<link href="StyleSheet.css" rel="stylesheet" type="text/css"/> <meta content="text/html; charset=utf-8" http-equiv="Content-Type"/> <style type="text/css"> </style> <meta content="urn:uuid:742f59e9-c2da-40e0-b7b7-7149cb817241" name="Adept.expected.resource"/> </head> <body> <table border="0"><tr><td><img alt="" height="48px" src="Images/chapter-i.png" width="100px"/></td><td><b>17 Aevum Oblivio</b><br/> A Flying Leap</td></tr></table> <p class="first_para"><i><big>H</big>e had to trust in the alchemy Nyl had worked upon him. </i></p> <p><i>A Technician of the multiplicity couldn't operate alone in the vacuum of dry space; without the means to propel itself, the poor creature would end up a slave to gravity, undying but frozen, a tiny living asteroid going slowly insane on its eternal orbit.</i></p> <p><i>Or dissipate into fractured particles as re-entry burned it up…</i></p> <p><i>A Slavesystem, on the other hand, was more at home in space than in the confines of an atmosphere. </i></p> <p><i>Zhe would have to reconfigure his new skin to survive the fall down to Earth. </i></p> <p><i>With no time to experiment he leaped at the viewing dome, his Blacksteel-armored feet poised to smash through the glass.</i></p> <p><i>A salvo of railpistol bullets flew ahead of him, sending cracks skittering across its surface. When he struck the whole dome blew out in a glittering exhalation of crystal shards, taking the atmosphere of the control room with it.</i></p> <p><i>Zhe exerted a fraction of his will on the seething bulk of the Slavesystem which enfolded him. He formed a device from its mass which every Technician knew inside out; a gravitonic torque. With a twist of its controls he arrested his fall out into space, turning his new body as he spun through a cloud of diamond-chips and frozen water vapor.</i></p> <p><i>Zhe's feet made contact with the smooth surface of the elevator tower almost a mile below the shattered control room window, anchoring to the metal with the satisfying clunk of powerful magnets. </i></p> <p><i>Below him, the tiny domes of Elysium sparkled with energy for a moment, the pent-up power of millions of trapped minds focused into a weapon of terrible potential. </i></p> <p><i>Feedback from the thing which had devoured Nyl splintered through his mind; the unclean touch of a being not meant for this reality. It ached to remake the planet in its own image.</i></p> <p><i>Zhe felt the Forge building like pressure inside his skull.</i></p> <p><i>He began to run down the tower, picking up speed as he went.</i></p> <p> </p> <p><code>((SCAN COMPLETED. NO FAULTY SYSTEMS/BACKUPS DETECTED.</code></p> <p><code>PROCEEDING TO ACTIVATE FORGE SYSTEM IN T MINUS 4… 3… 2… 1…))</code></p> </body></html>