"I'm still pissed the hell off, that's why!” Vegas bellowed, distorted voice unmistakable as the doors swished apart. “Thorne thought he could take a shot at us and just fly away!”

  Tani glided into the room with quiet steps, sentinels in tow, agleam in a fresh change of citrus-scented robes. Her amusement akin to a brimming teapot beneath the ebony surface.

  “Calm down, Vegas. You're frothing again.” Ilana cut in, arms crossed tight. “Besides, he won’t stay hidden long, not even in his own Sphere. These so-called Loyalists will soon find their misplaced sympathies, unhealthy.”

  Her final stride carried Tani in range of the intangidisk, mounted atop the circular comms station. Her blue, etheric doppelganger rippled to life on its smooth surface. Regal. Coiled as ever. The bloc of Magistrates once again made whole, far sooner than she'd have liked.

  Minus Thorne of course.

  The room was a tertiary tactical center, one of many housed within the guts of her flagship Omnira. Usually bustling with crew, but cleared on her command. Now only her self-proclaimed peers and chirping consoles filled the silence. Which was very good. No distractions. This had to be played perfectly.

  “Make no mistake,” Tani interjected, cold and clipped. “Thorne was once the leading mind in ceespace navigation. And I doubt even you Korrak, who better understands the field in theory, will find him.”

  “Sentimental for your old mentor?” Vegas sneered, while his aide filled his goblet with shaky hands. “Running interference for him?”

  “Not at all. Citadel data is conclusive, the trail leads directly to Thorne. He orchestrated the attack, he leaked state secrets. And he’ll receive the same fate as any traitor if captured by me. I can assure—"

  “I assume that means execution?” Sirana Jhanar asked, teal eyes narrowed in challenge. "Knowing how you pardoned your turncoat uncle?"

  “Disruptive interposition aside, that was a miscarriage of justice rightfully rectified. Quite the ill-timed moment to develop a spine, Sirana.”

  “Mind how you speak to my wife,” Korrak added with a twitch on his brow. "The office of Magistrate isn’t the only notable power in the Directorate. I suggest you restrain your youthfulness, and learn to speak with caution from time to time.”

  “That a threat? Or a pointless reference to your obscenely wealthy parents, and so-called in-laws?” Tani let the taunt linger on her tongue. “Family reunions must be awfully convenient for you two."

  An unreadable glance passed between the not-so-secret siblings, succeeded by perfectly matching frowns. Too perfect.

  Drunken snickers sputtered from Vegas, but the rest were silent. None yet knew where the dice would fall. And admittedly, Korrak had been right, Tani would have to be a tad more diplomatic in the future. Ruthless hostility was a powerful tool of manipulation, especially against the under-prepared and weak-minded. But, it could also unite them against her before due time.

  “Yes, yes. We all know of their blood relation—and most of us knew that we knew.” Ilana thumbed her brow. “I invoke seniority to lead these meetings from now on. We need focus, not constant bickering.”

  Every face creased with suspicion, but no one aired any immediate objection. Best that the burden rested on someone else.

  “I propose," Illana continued. "Considering the potential conflict with Union forces, that we apply Directorate Civil Mandate 2586.8. To delay appointing a new Magistrate for the foreseeable future. Until that day, we all divide Thorne’s territory and fleets amongst ourselves.”

  One down, six to go...

  “Agreed.”

  “Whatever works best.”

  The votes circled the table, and Tani nodded when the time came, her excitement buried alongside her amusement within the confines of her spirit.

  “Good." Illana brushed her short, steel-hued hair. “I’ll inform the citizenry at large. But on your return trips perhaps visit the capitols of your new territories personally. It may help to ensure the change is met with celebration. And if not that...than at least with well-mannered, obedience.”

  Lately, the days felt like they ended before they even began.

  And aside from her now expanded powerbase, that little meeting had eaten precious minutes.

  Time slipped through her fingers like oil. Elusive. Slick. So, she delegated where she could, consigning more menial tasks to subordinates. A wise leader knew when to conserve strength, though at times it was perceived as indifference.

  That was far from the case.

