Chapter — Proof
General Voss knew something was wrong when they found the first carrier.
It had been cut open from bow to stern.
Not destroyed.
Opened.
The vessel lay across the dead plain like the carcass of some metallic animal, its interior exposed to a colorless sky. Binary constructs still flickered weakly between sections of hull, trying to repair damage that no longer seemed to agree with repair.
Torin followed Voss through the wreckage.
They had expected an army.
More than a million General-class officers had been deployed throughout the operation, accompanied by Corps divisions so large Torin had stopped trying to comprehend the numbers. By the time his transport arrived, this region was supposed to have become one of the largest military staging grounds in Continuum Corps history.
Instead, there was wind.
And bodies.
Voss crouched beside a broken insignia.
Torin asked quietly, "Where is everyone?"
Voss didn't answer.
Something moved beyond the wreck.
Every surviving Corps soldier raised their weapon.
Three figures emerged.
Torin recognized them immediately.
"Halden?"
Halden looked considerably worse than when Torin had last seen him. Half his armor was gone and dried blood covered one side of his uniform.
Mari supported Joren beside him.
Torin hurried over. "Where's your supervisor?"
Nobody answered.
That was answer enough.
Voss looked beyond them. "Your unit?"
Mari shook her head.
"Us."
Voss stared at her.
Mari clarified, "Just us."
The General's expression didn't change, but Torin saw his jaw tighten.
Halden looked around at Voss's surviving group. "You?"
"Twenty-seven."
Halden gave a dry laugh.
"You did better."
Nobody found that particularly encouraging.
Voss stood. "We consolidate. Nobody travels alone from this point onward."
Joren managed to straighten. "Where exactly are we going?"
Voss looked toward the horizon.
A distant column of smoke twisted upward.
"Forward."
Halden muttered, "Excellent. I was worried we might do something sensible."
They found ACT forty minutes later.
Not inside a ship.
Not conveniently waiting in a hallway.
They found them in the ruins of what had once been a Corps deployment station.
Raiyo sat on a broken wall, sharpening one of his swords.
Yamiya Miekō stood beside a fractured terminal, studying information that shouldn't have still been accessible.
Nyxus was searching through an overturned supply crate.
And Kaosu stood with his back to them.
Voss's hand rose.
Twenty-seven rifles immediately followed.
Raiyo's sword stopped against the whetstone.
Yamiya looked up.
Kaosu turned.
Halden stopped walking.
The color drained from his face.
Torin noticed and almost smiled.
Months earlier, Halden had laughed until he couldn't breathe when Torin told him he'd fought the son of Karma.
He wasn't laughing now.
Crimson threads crawled lazily around Kaosu's arms.
Kaosu looked over the Corps formation.
"More of you?"
Raiyo sighed. "Apparently they're renewable."
Torin stepped forward before Voss could order anyone to fire.
"Wait."
Nyxus's head emerged from the supply crate.
He squinted.
Then his eyes widened.
"Torin!"
Torin smiled despite himself. "Hey."
Nyxus abandoned the crate and walked toward him.
Voss leveled his weapon.
"Stop."
Nyxus stopped.
Voss gestured toward the object in his hand. "Drop it."
Nyxus looked down.
He was holding a packaged honeybun.
"No."
Voss stared at him.
Torin closed his eyes.
Voss's voice became quieter. "Excuse me?"
Nyxus held the honeybun slightly closer to his chest.
"I found it."
"You're standing in a Continuum Corps supply station."
Nyxus nodded. "That's where I found it."
Yamiya covered her mouth.
Torin wasn't entirely sure whether she was coughing.
Voss activated his scanner.
"If any of you make a hostile movement—"
Kaosu smiled. "You'll what?"
Torin immediately looked at him. "Don't."
Kaosu's smile widened. "I wasn't going to do anything."
Raiyo glanced at him. "That's never reassuring."
The scanner passed over Raiyo.
