CHAPTER TWO

Ryol

 

Rift detected. The words emerged in Ryol’s head without sound.

Without turning from her workstation, she diverted a small sliver of attention to Aurora and responded to the computer’s news with a thought. Inform Jardiv I’ll be there presently.

He awaits your arrival.

Ryol rose from her station and drew a complicated pattern in the air with her fingers. She thought of the last Rift a week prior and her subsequent off-dimension visit to the small world of Melonia. They were a kind people, long since having surpassed the need for war, with an ingenuity for technological advancements that exceeded their technical understanding. As was often the case as Recruiter, they suspected Ryol of supernatural powers.

Ryol had found it to be a function of the premature civilization’s way of thinking to explain the unknown via the supernatural, rather than by technological means.

That was fine. It made her job simpler. In the hundred years since she’d been assigned the missive of Recruiter, she’d yet to discover a civilization capable of understanding the Lenoreans’ technological prowess. In that way, her people were superior to the rest of their known Universe.

Ryol did nothing to disprove the Melonians’ theory. They needed more time. Two or three more centuries and they would be ready to join the Alliance.

Aurora pushed a screen across Ryol’s retina. Her lilac pupil dilated into nothingness. She waved a flippant hand, shifting minimal attention to the oversight of the program’s search, and relocating it to the back of her mind where it would continue scanning without interruption.

Ryol twisted her palm towards the ground and the office lights dimmed. Shadows danced where previously there had only been light. She inspected the room which had changed so drastically only in perception.

Let us see what this new world has to offer, she thought.

Ryol queried Aurora. Relocate: Operations Center.

Stand by.

Ryol shifted all unaccounted attention towards the task. She could walk, but that came with the risk of being detained by individuals curious about the trade agreements occurring in the Neutral Zone. Twelve delegates from twelve dimensions comprised the Alliance. The Madam Leader of the Lenoreans, the thirteenth dimension represented, presided over the gathering to decide the fate of the Graesians.

Ryol had recruited the Graesians into the Alliance herself. She felt a maternal interest in their fate, and so she had observed the meeting through her mind-link with the Madam Leader.

That would have to wait. Even with her prodigious amounts of attention, and Aurora’s assistance, she could not focus on all the tasks before her while allocating portions of her mind to the events unfolding in the Neutral Zone.

The Rift was her primary task now.

The translocation band attached to Ryol’s upper arm vibrated. She studied the blue metal that made instantaneous travel possible. The Lenoreans had proven the theoretical basis for the technology generations earlier, but the device hadn’t become a reality until the Oleidians joined the Alliance with their abundance of precious Zoridiun.

Such was the benefit of the Alliance to the Lenoreans.

Ryol’s arm tingled in response to the vibrations of the shining translocator. She closed her eyes. Darkness covered her.

The Universe tugged at the molecules comprising her existence. Tore them apart, dispersed them across the planet, before reassembling them in the brightly lit Operations Center.

Streams of incomprehensible data pouring down the liquid monitors overhead pooled in a wide basin at Ryol’s feet. The separate pieces of data merged, forming complicated strings that Aurora translated into meaningful information in Ryol’s mind.

“A primitive people, I think you’ll agree,” Jardiv said, appearing beside Ryol at the information pool. He stood rigidly, studying her with a sharp analytical stare that made him the ideal Keeper. “They opened the trans-dimensional portal for less than one millionth of one second.”

An absurdly short period of time, Ryol reflected. “Is it possible they stumbled upon the effect by accident? Perhaps an anomalous event?” The muscles in Ryol’s face betrayed none of the interest she felt.

“No, Recruiter. It was an intentional, if not ineffective breach.” Jardiv knelt and dipped a finger in the pool. Images coalesced, riding the ripples that spread from his finger.

Ryol interpreted the new information and nodded. “It would be premature to open a line of communication with this people. I will personally monitor their progress. Do not let this consume any more of the System’s attention. Remove it and return the System to its original search parameters.

“Yes, Recruiter.” Jardiv dipped his chin in acknowledgment.

Ryol closed her eyes.

Observation Chamber, Aurora.

Stand by.

The familiar tingle of the translocator made the flesh along Ryol’s arm shiver. When she opened her eyes again, she stood in a room of pure darkness.

She scrawled intricate passages in the air. The room responded with a symphony of light.

Temporal viewing required vast amounts of energy, especially when it involved a different dimension, but her position required diligence. She could not adequately report her findings to the Madam Leader without witnessing the events herself.

Beyond the requirements of her position, however, something else existed. A piqued curiosity. This new world shared an astonishing number of similarities with Lenora. She’d never encountered such a place. A thought niggled at the back of her mind—a thought she refused to assign more than a passing fraction of attention to, but a thought that existed nonetheless.

Ryol required more analysis before she would allow herself to venture down those avenues of thought and hope, but she could not deny the possibility that they had discovered the first world capable of sustaining Lenorean life without the need for terraforming. And if that were true, then their world might also have Eitr.

The Lenoreans did not have long before they ran out of the rare substance that powered their world. It was that search for Eitr that had led the Lenoreans to discover alternate realities existing beyond the veil of time and space.

Ryol redirected her attention to a new line of analysis as the room ceased its realignment. Aurora simulated an immersive rendering of the moment leading to this new world’s Event Zero.

An alien room, with many objects made of metals and glass, appeared around her. The furniture created from sharp angles and flat panels lacked the subtlety and sophistication of the Lenoreans’ work. Even so, they possessed a similarity Ryol was unaccustomed to seeing in foreign objects. These designs, based on the same physiological principles as the Lenoreans’, made her heart race with excitement.

Her heart quickened and her hands became slicked with sweat. She canceled all programs running in the back of her mind. She redirected all her focus to the individual standing in the center of the room, frozen in time.

Blue light leapt from a box in his hand. It traced a straight line across the room before terminating at a blank wall.

The emotions of this species were unfamiliar to Ryol, but if they were at all similar to the Lenoreans, the parted lips with exposed teeth indicated a state of happiness.

Or rage.

She hoped for happiness.

Never, in the thousands of worlds Ryol had explored, had she discovered a civilization sharing such striking physical characteristics with the Lenoreans. Though undoubtedly at different phases of their evolutionary development, the possibilities were endless.

I must inform the Madam Leader immediately.

Ryol studied the scene a while longer. She could not repress the spring of emotion bubbling in her stomach. It swelled inside her, searching for an escape. She did the only thing she could think of to release the happiness—she parted her lips, exposing the white enamel of teeth below, and smiled.