  She cared. About her people. And the finer parts of Directorate culture and prestige. A majestic beast of human accomplishment plagued with a few cancerous boils. When she and she alone ruled, it would be healthier than ever before.

  But Tani needed a brief pause, her experiments demanded it.

  Omnira was headed toward Valoria, Thorne’s former home and the cultural capitol of his Sphere. The fleet there had turned Loyalist in a blink, and were hard at work plundering military resources en masse.

  A locale ripe for a well-curated narrative, to say the least.

  As her ship was shackled to a long journey, so too was Tani to her laboratory. A spacious and softly lit chamber, every inch of its golden circumference both pristine and fine. Marvelous. Fully-stocked with every useful scientific machine and instrument known to man.

  A heavenly playground for the truly enlightened. Though admittedly, the abundance of overly polished metals made her eyes ache at times.

  She rubbed them, gently, as her mind drifted back to the task at hand.

  The test at the Citadel had revealed a maddening truth. Her disruptors still couldn’t maintain resonance with Domain-0—the connection faded, and far quicker than earlier tests.

  Tani had toiled to tune them to 0.2 QPM—quasi-phasmatic microns, derived from equations based on inter-elemental waveform density, and calibrated across several gravitic oscillations. Yet, still they drifted. Rebellious little bastards. Downgrading weapons of a scientific caliber encroaching fantastical to mere baubles.

  And re-calibration?

  A brutal pain in her rather supple ass. It required a recursive sweep through a nine-point Isoharmonic Feedback Loop, impossible outside of a well-equipped lab, with at least two separate—

  Tani jolted upright, caught herself seconds before she fell brusquely from the chair.

  Stars, she'd nearly bored herself to sleep...

  Marginally annoyed, she smoothed her beige tunic, then reactivated the auto-boltflushers. Twin energetic prods that flickered blue over the bracelets set in the workstation. To the naked eye, microsynthenoids were barely perceivable, translucent crumbs.

  Magnified on the viewscreen they were vibrantly thrumming insects. Oddly cute. And she rarely allowed herself such childish vocabulary.

  Though their bulbous eyes and stubby limbs were functional, rather than aesthetic choices. Simple. Operative. An outward design that understated the difficulty of their creation.

  If only her predecessors had better understood the field of dometrics. The burden would've been lighter. Brilliant minds like Tallis. Haldane. Kovik. The latter had developed the ceespace equation as a prisoner of war. Emaciated and barely alive.

  All of them had possessed the genius necessary to further map the dometric realms. Had they only been born a few centuries later.

  But they hadn’t.

  Domain-2 was physical, measurable, perceived existence. Domain-1, ceespace—the fluid realm of faster-than-light traversal. An ocean of opposing cerulean and crimson waves. Not entirely quantifiable, but how humanity had reached the Felfield galaxy in the first place.

  And lastly, Domain-0.

  An invisible lattice of power beneath them both, elusive, theoretical. Myth made reality by Tani, and her new inventions. The tiny machines disrupted and ultimately pierced the veil between realms. A wound that bled infinite energy when resonance could be maintained.

  She had never dreamed before interfacing with Domain-0, not once in nineteen years. But now? Myriad voices and visions whispered in her sleeping ear, quiet yet heard. They weren't simple hallucinations. No. They were dreams that did not belong to her. As if the realm were connected to the collective subconscious of man.

  The theory should’ve somewhat unsettled her. Instead, it only fed her curiosity. A prime example of Tani's eternal curse.

  The Scientist’s Burden.

  The lab door sighed open, and only one other person had ever possessed clearance.

  “I brought you something to eat,” Maia said, heels clicking with quiet indignance. “Think you’re finally hungry?”

  “I think you’re plotting to fatten me up.” Tani tucked a braid at the shoulder, then spun the chair in playful circles. “But is that really what you wish to ask?”

  “No.” Maia set the tray down, and the warm scent of honey-drizzled waffles wafted over. “But I doubt you’ll answer the question I want to ask. Am I wrong?”

  “Not before now. But, the moment’s right.” She slyly tilted her head. “Though credit where it’s due, your passive-aggressiveness since Primas has been at peak form. I’ve never seen malicious compliance executed so masterfully."

