I went into my room. My bed that I had in my grandparents’ house had a quilt Granny gave me that was ripped in a lot of places, and stained, so she got me a lace cover for it with flowers. I sat on it. The bed was a lot softer than I remembered.

  The room had my junky furniture, so I waved all of that into my account. I learned in Rainbow how to set it up. Pier and I lived many lifetimes. We saw civilizations rise, and we saw them fall. I trembled. No one person should have this power that I have right now. I could play the stock market and get rich, just with what I remember about what became valuable in Rainbow. But, so could Molly, who’s talking with Liz and the MarKuan royalty right now. Or Deb, who’s watching Ray trade with a very worried expression. She’s sitting by her husband. His brother’s talking with a sick and very pregnant lady they just rescued off a bridge in New Orleans. The healer’s worried. They are in a room by Pirad’s Lab.

  Ray and her Zheien husband, Asha, are trading in the Trader’s Circle. From here in my room, through these transparent walls, I can see a lot more through my Cube. I don’t want to be here.

  But, Ry’nao said, “All of us feel inadequate at times. Make the best decisions you can with the information you have.” That’s from a man with the responsibility of running 13 galaxies. They are at war and have been for 300 years, and he was there when it started. The good guys are the Unified Seven. The bad guys, The Tiers, are run by Eriganh, who wants to take over. He leaves a path of destroyed stars everywhere he goes. He’s good at breaking things. Not good at building anything. All he knows is greed.

  Satauuver was like him, but now he’s dead and his slaves are arriving in the Alb System, which is growing. Most of 25 colonies moved there in the past week, some with their star systems, all made possible by one Adia Rayaline. She holds the White Cube Of Light, most powerful of the weapon-cubes. Eriganh holds the second most powerful, the Red Cube Of Fire.

  My Cube is ‘way down the line of power, but I can change everything by what I do because I have time travel.

  Snafanas, Satauuver’s 2nd in command, wants to somehow take power away from Eriganh and confront Rentappenen. Does he know how powerful Rentappenen is?

  I’m shaking, because I do. My Cube Of Many Colors is a clone of his. The only reason I have it is, its power is extremely limited. I used it to explore other futures, in the other future. The one I left it at wasn’t enough. Every use took my life-force, and made me weaker until I died. Pier and I were linked and he died with me. But, Rentappenen didn’t die when Ray fought him. He faked it.

  Now I know that, and he’s trying different futures, even now.

  However, he’s been using a species to destroy the Padrisa that’s now fighting back. A species that wasn’t even supposed to be brought back from its destruction. A species that struck fear into the Padrisa because it destroyed every star system in it in a future that I hope never happens! The Padrisa is the Virgo Supercluster Of Galaxies, and our 13 galaxies and our entire subgroup of galaxies is part of it. They don’t have names. One of them came to a family here on Earth, and their 4 year old calls him Dromie.

  I have one advantage, and one advantage only. I lived all those futures.

  I didn’t live this one. This one is an unknown, to me, and to Rentappenen. If we don’t stop him in this one, we will lose the Padrisa.

  You could be reading stolen content. Head to the original site for the genuine story.

  Levels above ours tried to get rid of Rentappenen for centuries, and they banished him to lower levels. Now, he is destroying those levels’ entire Councils. That’s unheard of in the history of Councils.

  I can think about all this because I can stop time itself from passing, just for me, while I think of what to do about it.

  Because I have Rentappenen’s Cube clone, I can see what he’s doing. He’s scared. He’s porting troops from one timeline to another in a desperate ploy to win. That’s the flaw! He’s using up resources in one timeline after another. I used up my life doing that, the first time.

  Because I am sitting still, I can see it.

  Time is a resource, just like food in the refrigerator. Once Rentappenen visits one timeline, it’s blocked to him. He can’t send anything back to it. He can’t pull resources from it.

  As he does this, people in his Collective, and the copies of it, die. He has a finite number of followers. As they realize he is using them up, they are considering alternatives.

  Pirad made a lot of Cubes, over centuries. People have been traveling, swaying worlds to join the Seven. This has also been going on in the Padrisa, on other tech levels.

  But, timelines have foci, places where many converge. Earth is one focus of many timelines, maybe even all the ones I saw in my search to find the one future where everything worked. Maybe I was looking at the wrong thing, and Pirad’s son, Pier, too.

  Rentappenen knows I’m not cooperating with his brother, but I’m hidden from him here because of Pirad.

  He expects me to do what I did last time and burn myself out.

  I’m scared to death, but I already know I’m going to die. What have I got to lose? Maybe I can save the Padrisa before I do.

  My clone and Pier went to Alb to find out where Dromie’s people are. I’m not sure what they have in mind. That species could destroy the Padrisa trying to save it.

  I’m here, and I’m going to do something only someone here can do. I’ll create a time bubble in the focus of many timelines, all that converge right here. I’ll use the copies of each person with a Cube, from moment to moment, to fight him, and to hold it open as long as I can.

  Rentappenen is using up his selves on these endless timeswaps. He expects me to second-guess him and use myself up chasing him from one timeline to another.

  I refuse to play that game. I’ll build a time bubble that stops time, and all our selves will fall into it because of the sudden stop, just like a car crashing into a wall throws everyone in it around!

  Ray traded with that Aryllan. Snafanas. He isn’t feeling so good. All of his people got changed today, and he misses his two-foot saber nails. Eriganh’s planning to destroy Titan! Anyone with a Cube can hear the thoughts of everyone else with one. Rentappenen’s trying to hunt all of them down. Pirad is hiding the good guys. They’ve found a lot of Earthans with Gifts and given them Cubes to help Rentappenen fight. That’s not fair! But, it’s using up Rentappenen’s resources to do that. After this battle on Earth, he’s done. He won’t have anything left to fight with. And, he’s scared that Ry’nao will notice.

  Our government of tech levels always has a higher level that might notice rules are being broken. There are higher levels than the Padrisa, and the Padrisa has already had warnings. I can’t see much of that, but the Padrisa already wants to see people from our level about leaks of higher-level tech into our level that Rentappenen did. That’s forbidden on all levels. They send observers. Then they send someone to enforce the rules. The process can take centuries.

  Rentappenen’s been ignoring the rules, thinking he’s somehow going to take over everything. That only works until the day of reckoning.

  As she traded, she fought the urge to pull at her blonde locks. Her deep blue eyes didn’t leave him. He attacked her with his telepathy and she zapped him. She has Snafanas’ Blue Cube, and it multiplies her telepathy. But, she can also see Eriganh’s Red Cube—and use it.

  Pirad startled and ported in there.

  Eriganh pushed his Collective to heat up Saturn! A reaction started, but I grabbed it. The heat melted the slaver base, and a wave swallowed up ships! But I reversed it. People un-died!

  Rentappenen saw me, but I slipped back into timestop. The Cube Of Many Colors heated up in my hand and sweat made green powder-stars on the floor of the ship. But, I slipped through time faster than Rentappenen could. Someone’s helping me! I saw a man with black fur and cat-ears smile. Pinda. And, Pirad kept Rentappenen from getting a fix on where I was.

  I kept it going, then remembered. I created a time bubble that Rentappenen didn’t see, on the ship. I’ve already lived this future? How?