Chapter 203: Propensity to Self-Medicate

  The alarm rang precisely at 6:00 am. It was a plain alarm, an offensive beep beep beep with no cheer nor personalization. Morgan didn’t need an alarm to wake at 6:00 am anymore, having woken up minutes before, but they did not turn it off.

  The automatic drapes rolled open, the morning light of summer already bleeding gold.

  Wake up. Get ready.

  Morgan sat up from the bed, padding barefoot across polished wood. Four pillows, two bedside tables. One set unused. Unbalanced.

  A wedding ring hung around a chain, warm against their chest. It wouldn’t fit on their fingers, too large. It did its best to ground them.

  A shower, cold and quick. 2 minutes. Morgan stepped out and dried off. Towel in the hamper.

  The high-end mirror was already defogged. Black hair was parted down the center, then slicked back with product. A neutral face stared back, unsmiling. No reason to smile. Lips drew back, teeth were cleaned. 30 seconds each side, up and down. The essences hadn’t stopped the routine.

  A second toothbrush lay untouched but weathered from use. A comb with strands of brown hair unremoved, was an oddity against the austere cleanliness of all else. Beard gel, beard comb. Christopher had never been as clean as Morgan, but he had always maintained his facial hair.

  At that thought, something ached.

  It was the only thing Morgan could feel, with how hollowed out they were.

  6:10 am. The coffee maker dinged. Crack two eggs into a hot pan. Two pieces of toast into the toaster. Two pieces of bacon (Christopher always indulged). A quick salad of super greens and arugula. A dressing of lime and EVOO. Orange juice that Morgan never drank but had delivered every week anyway. 10 bronze rank spirit coins to provide the magic.

  The dining table was empty besides themselves. The placeholder stared back, bleak and mocking. A glass for wine, and a for a drink. Two forks, two knives. Morgan ate their meal mechanically, tasting nothing.

  The TV automatically clicked on, and the news played. Weather—80s, normal for summer. A shooting at a grocery store, 2 dead. Upcoming re-election. Court cases, campaigning. Earthquake in Taiwan. Military action in the Pacific. Dictators shaking hands.

  Nothing important.

  *****

  Aetersomnia Inc. was headquartered in New York, NY. The CEO, Morgan Black, was never late. Precisely at 7 am, they arrived at work, dressed sharply in a tailored suit of one of various neutral shades: grey, black, charcoal, pinstripe, slate, navy.

  Riley could tell when they arrived by the sound of their crisp footsteps before she ever saw them. They were always at the same speed, never lingering. Chief Black never slowed to chat, or to appreciate the morning sun out of the high rise, or to glance twice at the notice board of company updates. She got the same greeting every single day.

  “Good morning, Ms. Sullivan.”

  “Good morning, Chief Black.”

  CEO Morgan Black never called anybody by their first name and required the same formality for themselves. Their tone was always perfunctory, professional, and neutral—neither prideful nor scorning, and not a single iota of warmth to be found, like the uncaring neutrality of the vacuum of space. The office was always slightly chilly, and the summer sun’s best efforts did nothing to warm it.

  “Is there anything of note for today?” They prompted, as they always did.

  “Yes, Chief Black,” she said. “I’ve received a communications from our master’s people. The Wanderer has arrived.”

  “Hm,” was their neutral response. They slightly inclined in their black office chair, neither slouching nor of overly good posture.

  She knew Chief Black was not finished, so she waited. As with everything, they neither slowed nor hurried.

  The Wanderer: Nora Ambrose.

  Their master’s experimental failure, of no inherent meaning nor value except for the token she held. The only other noteworthy aspect of the subject was the survival of her mind. They could not send anyone after her directly—their master had been commanded not to interfere. As followers of their master, they were included in such directives. If they wanted to interfere, they had to be indirect, circumspect.

  No matter. There were many pieces waiting to be used.

  The Agency—they had their pieces there. They had no reason to suspect spies beyond the usual channels; they were entirely ignorant of the existence of their cult. It was easy enough to order a hit…No, too direct, too easy to trace back to them by the Reaper’s shadows. Morgan would save that piece for a more divisive move. Yes. Better used elsewhere.

  The greys: That held potential.

  Their fingers drummed: Rap-tap-tap, rap-tap-tap. Two triplets.