BOUNDARY MANIPULATION DETECTED
ENGAGEMENT RISK: SEVERE
Then Yamiya.
The display hesitated.
CLASSIFICATION: UNRESOLVED
Voss frowned.
Then Kaosu.
The scanner immediately flooded red.
DIVINE LINEAGE CONFIRMED
CHAOTIC LORD
ENGAGEMENT NOT ADVISED
Halden quietly took one step farther from Kaosu.
Kaosu noticed.
Of course he noticed.
Then Voss pointed the scanner at Nyxus.
The device went blank.
Nyxus took a bite of his honeybun.
A loading symbol appeared.
THREAT ASSESSMENT REQUEST SUBMITTED...
Voss waited.
The loading symbol vanished.
REQUEST DENIED :)
Silence.
Voss stared at it.
"What the hell?"
Nyxus leaned over to look at the screen.
"Huh."
Voss looked at him. "Was that you?"
Nyxus chewed thoughtfully.
"Probably."
"Probably?"
Nyxus shrugged. "I don't really know what it's doing half the time."
Raiyo returned his sword to its sheath. "That's normal for him."
Halden stared at Nyxus.
This was the idiot Torin had been talking about?
Nyxus noticed him staring and smiled.
"Thanks."
Halden frowned. "I didn't say anything."
"Oh."
The smile disappeared.
Torin almost laughed.
Almost.
Then Voss looked beyond ACT.
There were more bodies behind them.
Hundreds.
His amusement vanished.
"Did you do this?"
Kaosu looked around.
"No."
That answer disturbed Voss considerably more than yes would have.
Yamiya closed the terminal.
"We've been finding them for days."
Torin looked at her. "Where's Aoikishi?"
That changed all four of them.
Even Nyxus stopped chewing for a moment.
Yamiya answered first. "Gone."
"Gone where?"
"We don't know."
Raiyo stood. "He detected a Flick concentration months ago and went to investigate it."
Kaosu added, "He said he'd come back."
Nyxus swallowed his food.
"He didn't."
Nobody joked about that.
Voss looked across the dead deployment station.
Millions of personnel had entered the wider operation.
Sorrow herself had disappeared.
Now ACT's leader had vanished after following the same disturbance.
There were, Voss decided, enough enemies for one afternoon.
He lowered his weapon.
"Temporary ceasefire."
Kaosu raised an eyebrow. "You mean you need us."
Voss replied, "I mean killing you has become considerably less important."
Nyxus nodded approvingly. "That's polite."
"It wasn't."
"Oh."
They moved together.
Nobody called it an alliance.
Raiyo and Voss walked near the front. Yamiya periodically checked the surviving Corps instruments. Kaosu kept looking toward the horizon.
Torin stayed with Halden.
For several minutes, Halden said nothing.
Then something enormous screamed through the atmosphere.
Everyone looked up.
A piece of a Corps carrier was falling toward them.
Not a fighter.
Not an escape pod.
A section of hull large enough to bury the entire formation.
Voss shouted, "MOVE!"
Kaosu didn't.
He looked upward.
Red energy gathered around one fist.
Not the wild calamity Torin remembered.
It compressed.
Tighter.
Smaller.
Precise.
Kaosu stepped forward and punched.
The impact cracked across the plain.
The carrier section stopped.
For one impossible instant, millions of tonnes of metal hung above Kaosu's fist.
Then the entire wreck folded inward around the point of impact and launched sideways across the horizon.
It disappeared.
Kaosu shook his hand.
"Ow."
Halden stared.
Torin looked at him.
Halden remained silent.
Torin smiled.
Halden sighed.
"You undersold him."
Nyxus turned around immediately.
"Thanks."
Halden snapped, "I WASN'T TALKING TO YOU!"
Nyxus looked genuinely annoyed now.
"Why does everyone keep doing that?"
Torin laughed.
It lasted about three seconds.
Yamiya stopped walking.
Her expression had changed.
"Voss."
The General turned.