  Amusement twitched at Maia’s lips. But only briefly.

  “Okay then. Why?”

  “Why was I blessed with the most beautiful best friend in the galaxy?”

  “Flattery gets you most places. But the question still stands.”

  "Why did I sabotage Thorne? Or why did I kill those malcontents with extreme prejudice? I thought both answers to be obvious.”

  “No. Thorne was dangerous to whatever you've got cooked up. Too smart. I get that." Maia pursed her lips, scowling at her feet. "And the killings? They were horrific, yes—but not too unexpected. With all the enemies you’ve made in the past two years, we’ll probably do worse someday.”

  Tani halted the chair's rotation abruptly. “Then, what is this really about?”

  Maia held her gaze.

  “You lied to me.”

  Her tone caught Tani completely by surprise. A sharp, and incredibly deep hurt, like there were shards of glass in Maia's shoes.

  “I didn’t mean to,” said Tani, her voice much softer now. “Not really. It wasn’t a lie. More of an accidental omission.”

  Maia’s eyes became illegible. For the first time since they were little girls.

  “An ungraceful and ill-timed surprise?”

  “A lie,” Maia repeated flatly, folding her arms, creasing her nankeen robes.

  Tani rose and made her way closer, posture lumbered by a rising amalgamation of regret and gratitude. There weren’t enough fissens in the galaxy equal to someone calling her on her bullshit.

  She was happy to relent.

  “You’re right. It was a lie. Multiple. But truly, it wasn’t intentional from the start. It really was a series of unfortunate and forgetful events. If forgetting were a possibility for me. I'm sorry, Maia.”

  A stout silence fell between them, louder than any heated argument. Her friend's expression teetered between anger and forgiveness, before she affectionately folded Tani into a bone-deep hug.

  “You should’ve told me,” Maia murmured into her shoulder, the warmth of breath at her skin. “I tell you everything. Everything.”

  This story has been stolen from Royal Road. If you read it on Amazon, please report it

  “I know. And I know that I haven’t been the easiest friend to keep lately.”

  “Wherever life takes us I want us to be honest with each other. Wherever. And while you’ll always be the biggest pain in my as’sul, by an incredibly wide margin I might add...I forgive you.”

  The humor chased away the residual tension. Tani had even barely registered the Sapien curse. A linguistic element of their poverty stricken past she'd rather forget entirely.

  They gently eased apart, as emotionally bonded as two humans could be without romance. Maia leaned curiously to the side to regard the bracelets, tawny bangs curtained over her hazel eyes.

  “So, those are the secret magic-doohickeys, huh?”

  “Microsynthenoidic disruptors. They interface with my neuro-node and respond to thought.”

  “Like, they talk to you? Or just turn off and on like back at the Citadel?”

  “They could talk, if it so served my purposes.” Tani jabbed a thumb over at the viewscreen. “But I shape the power they collect with both conscious and unconscious intent. Impact bursts. Disassimilation beams. Aegietheric shells, etc.”

  “Right. Saw them in action. Think my brain shorted out though." She crept closer, as if they might explode or leap up and attack. "What is it? That power?”

  Tani paused, considering the best words with which to explain.

  “I first called it dometric energy, but I think due to its flickering nature, dometric fire has a more precise and dramatic ring to it.”

  “It’s terrifying whatever you decide.”

  “They probably said the same about the first atom bomb.”

  “That’s probably the least comforting analogy you could’ve used.”

  “Oh, I'm well aware.”

  The ship violently lurched. As if the floor had paused while the galaxy raced ahead. Klaxons screamed in protest. Maia barely managed to steady them both, while warning lights pulsed overhead in epileptic flashes.

  “What in the universe—?” Maia yelled. “It’s always something around here!”

  Tani lunged to key at the console, braced against the chair as the floor rocked beneath her boots.

  “Shipwarden, report!”

  Static hissed, then cut into the clipped voice of Shipwarden Kaphas.

  “Milady! A Directorate cruiser dropped into our ceespace vector. We had to emergency reverse thrust to avoid collision. It’s The Kiln—one of Thorne’s rogue vessels!”