  The greys could be part of any organization or no organization. They only thing they shared was their permanent residence within the ether realm. A rumor: their precious home was threatened. Nora Ambrose sought to dismantle it. Not all would believe it, but only one need bite. There were many who did not stop to think. Thought and action, in balance.

  An observational probe. The opening move. Assess the opponent. Develop a strategy. Sow Confusion. Divide and conquer.

  It served many uses. Yes. This move would do.

  “A rumor, Ms. Sullivan.”

  Riley Sullivan was unremarkable, unexceptional. No beard. No facial hair to remind them of Christopher. Most importantly, she remembered to call them Chief. Not sir. Not ma’am.

  “Yes?”

  “Have a rumor spread amongst the greys that the Wanderer, Nora Ambrose, seeks to dismantle the ether realm.”

  “At once, Chief.”

  They dismissed her. She left.

  The best part: the rumor wasn’t even false.

  *****

  “Report,” Diya ordered.

  “All 8 members are within the realm,” Minato said. “We’re all connected with my radios and Nara’s Guide system.”

  “Final equipment check.”

  They all conducted final checks—their breathing equipment, grenade belt, guns and ammunition, healing bandages and emergency syringes.

  ““Ready.””

  “Move out!”

  On the 5 lowest floating islands grew ample forest. The trees were mostly coniferous, with thin, needle-like leaves, although not any tree Nara could identify. Their branches hung with odd leafy streamers, a living weathervane of wind speed and direction, blunted by the forest. At the edges of the forest, need leaves snapped and strained against the unrelenting pull of the wind, streamers whipping this way and that in an invisible vortex.

  “Ah. Yup. The wind will be a problem,” Watson said with a grimace.

  “Damn fucking will be,” Warthog said, in little mood to joke since he’d suffer equally in this environment.

  “What alternatives do we have?” asked Diya.

  “The two magicals,” said Warthog. “Combat knives, grenades, and Yasmin.”

  ‘Magicals’ Nara mouthed to John. He shrugged.

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  “I’ll do what I can. The wind between the islands is pretty strong; it may empower some of my abilities, but it may not help you all so much,” Yasmin added apologetically.

  “Surely, this isn’t the first volatile zone with complications?” Nara asked.

  Minato shrugged, his smaller frame managing to heft all of his equipment with ease. Their relative bulk was this world’s standard (less heavy than Sen, although more cluttered), and Nara wondered if that was really the most efficient methodology. “This volatile zone is unusual with its complications, but there are records of other volatile realms with such difficulties.”

  “So how have you cleared it in the past?”

  Diya grimaced. “Specialists from other regions could be called in, if they could arrive in time before a collapse and with time to clear.”

  “And if they couldn’t?”

  “Collapse preparations,” Diya said ominously. “The coterminous area is evacuated and cordoned off. Field teams prepare to engage.”

  “Surely people would’ve have noticed?” John said. “That all seems rather visible. A whole hullabaloo.”

  Blocks cordoned off with tape, a police perimeter: Nara could imagine.

  “Anyone who does gets the orientation and an NDA to sign,” Diya said. “Some of our agents and staff are onboarded this way.”

  “If you can’t buy them off, assimilate them...I’ve heard that America has a very convincing evacuation cover up,” Yasmin said, brown eyes wide and innocent.

  “What?”

  “Active shooter.” Her eyes crinkled, impish.

  Holy fuck, Nara thought. Yasmin’s humor was dark.

  “We have roughly 44 hours until collapse,” Minato reported.

  Diya clicked her tongue. “Let’s get moving.”

  The first few hours were an adjustment—Diya and her squad had worked with Nara as her students, but never in the full capacity of a team. It was unlikely they’d ever achieve the seamless efficiency and breath-to-breath dancing tradeoffs Nara could pull off with Team Unknown; their training was just too different, and it was too soon to make such a complete adjustment.

  The mixed ranges, especially with the spraying fire of gatling guns, was equally problematic. Nara was most effective up close and personal, and Diya’s squad had never needed to care where they pointed and shot, as long as it was in the direction of the enemy. After taking a stray few hits, thankfully greatly dulled by Nara’s various defenses, or curved around outright by Infinity Domain, they collectively decided that Nara was best ranging off alone, targeting smaller packs of enemies as the squad dealt with the main waves with full force. As a strategy her own team employed of her, it was a good strategic choice. Reinforcements were what could make or break the balance of a fight.