Yamiya held up one of the Corps navigation units.
"How long have we been traveling?"
"Forty-three minutes."
Yamiya showed him the screen.
Their local position hadn't changed.
Voss frowned. "Faulty instrument."
Raiyo checked another.
Same coordinates.
Then another.
Same.
Voss looked behind them.
The deployment station was gone.
They had unquestionably traveled.
Raiyo's eyes narrowed.
"So why haven't we moved?"
Kaosu went still.
Not confused.
Still.
Torin saw it.
"Kaosu?"
Kaosu didn't answer.
A Corps detector chirped.
FLICK CONCENTRATION: 8,091
Then:
19,440
Voss looked down.
73,882
The number climbed faster.
408,991
2,773,401
Yamiya whispered, "That's not us."
The scanner changed classification.
DISJUNCTION
Then immediately:
CONFLUX
Every Corps detector activated at once.
HIGH CONFLUX
Kaosu's face had lost every trace of amusement.
Torin had seen him angry.
He'd seen him arrogant.
He'd seen him excited to fight.
This was different.
Kaosu whispered, "Turn around."
Voss looked at him. "What?"
Kaosu finally faced him.
"Turn. Around."
Halden swallowed.
There was something uniquely persuasive about watching the son of Karma decide that bravery had become a clerical error.
Voss gave the order.
"Reverse course."
They turned.
The detectors screamed.
The numbers blurred too quickly to read.
Then every screen displayed the same warning.
GRAND CONFLUX DETECTED
The pressure arrived.
Mari collapsed to one knee.
Joren nearly followed.
Several Corps soldiers simply hit the ground.
Torin's lungs locked.
His body demanded that he fall.
He deferred the consequence.
Later.
His knees stopped buckling.
Blood ran from his nose instead.
Raiyo drew all four swords.
Yamiya's outline flickered.
Nyxus lowered his honeybun.
Kaosu started walking faster.
Then faster.
"Move."
Nobody argued.
They ran.
A kilometer.
Ten.
Raiyo cut distance to accelerate their retreat.
Corps personnel deployed Binary propulsion.
Torin overclocked his own body until his muscles screamed.
The scenery tore past them.
Voss checked the navigation display.
Same location.
Kaosu looked at it once.
"Faster."
They went faster.
Same location.
Raiyo severed another section of distance.
Same location.
Nyxus looked around.
"Are we going anywhere?"
Kaosu answered through clenched teeth.
"No."
Torin understood.
"We're trapped?"
Kaosu shook his head.
"No."
That somehow sounded worse.
Kaosu finally stopped running.
His fists tightened.
"We're being repositioned."
Nobody spoke.
Raiyo looked back the way they'd come.
Nothing.
Voss checked the scanner.
The Grand Conflux reading was no longer ahead of them.
It was behind them.
Voss slowly turned.
Someone was standing among the formation.
Not approaching it.
Inside it.
A few Corps soldiers stumbled away.
Torin's blood went cold.
The man hadn't teleported.
There had been no spatial disturbance.
No portal.
No movement.
Reality had simply corrected the embarrassing little mistake in which they had believed themselves to be somewhere he wasn't.
Kaosu turned last.
For the first time since Torin had known him, the Chaotic Lord looked genuinely afraid.
"Father."
Karma smiled.
"Hello, son."
The ground vanished.
So did the sky.
So did the dead world around them.
Everyone fell less than an inch before another reality caught their feet.
An endless crimson plane stretched beneath them.
Its horizon was impossibly distant.
The Karmic Battlefield.
Voss looked around.
His scanner had stopped displaying numbers entirely.
It showed one sentence.
MEASUREMENT IRRELEVANT
Karma walked through the Corps formation.
Nobody attacked.
Not because they had been ordered not to.
Their bodies had simply reached the sensible conclusion before their minds did.
Karma stopped beside Halden.
Halden couldn't breathe.
Karma glanced at him, uninterested, and continued.