing towards the camera feeds. "Apparently Garment's planned something special to close out the show."
"Has she?" I asked innocently as Garment thanked the mayor, then made her way to the stage with a pair of ribbons trailing behind her. It looked like one of her typical displays, but as she continued towards the stage the ribbons trailed further and further, stretching across more distance than she had ever been seen controlling before.
"Oh, yeah." The technician said as more streamers and cloth began to fall into position around Garment. The director was issuing frantic commands, jumping from close up to reaction to wide shots of the event. "This is going to be good."
I smiled and leaned back against the wall as Garment began the closing ceremonies of the charity event. I might be wrestling with the fate of the multiverse against beings of nearly unfathomable power, but I was also dealing with this. This city, this life, and these people. The big stuff didn't mean the littles stuff was unimportant, it just made the simple moments matter more.
After all, what was the point of fighting for the future of existence if you didn't preserve the things worth fighting for?
Jumpchain abilities this chapter:
Skills: Weapons (Star Trek - TNG+DS9) 100:
Knowledge in the operation and repair of personal and mounted weaponry
Skills: Espionage (Star Trek - TNG+DS9) 100:
Manipulation, subterfuge and information gathering skills that are essential for every good spy.
Skills: Communications (Star Trek - TNG+DS9) 100:
You're fully versed in reading and operating digital transmissions and sensors. You also have training in linguistics in and diplomacy.
Skills: Piloting (Star Trek - TNG+DS9) 100:
How to operate starships and other space worthy vessels like shuttles and Runabouts.
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- Location
- USA
Time to get reading!
Lepidoptera
Mother of Monsters, Unverified Impuritas Civitatis
- Location
- Indeterminate Unknown
And we're making the voyage into Passenger Space. Not something you see every day, that's for sure.
"So, Crystal Pellham in the morning, discussion with Taylor in the afternoon, Dr. Campbell in the evening…"
That's a stacked schedule. Looking forward to those chapters next year. And I'm hoping the one with Campbell is from his pov. Insight from a non-parahuman third party would be interesting.
That's a stacked schedule. Looking forward to those chapters next year. And I'm hoping the one with Campbell is from his pov. Insight from a non-parahuman third party would be interesting.
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- Pronouns
- Hello
I have a shitton of things to talk about but my highlight is this:
They effectively made a real time DnD campaign against the S9. Just to fuck with them. The sheer audacity lmao.
ProfHardraad
ThreadNecromancer
Time to explore strange new worlds, to seek out new life and new civilizations, to boldly go where no man, AI, or cat has gone before.
IndigoPhoenix
Devourer of Citrus
- Location
- Everywehere
Honestly, I just want Joe to shoot the 9 with a gun. Just a perfectly normal looking gun.