  There was no dedicated healer on Diya’s team, although Yasmin possessed the most healing type abilities with her Wind Essence. She had Bird, Fire, and Wind for Firebird, but her healing fire abilities was of hearth fire, a warm and kind sort that sealed wounds and soothed hurts. She launched bolts of fire from a ring that burned behind her, flying on her winds which fanned them into sweeping blasts or sped them forward like wildfire. Her control left something to be desired, and the windswept greenery was set alight; Hanging vines burned like red hot whips, searing and dangerous. The needle leaves crackled and popped, and seed cones popped in explosive booms, launching red-hot needle seeds that embedded themselves into exposed ankles and flesh.

  It all got a little out of hand, blazing into a wildfire. Nara hadn’t gotten the Adventurer’s talk about collateral damage, but she could see why Encio or others with wide-range powers were thoroughly warned. Little point in protecting a village if you burnt the whole thing down in the process. It was the mark of a good adventuring team if they could minimize collateral damage: it meant they had skill to spare.

  Diya coughed, yelling through the smoke and raging blaze. “Towards the edge!”

  Through the blazing flames Minato charted a course, leading them on a mad dash to the edge of the floating island. By the end of it all they all smelt like toasted pine and campfire smoke.

  The only saving grace of the uncontrolled fire was it burned friend and foe alike. The vine snakes sizzled and blackened, the wispy floaters which caught on the wind just as readily caught on fire.

  The squad looked back, the entire forest fanned into a wild blaze. Nara lingered, just a bit, head cocked to the side like a hound on the hunt. She thought she sensed something, but the cloy of ash equally clouded her senses. She hoped it was a monster, wick of life burnt short.

  Had this been the primary realm (or normal Earth), it would have been an environmental disaster. Perhaps, not too out of place against a catastrophic backdrop of Australian wildfires, Indian heat waves, and Texan super-freezes.

  “That could have gone better,” said Watson through his hacking coughs. John was weaving his healing spells, fighting Cauterized wounding afflictions with healing power. Blistered skin recovered to a tender pink, but their scorched armor was unfixable, the heat melting the material that preserved them against impacts. Grenades and other explosives in their tool belt had been abandoned when a heat triggered blow took out part of Warthog’s hip, saved through an emergency stim ability and John’s backup. Unfortunately, John’s bubble shields couldn’t absorb damage that originated so close to the body—a weakness they both hadn’t even realized until now, even though Aliyah frequently set off Mana Blasts and Rune Traps right on top of an enemy to bypass that very thing. It was different being on the other side of it.

  “Sorry,” croaked Yasmin, still clearing the smoke from her lungs. “…At least they’re all dead?”

  “It’s an option, perhaps?” John offered consolingly, although it didn’t look like he believed in its effectiveness, much the same as Nara. He gave Yasmin a companionable pat on the back, who sheepishly sniffled, eyes and nose watering from the remnant ash and heat. A bottle of water was passed around, rinsing the sting from their faces. Nara decided against using crystal wash, especially since it could happen again.

  Diya pinched the bridge of her nose. “I’ll have to think about it. Much of our supplies are destroyed, and this strategy isn’t sustainable.” Everyone’s gaze followed hers, up the ladder of floating islands. With no plant cover at the topmost islands, the only objects to burn were their enemies and themselves.

  “It’s also a good opportunity to train on the lower islands, while we still have cover,” Nara proposed. “Work on our teamwork. The strategies don’t apply one-to-one, but...”

  “Better now than with the EQ 3 monsters,” Minato said. “The highest response of EQ 3 signals are from the highest islands.”

  “Any information on their type?”

  Minato hummed. “I think they’re probably flying. The radar is detecting speeds over 120 km per hour.” He squinted up at the apex islands. “I’m estimating top wind speeds at over 50 km per hour, but my drones are too vulnerable to approach. I think we can expect short bursts of flight speed surpassing 120 km per hour when flying with the wind.”

  “Sounds like shit,” Warthog grumbled. He wrung out the cloth within his hands he had borrowed from John, water and sweat blackened from soot and blood.

  “At least you’re so thick you’ll stay down,” Watson said.

  Warthog opened his mouth to argue, but Diya’s glare had him snapping his mouth shut.

  The small floating steps that stretched across the gap of screaming winds bobbed almost merrily, as if a misstep wasn’t a plunge into an inevitable end, a direct path to fall out of the astral space into the astral itself, to be churned and ripped apart by the fuzzy dimensional membrane before annihilation at the hands of the astral unrelenting against the matter of its counterpart.

