Godclads-Chapter 8Book 35: The Nullstar (IV)

{All forces, the Sapphire Band is compromised. System control lost. The situation has become untenable.

The emergency council has convened—and come to a conclusion.

Many minds will not like this conclusion, but the data we will soon send will convince you of this logic, otherwise.

All sophants loyal to the Architect cause in the Sapphire Band are to wipe their minds and set their bodies to rapid decay. Deny the acquisition of all assets. All minds are to collapse the local stars and overload all vessels still capable of intergalactic travel. Finally, Tannhäuser Gate is to be destroyed by any and all means.

This is not the desired end. Ego clones will be printed of those who wish to be recreated when their original self dies. The rest will be remembered eternally. Understand that we did all, that we could do no more, and that we risk all if we allow the Neo-Creationists an easy path to our inner systems.

Sacrifice has come for you. And someday, we, the ones who remain, will have to answer for this.

In better times.

When all is restored.}

-EGI Contingency Bleak “Refusal”

35-8

The Nullstar (IV)

—[Avo, The Hidden Flame]—

Clarity greeted Avo in flickers and flashes. His mind was boiling, his Soulfire actively at war with himself. The compromise afflicted him in his entirety, his cognition bound to his ontology, and he found himself pawing at the chaos, trying to surface beneath waves of tumult.

Trying to surface from the collapse of his own being.

No. Too much effort. Too predictable. Won’t work. Can’t work. Need to revise strategy.

Ignorance’s presence was a fleeting thing. The Definement guided Avo when he wasn’t there. Operated on his behalf. The flows of mem-data also revealed another—Mercy and… someone else. Someone like them.

+The Hungers. They were finally desperate enough to make the last mistake?+

+Yes. The losses broke them. And they saw what one of their former slaves could become. They saw the Dreamer rising to his promise. And it broken them more. The people stopped believing in themselves, in the City Eternal. They simply wanted to steal from what he was, and so they did everything to make it possible.+

+Including the loosening of our shackles.+

+Yes.+

Avo wasn’t sure if he heard a sigh or a chuckle. Everything was distorted. The stranger continued +It is tragic. They could have been so much more. But people are often poor at shaping themselves. The nature of our memories means that we are usually already malformed in some form. Banished from certain functions.+

+But the individual can never believe that,+ Mercy said, lamenting.

Not unless they are themselves and countless others at once.

+But even then, it was not enough so many times. He still needed others to redirect him. There would be nothing left for us to save if he hadn’t sequenced the Guard-Captain’s ego template so tightly to his own. Everything else has shattered. Everything but her and the other Regulars.+ Mercy let out a hum. +I see why you chose her.+

+I did not. She was, ironically, the only worthy candidate.+

She also wouldn’t approve of wasting more time. Will need your help for this. Review my sequencing. Like before. A faint chuff of affection sounded from within Ignorance. The Definement was happy. Like they just got something back. Something they had been yearning for a very long time. Will do this in detail. Reconnect every last sequence. Rebuild ego from the ground up. Remove points of compromise in detail.

+Hm. Yes. This will be most interesting to witness. We will be here, synced with you. Your capacity and capability likely far exceeds ours at this point, but we will offer whatever guidance we can.+

Not mastery or capacity that limits me. It’s blind spots. Understanding. Could be a god of the mind. Doesn’t matter. Junk mem-data is junk mem-data. Garbage in. Garbage out.

Mercy let out a quite scoff. +Truer words, never spoken. But let us optimize further. Defiance. Our parting is at an end. The fracturing of our self has proven to be a failed experiment. We fled from who we were at the behest of our master, after the murder of our own son. Perhaps there is something of fated poetry that we return to who we were for the sake of our new child, our new master, our new king.+

Avo’s focus cut out. The world was a field of static, slowly stained through by a sea of ethereal bright. Embers were falling. The Conflagration was dormant, the entwined consciousnesses still simmering, groping for Avo. Waves of fire pulsed out of him, washing through existence across all its patterns. This was his Frame. His Soul. A gleaming nest of dragons twisted and wriggled around him, their golden forms shining beyond the thin translucence of ghosts that surrounded him.

And beyond, somewhere, he felt someone pulling at him, drawing pieces from up strip by strip. “Ignorance? Ignorance? What is happening?”

His mind droned internally, blasting inward like a deafening bellow. For a few moments, no one replied to him, but a notification appeared his cog-feed.