  The Kiln?

  Tani’s spine straightened.

  “All hands to stations! Keep us parallel! Shipwarden Shia is at the head of that vessel, and she'll want to cross our bow and target the bridge with her broadside—”

  “She’s not attacking!” interrupted Kaphas, completely bewildered. “No aegietheric shell, no charge on weapons. Just…coasting along ahead of us.”

  “Have you been drinking on duty again?”

  “No, milady, I swear! She’s doing absolutely nothing.”

  “Check the long-range scanners. It has to be a diversion.”

  “No other military vessels in range. Confirmed. They’re also hailing us now it seems.”

  Shia was a decorated officer. Rigid, disciplined. A hard ass of hard asses. And in less than a minute, she'd spat on a number of essential naval protocols. An oddity that made Tani itch with suspicion to say the least.

  “Fine,” she muttered, cropping the disruptors out of the intangidisk's view. “Put her through then.”

  “Text only. And it’s not Shipwarden Shia. It’s supposedly from Fleetmaster Zharein. Requesting to board via shuttle. He wants to speak with you in person. Alone.”

  Tani turned to Maia, who was equally baffled and annoyed. Zharein was far from reckless, and once, maybe even their friend. He had reassigned to Thorne's Sphere years ago, begrudgingly so.

  But it had been the best way to stave off involuntary retirement. This was either a genuine attempt at diplomacy, a cry for assisted suicide, or a devilishly clever trap.

  “He’s en route. Should I shoot it down, milady? I'm eager to try out the new phasmic cannons?”

  “No. But scan his shuttle down to the bolts,” Tani barked. “Train every gun on The Kiln’s bridge. Then have Thir escort the Fleetmaster to my chambers upon arrival."

  “Aww. At once, milady.”

  The comm cut out, and Maia gently brushed Tani’s shoulder with a firm hand.

  “Want backup?”

  “No. But thanks. Join Kaphas on the bridge in my stead, maybe get close enough to smell his breath. He's a little too chipper today.”

  A nearly Cheshire grin twitched to life on Tani's face, as she thought the bracelets into a liquid state—beckoned them to pour out of the workstation and over her wrists.

  The cool alloy and her next words hardened like neutron-treated durtanium:

  “I can handle Zharein...with or without these.”

  Tani took the enclosed tram that threaded Omnira’s armored spine, reserved for officers and emergency crew. It reached her chambers in three minutes flat. A trek that ordinarily should've taken twenty.

  She tugged her tunic tight, then stalked through its doors with a pneumatic hiss. Aside from her lab, this was the only room she trusted for this caliber of conversation—swept daily for bugs and digital tampering. Not that she yet knew the topic of Zharein's visit.

  She nodded to Drahn and Lesh, opposite each other along the procession of pillars that ran the room's length. Thir Véla stood guard in their midst, back to her. Posture loose, but deceptively primed.

  "You are dismissed Sub-Chief. Leave the Sentinels if you wish, but I am in no danger here."

  Thir began to protest as she passed, then reluctantly thinned his lips. "I believe you, milady. And arguing with you is a remarkably tiring experience. We'll be right outside."

  They promptly took their leave of the icy and quiet sanctum, perfectly curated to Tani's tastes. Ample, with a high-ceiling, and a circular bed flush with a reinforced viewport, where the stars danced her to sleep every night.

  At the far end, Fleetmaster Zharein was sat at her dining table, a glass of liquor in hand. Beard freshly combed. Hair silver and neatly cropped. A face etched with age and a more than earned self-assurance.

  His golden uniform was starched and overrun with medals. The red quasar of the 637th Stargazer Corps stitched on one shoulder, the Directorate fist clutching the galaxy the other.

  His natural eye—blue and cunning—studied the ceiling's intricate carvings. While the amber glow of his implantic eye was calmly fixed on her approach.

  “Tani,” he finally said, standing with a warm smile. "My best student. Still as stunning as the day we met. I often tell initiates of the time you beat the Iotaic Pass simulation. To inspire creativity. And you’ve only grown more brilliant and remarkable since.”

