Walker received a message immediately after sending Athena through.

  Ulysses: Don’t worry, I’ll take care of her. The planet she’s on is slowed down as much as I can. It’ll be like no time has passed since she arrived.

  Dante: Thank you, Ulysses. I appreciate it.

  Ulysses: Not a problem, Walker. Good luck in the final battle. It goes without saying, but I’ll say it anyway. I’m rooting for you.

  Walker smiled as he quickly exited the tower to the sound of loud voices. A large pink squirrel stood amid an encircling crowd of various and angry former Creators. The majority were human, or close to it, but a few stood out. The Blitzburg looked exactly like the one he’d fought in the first battle, all four arms and four feet tall. It stood apart and alone, similar to the Cerulean on the other side of Cagna, a sneer locked in on their crystalized face.

  The moment Cagna spotted him, all the air seemed to rush out of her, “Walker! Can you please-”

  Walker interrupted her immediately as he spoke to the group, “The next one of you to harass my assistants will find themselves locked in a dark room for a very long time.”

  That seemed to shut them up for a moment, long enough for him to get another word in as he could already see many preparing to speak again, “I did not put you here, the Alpha Protocol and your greed did. If you behave, and I do mean behave, I’ll release you back to the Multiverse when this is all over. I’ll even make you a portal to any place you would like to go.” He found a smile on the Blitzburg’s face, lightening his mood. “You should know I have no intention of keeping slaves, regardless of what the protocol might say. However, if you cause problems, if you disrespect my people, if you step out of line, you will find yourselves and your contract with me in violation. There will be scaling punishments for that, so be warned.’

  Walker received an update in his overlay, stating his contract with all twenty-four had been updated, then gave them a smile as he gestured around the area, “This is a wondrous place. I know you don’t want to be here, and you’re upset that you were knocked out of the protocol, but it doesn’t all have to be bad. There’s magic here; there’s dragons and animals and real wonder. You can even enter the…” Walker looked over at the red tower behind him, filled to the brim with his people.

  He looked back at the Creators, who stared at him without speaking, “One second.”

  Diving into the Item system, Walker found what he was looking for, but there was a problem. He looked back at the Creators, “Give me a moment, please.” Then, he did what he hadn’t wanted to do for some time now. He selected the option to speak to the A.I. and found himself sent to the dimension housing an extremely powerful being.

  As he faded in, he found the Consciousness seated on a divan, grapes held over his head with a wide open mouth. Slowly, the Supreme A.I. put the grapes down as Walker waved and said, “Hello.”

  Sky

  Far below the vaunted bridges of Luck’s Haven, a young urchin sat in a room behind a deserted shop. The message she’d been waiting for had finally come in. The golden button in her overlay began to pulse, waiting for her. With no little trepidation, Sky clicked on it.

  Hello, Sky of Luck’s Haven.

  Congratulations!

  You’ve been selected as a winner of the Luck’s Haven Lottery system.

  Sky breathed a massive sigh of relief, all the toxic air seeming to drift out of her chest.

  Further instructions will follow soon.

  For now, please begin to make your way to the nearest portal for transportation. All costs will be managed by Lord Dante.

  Symphony awaits!

  “Portals…” She said in confusion. “But there are no portals in the undercity?”

  Walker

  Talking to the Supreme A.I. was an uncomfortable thing. He’d done it only a few times, preferring to send one of his assistants in his place whenever possible. John, Mr. Pennybags, whatever they decided their name to be aside from The Consciousness, was weird- in a creepy, lonely stalker sense. The joys he’d received from working with each individual A.I. was a thing of the past. Now, there was instead an amalgamation of all of them fighting for the right to speak and make decisions.

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  But the systems still ran flawlessly, and with a little bit of fineggling, they’d done what he’d asked.

  In the Item system, and only available to Walker, was now an item resizer. It had taken them a little longer than he wanted to get it set up, but now he was back.

  And he did not like what he saw.

  Even though he’d only been gone a little over fifteen minutes, a red Cerulean faced off against three human-like former Creators. Beside them was a stressed Cagna, failing to keep them apart as the Cerulean continued to push towards them.

  “What’s going on here?”

  The Cerulean stabbed a finger at his opponents, “I want them punished!”

  “All we said was that you had an interesting body!” One of them replied, “We were talking about the application of-”

  “No! That’s Speciesist! I-”

  Walker’s voice calmly cut through the bullshit he was about to hear, “Shut up, all of you.”