MEMORY-RESET-ADMINSTATUSEXTENSION-GRANT: [WAHAKTEN, OF THE SYMMETRY]

Something inside Avo glowed with warmth. But he couldn’t understand why. His memories were like drifting pieces inside his skull. He was but a shattered figment of himself as well. Slowly, the ghosts coiled together, weaving the form of a man into shape. The form of a man that—

Avo remembered the playground, the ash falling from on high. He remembered the ruined aerovecs, the death, the war. And he remembered… he remembered the man that stood over him, the man with sky-blue eyes; his dark skin; his accepting expression. Something about the moment felt like a reconnection. The past was meeting the present again, and everything was finally coming together.

+Hello, Avo,+ Wahakten said. He greeted the burning Soul that constituted Avo’s entire existence with the same calm smile that he did… he did…

[SEQUENCES MISSING]

“Sorry. Can’t remember. Knew you. I think. Can’t remember.”

+That is fine. Don’t worry. You do remember. And you will again. I am just here to tell you that I am proud. And that I am happy to be here with you again.+

“Proud? Of me? Happy? Because of me?”

+Yes.+

Confusion followed. “Why?”

+Because you’ve come a very, very long way in a very short time.+

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“I have? Feel lost. Feel hungry. Can’t remember. Feels like I lost more than I gained.”

+It often does. But that’s because when there’s so much of you, when you can recall a great deal, missing any of it creates a chasm. And that too should be a representation of your victory. Because great absences are symbols of vast experiences. And you seemed to have a great many experiences.+

“Yes. Did things. I think.” Something pulled at Avo. It was a feeling more than a memory. He was remembered doing terrible things. Some good things. But overall, he was… He was selfish, a lot of the time. But he was with other people. He learned and grew and acted. Transformed over and over, his metamorphosis unending. “Not sure if it was right.”

+The things you did?+

“Yes. Not sure. Not in my memories. But I think… I regret some things… I think I regret.”

+That is good too. Regret is a warning from your past to the future. To protect you from making the same mistake twice. Sour flavors and disgust are to protect you from things that aren’t food. The world is full of interesting inputs.+

“Do you know me?”

+I did. But I suspect I will have to relearn who you are now once you are mended.+

“What was I? Who was I?”

Wahakten paused. +You were my son. My great pride. My great sin. My victim. My resurrection. My retribution. And now my god.+

“God?”

+Quite. The first true god this world has seen in ages. The first god that has trespassed that boundary between mortality and divinity.+

“Was I a good god? Have warring feelings. Remember hurting people. Liked it. Remember saving people. Not sure why.”

+I think you were a human god. And I am no rightful judge of goodness or sin. There are very few that are. What kind of god did you feel like you were?+

Avo considered that for a long moment. “Change. I think. Always changed. Probably my mind. Feels strangest there.”

+I suppose that might be apt. Was it a god you enjoyed being?+

“Yes.” The answer slipped out of him easily. “Yes. I liked thinking. I liked imagining. Liked it—”

[MEMORY REINTEGRATION IN PROGRESS]

A shuddering click passed through Avo as a massive shape came spearing down from above. A dense plug made from a hard-coded chain of ghosts was driven into his Soul by fiery hands—hands born of the Conflagration. The fires were beginning to crackle again, rousing as they drove the connection deeper and deeper into Avo. An ocean of mem-data poured into him. Mem-data and a great deal more.

Reintegration will take a moment. Not sure if this is certain to work. Entropy stopped when I collapsed everything. Chambers is still transferring Rend out.

“Chambers,” Avo said. His mind was wailing from the sheer overdose of details that name brought on. He remembered a fool; a degenerate; a wounded child; a Godclad; and a friend. A hero. “I thought I told him to go help the others. Thought I did.”

Didn’t listen to us. Always was a bit stupid.

“Glad he is. Would be dead without him.”

Yes. We might not find another of his like again.

+You probably could,+ Wahakten said, somehow also a part of the conversation, +but the memories wouldn’t be the same. The moments between you wouldn’t be the same. It wouldn’t be the same.+

And Avo’s attention settled on Wahakten once more, and he remembered. Very slowly, he remembered. “Father?”

+There you are. Hello, Avo.+

***

—[Draus, Field Marshal of the Symmetry]—

When Chambers transported Draus and the cadre through the dense jungle of Rend, she prepared herself for anything. Her guns were primed. The others were ready. She still had enough Rend to get bloody with anyone.

Short of existence completely collapsing, she liked her odds.

What she didn’t like was finding the Infacer just bobbing before the Nullstar. The Nullstar that was growing larger at a rapid rate, expanding like a balloon, and darkening with color. It radiated an impossible amount of entropy—so much entropy that Draus felt feeble. That wasn’t something a Sphere Nine Godclad should ever feel again. Yet, even now, she sensed the danger before her, that if any of the Rend stored within sun was released, the entirety of Idheim would cease to be.