  “Strange.” She started to circle the table, hands tucked at her back. “How your nose can be on your face and in my undergarments simultaneously.”

  Zharein laughed, genuinely. “Still venomous as a viper too.”

  “I assume you didn’t come just to flirt and drink me out of zydrian ale?”

  He glanced at the glass as if it had appeared by magic.

  “My apologies, Magistrate. Even on Fleetmaster pay, I can only afford a bottle or two a year. Couldn’t resist, I'm afraid.”

  He drained the contents, then spun the wobbling glass across the polished table.

  “But that’s not why I’m here. And I’m not surrendering The Kiln either. Shipwarden Shia will handle that formality. I only ask, humbly, that you show her leniency. She disobeyed the recall under my orders.”

  Humbly...that's new.

  “I’ve brought gifts,” he continued, voice gravelly as ever.

  “How charming. Small and insignificant enough to tuck into your decorative pockets, I assume?”

  “On the contrary. A gift of significant knowledge. Insight to refine your...microsynthenoidic disruptors, I believe you call them?”

  The words stabbed into her chest. She halted mid-stride, fists curling into balls of barely veiled rage.

  “The only disruptor here is you, Fleetmaster. Interrupting my voyage with recycled theory and secondhand technobabble. Synthenoidic brains can’t be miniaturized without destabilizing their neural cores. They’re far too complex.”

  “You’re right. That was true. But as I said, you are remarkable.”

  Tani’s pulse climbed. A part of her clung to still seeing him as an old friend. The rest wanted to rip the name of his source from his throat. Her servers were quadruple-encoded and scanned obsessively. And if a human leak existed aboard, or at her estate, they would soon help her to redefine the word agony.

  She kept her next words purposefully light.

  “I’m already bored with this conversation. Luckily, my Sentinels are exceptional listeners. And the ride to Valoria is quite lengthy, plenty of time for a meaningful conversation.”

  “Yes, your machine men. Predecessors to your disruptors. I'd like to take a look under their hoods one day, if you don't mind?"

  "I very much do."

  “Even so. I wouldn’t recommend torture. Unless you want my colleagues leaking how you framed Thorne? Cloning his Stellarnet access codes and tying him to crimes he did not commit. Must've taken years. Brilliant. But your fellow Magistrates might not appreciate it, as I do."

  Tani blinked, so far beyond stunned that her toes felt numb. She was so careful. Whoever Zharein worked with, perhaps a ghost unit under D.A.R.C. (Direct Action and Reconnaissance Contingent)—made her own intelligence web seem provincial.

  He lifted the bottle of zydrian ale in silent question. She nodded faintly, and sat across from him, mind calmly abuzz. There was no point denying what he obviously knew. Far too specific to be an intelligent guess.

  She had to hear him out.

  “I hear you’re struggling with maintaining resonance?” Zharein poured two knuckle-deep glasses and slid one over.

  “It was always a potential hiccup.” Tani softly brushed the bracelets, watching the green liquor swirl. “Domain-0 isn’t easy to navigate.”

  “Ah, yes. Domain-0.” He took a sip and exhaled. “Or as immortals call it, The Veil. They're an awfully dramatic bunch.”

  Tani arched an eyebrow. “Immortals?”

  “Yes. What you call Domain-0, Homo lupinus and Homo sanguinis—wolves and vampir—call The Veil. Though even they don’t fully grasp its depths.”

  Tani let out an atypically boisterous laugh. Unfiltered and completely at Zharein's expense.

  “Either the ale’s stronger than I recall, or your mind is beginning to fray. Maybe both. Science skirts magic at times, sure. But immortals? Bedtime stories. Heartlander gossip. Supermen and shadows. Ridiculous.”

  Zharein didn’t smile. Just watched her, silent and patient. “I once thought as you do. But now no longer.”

  He retrieved a matte-black intangidisk from his belt and placed it on the table.

  The first projection to appear depicted an aerial view of an urban battlefield. Nothing but gunfire, rubble, and black smoke. A man, bleeding to death in the debris, crawled until he fell still. Then, within the paltry span of a minute, he practically sprang upright—charging back into the chaos raging around him. As if he'd been taking a routine nap.