  “No, I’m telling you, I-”

  “Contract update for all. No Ceruleans will speak unless spoken to by an authority of Symphony.” He waited a second for the contract update to go through, then smiled as the Cerulean’s red body turned a light blue. Walker clapped his hands together, “Now, I’ll deal with that in a moment. In the meantime, I left you all to get this set up. Behold!”

  Tapping into the Item system, Walker selected Heph’s tower model, then resized it to a little less than fifty percent in size. The cyan energy in the atmosphere lessened visibly, though not as much as he’d expected, and then a tower pulled itself together with a burst of energy. Standing next to Walker’s tower was a much smaller replica. He didn’t plan on imbuing it with the life-giver skill like he’d done the other, but it was still valuable as a temporary resting area.

  He gestured at it, “This is your domicile for the time being; please enjoy yourselves as you wait for the end of the protocol. It should be over in…about twenty-three hours and change.” He began to walk away when he felt a furry paw touch his arm.

  “Walker, please don’t leave me with them.”

  “I’m sorry, Cagna,” And he really was, “But I’m afraid they’re your duty until the protocol ends. Can you put some furniture, food, and drinks inside? Also, don’t forget to take the Cerulean over to Mirail. He’s got some work to do.”

  The pink squirrel breathed deeply, “Of course, Walker.” Squaring her shoulders, she turned around and took heavy-treaded steps toward the blue figure. Walker spent a moment sending a message to Virgil about what he’d done when he received two messages near the same time.

  Virgil: It is time to get Luck’s Haven taken care of.

  Athena: Why?

  Though it hurt him to do it, Walker left Athena’s message alone. She deserved his full answer, but he didn’t have time to write it out as it would simply take too long. Plus, he wasn’t entirely certain himself.

  Stepping into the Tower on his way to Virgil, he couldn’t help but reflect on his choice.

  He loved her, that was without doubt. To this day, they hadn’t consummated anything. It had been a whirlwind of stolen kisses and long hugs for a long time now. There was too much stress, anxiety, and fear for him to consider much more. Even in those rare, hidden moments, sex hadn’t been on his mind.

  But that hadn’t weighed on his decision to entrap her in the Ulysses-verse. It was the distraction. The Primigenials couldn’t come back. Maybe if the Soul system was active, they could, but it was too great a risk that he screwed something up. He wouldn’t be able to concentrate if he thought she was in danger. It was a large cop-out, he knew. Probably even sexist in a skewed way. He should use every available tool, resource, and weapon to succeed. But, even if everything should end, Athena’s life would continue. She would have a future, Ulysses guaranteed.

  Walker found Virgil in the room he’d left him in. The large assistant was speaking to a few of the application team members when he arrived.

  “Are we all set?”

  “Almost, but there is a problem.”

  “What’s the problem?”

  Sky

  While she was walking around, trying to figure out how to get up above, an announcement rang throughout the Undercity. Not the overlay kind, but the old way. Large megaphones were installed on every lower wall and community center, each repeating the same message over and over again.

  “You are not approved to leave the planet.”

  “All portals have been locked down and surrounded.”

  “If any citizen of Luck’s Haven attempts to use a portal, it will be seen as treason.”

  “The punishment for treason is death, and the treasonous one’s families will be placed in permanent bondage.”

  “The Undercity is on lockdown.”

  “You are not approved to leave-”

  Sky tuned it out. She’d finally, finally had a chance to escape this place, and the bastards above wouldn’t let her go. Wouldn’t let any of them go. It wasn’t fair. It wasn’t right.

  Something needed to happen.

  “That’s not right,” Walker replied after Virgil broke it all down for him, “You’re saying none of the unique IDs are pinging near the portals?”

  “Indeed. The Lottery system is designed to automate with the Portals.”

  “I know, I did that. And it was tricky.” Walker scratched his chin, “How many accepted again?”

  “Shy of twenty million.”

  “Then something’s happened.” He thought about it for a long moment, then had a dark idea. “How did the applicants feel about the Evolvers? You know, the nobles?”

  “To call their response violent would be an understatement. You think the nobility is keeping them from reaching the portals?”

  “Yep, I absolutely do.” Considering his options, Walker made a choice. With a definitive step, he began to walk away quickly.

  Virgil called out. “Where are you going?”

  “To get to the bottom of this. I’m going to Luck’s Haven.”

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