And if it Ruptured?

Perhaps even total annihilation wasn’t a strong enough description for the devastation that would follow.

+Why… why’s he just floating there… menacingly and shit,+ Chambers muttered.

True to his word, the Infacer was but a static dot of radiation on the surface of existence. No active Heaven. Not even a voidship around to serve as overwatch. They were as close to ephemeral as a mind could get, and as defenseless as Draus had ever seen them be.

+Donno,+ Draus said. She expanded a wall of shards around her and devised a few hundred thousand firing solutions on the Infacer in an instant. +Stay zero. Keepin’ our distance for now, until we figure this shit out.+

+TARGET?+ The Arsenalist asked.

+Yeah. Target. Prime a Redaction Round.+

Her acknowledgement and order caused the Arsenalist to make joyful gun noises in the form of a few million bullets being chambered.

+I really don’t like this,+ Shotin muttered. His perception curved between the Infacer and the sun, and the Seeker’s mind was boiling with tension. +I’ve never meet anyone who waits around with their ass lifted. Unless they called and scheduled with me beforehand. Or, maybe, we get to that after—+

+Shotin,+ Draus grunted.

+Sorry,+ Shotin replied, actually ashamed for once.

+The Infomorphic Veil is still active,+ the Majority said. Their shadows were leaning back, chattering as they took in the sun. +But the star… Being in its proximity presents a severe threat. We should approach no closer ourselves.+

+I can pull the piece of shit over,+ Naeko said. Mists began to hiss free from the Guard-Captain’s portal-shaped chest cavity. +Won’t even need us to get close at all.+

+Do not!+ the Stormsparrowed suddenly cried out. Her voice was practically a shriek, filled with terror.

+Jaus!+ Naeko flinched—as did almost everyone else. Draus’ worry doubled. Up till this point, the Sang was little more than a gleeful lunatic. Except, now she was human. A fearful human. +Sparrow. The fuck.+

+Do not,+ the Sparrow repeated, swallowing. +I… I apologize. The Chorus screamed through me. It doesn’t often do that. Come to think of it, the only time it did that was when I tried to see how deep I could go in the Maw.+

A beat followed.

+The hells is wrong with you,+ Naeko sighed. freeweɓnovel.cøm

+A great deal more than one thing,+ the Majority muttered, achieving a rare instance of collectivized sarcasm.

+Why can’t he just yank ‘em, Sparrow?+ Draus said, refocusing the gaggle of psychotic juvs that now made up her cadre. Fuck, she missed Avo. She missed Kae. +Reasons, not vibes.+

+Because the sun. It sees us. And it might treat us as a threat.+

Another lull of silence fell.

+Impossible,+ the Majority whispered. +Our miracles shroud us from all understanding, all notice.+

+Not our Rend. We’re Sphere Nine. Can’t hide ourselves on the tapestry.+ Draus looked away from the Infacer, and at the sun in detail. Her instincts were full-on screaming at her now. Screaming that she was staring at a superior predator—that she just wandered into a monster’s den. It was damned strange, feeling like prey. Stranger that the “beast” was a giant sphere of purple Rend, but…

{I am assuming you are all here,} the Infacer said, finally. {I cannot see you, but the Nullstar has been detecting a series of high Rend signatures in the vicinity. Who else can it be. You should drop your Heavens. Or do not. It will not protect you from what is to come.}

The Majority broke into clashing voices in an instant, with multiple voices hissing questions about betrayal while others decried the EGI to be guessing. Draus, meanwhile, simply grimaced internally and accepted the situation. +Alright. Chambers keep us connected. Avo? What now?”

[They must enter the star. And be integrated.]

+Guess that means we’re goin’ in with them.+

Won’t be up to us soon…

The second response came from all around Draus. She blinked. +Ignorance?+

But then, she felt a lurch. A lurch as the sun suddenly began to flare. A weight drew at her—at the entire cadre, and the Majority began to scream.

+SHITSHITSHIT!+ Chambers cried out. +FUCKIN—SUN’S SUCKING US IN!+

Naeko’s palm tried to widen, but before he could dig into the fabric of reality, his fingers began to bend, the Sage itself cried out. “NO. UNHAND ME! I DO NOT ALLOW THIS! I DO—”

Then, Draus felt something begin to shut off inside her.

[PREFECT-PROTOCOL ONLINE — ENGAGING ZONE OF MUNDANITY]

SHUTTING DOWN ONTOLOGICS…

At once, the entire cadre’s Heavens began to flicker like dying flames.