  Odd, but not impossible. Adrenaline mixed with traumatic stress could inspire unusual things in the human body.

  A rain-slick rooftop came next. Two obsidian blurs danced across it, then plunged six stories to the ground. They landed without injury, one hurled a soldier through a terrastone wall like a toy. The other sliced through the reinforced armor of a KT-47 like butter. With a wicked and archaic sword, no less. Both waded back into the dark, so swiftly, that the remaining soldiers hadn't the chance to aim.

  Odder still, but—

  A fog-heavy, blue-leafed forest replaced the drenched city—trees toppled closer in a turbulent line, the preamble to a inhuman roar. A massive wolf-like creature leapt from the bushes and clashed with an owl-adjacent monstrosity. Its spindly wings flapped in rage. Claws shredded furred and feathered flesh to ribbons. A tornado of violence and branches spun about them...as they fought eagerly to the death.

  Until the feed stuttered to static, and the disk hummed a steady, defeated tone.

  “There’s so much more,” Zharein said softly. “Only made possible by our newest stealth-drones. They tucked tail for a while there, but aren't hiding as well now from what we've seen. But they're still elusive. Enough to still be considered myth by humanity at large. I understand your skepticism.”

  "From what we've seen?" Tani leaned forward, tone both accusing and curious. “Our drones?”

  He slid the intangidisk over like a poker chip. “In a moment. I want you to fully understand first.”

  "Oh? Then by all means. A little more exposition never hurt anybody."

  “The bulk of the immortals are entrenched in the Heartland. We've confirmed three bases, there are at least eight. They're not small by any means, just out of the way. Most wolves operate through BioMech as mercenaries. They have a nearly controlling interest in the company, and go when and where they please. We also know that at least two of the four vampir covens operate in the shadow of Omni-Corp.”

  “How...quaintly intriguing. And here I thought we had a leash on Omni-Corp? Still, regarding the footage, it can be very convincingly faked. I’m certain I've seen glowfilms with better effects. Maybe someone's pulling your chain?”

  “The Directorate has a financial leash. The vampir use fear. Though they're careful that our goals align whenever possible. And you’re a scientist, don't take my word for it. Test the footage. Or find them. Disprove me anyway you can, I welcome it.”

  He gestured to her bracelets.

  “Synthenoid brains are built on human neural emulation. That’s the flaw. Our minds weren’t meant to consciously interface with The Veil. But theirs were. Model your machines after immortals, and I'm sure they'll work as you intend. Or at least improve them.”

  Zharein rose and stepped around the table, slipping a coin into her palm with great care.

  Hexagonal. Charcoal. Weighty. And oddly one-sided. It depicted an open book that read: We shall never forget history. Though its truths have been gleefully exchanged for lies.

  She held it tighter than necessary. Confused. And perhaps angry at her own unfortunate ignorance. Zharein was many things, but an outright liar was not amongst them. At least not a good one. Still, Tani's damnably logical mind couldn't yet fathom that Dracula and The Wolfman existed. Not in entirety.

  “Why? Why share this? What do you gain by helping me?”

  “Whether Magistrate on Magistrate, or the Union, or both, either way war is coming. We think you’re the one who can best shape what survives. Enforce order. Fair without compromise. Vicious without pointless cruelty. The Union is an outdated and flawed governmental system. And your fellow Magistrates are beyond help. Hopelessly corrupt. Only vain conceits drive them now.”

  His voice dropped, as serious as he'd ever been.

  "And on the other side of the coin, the immortals once ruled Old Earth. In secret. Their petty rivalry nearly burned us all to ash. Now some are trying to alter their DNA, to grow stronger, shed their weaknesses. Something once thought impossible.”

  He cupped her disruptors, and to her surprise, she let him.

  “What you’ve made echoes old tech from before history. Tools once used to contain them. If they succeed in their plans, they’ll grow bolder. It may take centuries, but eventually they’ll spread and dominate us once more.”

  For the first time since 2599—seven whole years—Tani didn't know what to say.

  “I speak for my fellow Historians when I say that the Ordo Aevum won’t let that happen...

  ...not in a million years.”