  Besides the perilous terrain and tearing winds that grabbed at clothes to throw them over, the first crossing had some semblance of calm. The members of Diya’s squad have never been so grateful to receive additional training and would never complain about being pelted with rubber bullets ever again. When Warthog reflexively twitched his head from being brained by a sharp rock hurtling past, thus he swore. Yasmin, with her ability to conjure wings of fire and abilities which improved in windy conditions, was one of the few that had no concerns during the crossing, and was, with Nara, in charge of protecting the rest of her squad from falling into the void in subsequent crossings.

  The raging blaze that consumed the plant life of the first island had also dissuaded most other monsters, especially the flying ones, who strayed away to avoid the smoke which still charred the landscape and hung thick in the air, billowing out in the whipping winds, curling like a spring into the sky. The team had a single chance to practice their crossing with no additional life-threatening challenges, and Diya knew now to capitalize on it, sending her team back and forth across the islands, and developing strategies of what to do in case one fell. Nara was their primary countermeasure, their fall goalie who would catch them with her portal in case anyone fell, although sharing slow-fall and a temporary foot hold may be enough for anyone to moon jump back upwards. This reaction was practiced, with Nara teleporting downwards and extending her arms volleyball style to ‘receive’ a falling squad member. It was a bit odd to catch her volleyball—Warthog, the size of a boulder—and fling him upwards with the impressive strength of mid-rank bronze plus her Blood Moon gauntlets.

  They did eventually craft some sort of strategy: Nara struck from the other side of the island—acting as shepherd or bait, whichever worked—luring the monsters towards the garbage disposal that was Warthog’s heavy machine gun and other concentrated bullet fire. The guns of Earth—both in magic and in craft—had impressive burst firepower but the rather universal weakness of expense. Costing $400,000 to fire a weapon for 12 seconds translated to a similarly voracious mana expense. Tamer assault rifles and pistols had greatly increased mana efficiency, relatively, but they always costed mana to fire, given no other abilities. Unsurprisingly, the essence users of Earth that primarily used guns had several abilities to reduce the cost of conjurations and sustained mana expenditures.

  In conclusion, the general weakness of Earth was sustained battle. They combatted this with rotating shifts and inherently low engagement times; Diya and her team had to adapt, allowing one or two members to unload most but not all of their mana then fall back as they recovered, focusing on support and picking off edge enemies. These smaller rotating shifts allowed each member to use more of their abilities, when completely emptying themselves and shifting in another attacker hadn’t developed those abilities. They also learned to pace themselves as a whole, but guns were excellent at burst damage, and it was a waste in and of itself to not capitalize on that power to pick off priority targets or thin a herd.

  Along the way, Nara looted a Fire Essence, which caused Yasmin to flush hotly, since her raging inferno of the first island had apparently been enough to shift the balance of magic in the ecosystem to introduce odds of looting a Fire Essence. Her control in these tricky conditions had been improving—using her fire had never been her primary focus, and one of the neglected portions of her abilities—igniting smaller flames and quenching them before they got out of hand. Her first gun stone had given her dual wielded flamethrowers, which made her a terrifying flame bringer angel when she had mana to burn—literally. What she began to master was a lesser user Wind Bullet ability, a projectile special attack she could shoot at enemies from afar to deal light damage and knock them about, but more importantly, had a secondary effect of ‘fanning the flames’ of any fire it impacted. Fire would burn hotter, Burning would burn faster.

  Her next most used ability was Flaming Feathers that shot from the wings that she used as a medium. They were far more mana efficient, although they lacked the flesh-melting destruction of the flamethrowers. With a very rare Awakening Stone of the Phoenix (especially for Earth—it had to be looted from a monster), her fire abilities could instead heal allies for a low additional mana cost, which made her abilities surprisingly versatile, although she could only use damage or healing for each ability at a time.

  Yasmine was as close to a dedicated combat healer as Earth’s forces had. Anyone with such healing-oriented abilities usually worked as a field medic or in Agency treatment centers. Earth’s tech-oriented abilities had the advantage of producing abilities related to advanced medicine, and they awakened self- and ally healing abilities in greater frequency than Erras. Between six squad members, at least half had one version of stims, drugs, healing gauze, literal health packs, or healing bullets.

  At least the 1st world’s propensity to self-medicate had led to something beneficial.