SG: Rad #98 (3/3): Served Canapes

(continued from part two, preceding...)

***

"Hey!" Eivandt Seconds shouted. "What's going on in there?"
The inside of the laboratory, from which the huge surge of
electrically-supercharged bronze-gold light had emerged, remained
quiet for a few seconds more. Then, Rumi heard the voice of her
mother, Glum.
"Eivandt? That you?"
"Eep... I mean, yep!" Eivandt replied. "Other folks, too. I...
um... I... how're you?"
Rumiko Moroboshi peered around the corner and squinted. The
light crackled and fizzed and popped, bronze-gold at the low ebb of
its fluctuations and harsh white at its peaks. Within its center
stood a woman, discernible only in silhouette. Chains were attached
to her wrists and ankles, though what those chains had in turn been
attached to was not in evidence--and, likely, existence. Rumi thought
she could make out an expression on the woman's face, one that could
qualify as very angry, highly jittery, or possibly both.
"I'll be fine," said Glum, her voice much calmer than her
expression. "As soon as I make some eyeballs explode."
Rumi looked at Eivandt, Alice, Miguel, Tom, and The Programmer.
None seemed eager to enter the room.
"Dana Wader's, I mean," added Glum. "And Erasmus Fancy's. Look,
I am in serious need of letting some of this out of me, and it doesn't
want to go to ground or back into the pile, so... Rumi, is that you?"
Rumi blinked, considered pulling back, then realized she could
not. She walked into the room, shading her eyes with her right hand.
"Hi, mom," Rumi said. She was aware that her being here, miles
underground in a secret lair being run by villains and overrun by
demon monkeys, was at the very least a technical violation of the
house rules her parents had set down during the journey from planet
California to planet Earth. In spirit, certainly, if not in letter--
after all, they had not said anything *specifically* about teleporting
demon monkeys as persons to be avoided. It occurred to her that there
had been a provision about not feeding stray monkeys, but she did not
see how it could apply here.
"You weren't on the bus that brought Eivandt, Miguel, Alice, and
I here," said Glum. "Did you--?"
"Long story," said Cendra, as she slithered into the room, arms
still crossed over her chest. "Probably not the best time for it---"
"She and my younger brother were teleported in by Shadebeam,"
said Miguel. The werewolf moved cautiously but smoothly into the
room, hindered in his elegance only by the way The Programmer stumbled
and whined as Miguel dragged him along. "I am told it was not
intended that they would remain here very long, only so long as it
took for Shadebeam to locate us. But something went wrong, and
neither Shadebeam nor Esteban are here." He paused, taking in Cendra
and Rumi's glares. "What?" he asked.
The Programmer was looking rather crossly at her and her mother,
but Rumi could spare him no more than a glance as Miguel roughly set
him down.
"Young lady," Glum said, her crackling and sizzling gaze fixed on
Rumi. "You know you're not old enough to be invading villainous lairs
on your own---"
"I wasn't alone!" Rumi protested. "I had adult supervision! You
said---"
"Um, I don't think this is the time..." said Alice.
"Look at me!" Glum exclaimed. "They could have done this to
you!"
"But they didn't!" Rumi snapped back. She knew she should be
quiet, that her mother would move on once finished with upbraiding her,
but she had been holding her tongue in a lot of situations during the
day, and could somehow not find the will to do it yet again. "It's not
like I *asked* to be brought to this planet! But I'm here, and I'm
not just going to say 'oh, well, there goes mom, and I can't reach
dad, so I'm going home, especially since I was in Malaga, and---"
"How'd you get to Malaga?" Miguel asked. To Rumi, he sounded
surprised, but in a way that suggested he suspected and disliked what
he thought the answer might be.
"Look, guys," Tom said. "We really need to be working together
right---"
"Well, if you want," said Glum, "I'll call the star yacht back
from its Jupiter orbit and we'll just send you right back to planet
Cal---"
"Hey, Electra Milf and Dyna Bait!" yelled The Programmer, still
being held in place by Miguel's clawed hands. "Shut your pie holes
and get me out of here!"
This had what Rumi guessed to be at least part of its intended
effect. She, her mother, and everyone else in the room stopped
talking and regarded him with expressions mixing incredulity,
annoyance, and intent to commit bodily harm. The Programmer noticed
this, particularly the 'intent to commit bodily harm' aspect, and gave
a weak smile.
"Um," he said, "in your own time, yes?"
"Right, look," said Eivandt. "These are tense times for all of
us. It's been a long time since some of us were in it like this, and
the first time for the rest."
Rumi glanced from Eivandt to Glum. Sparks were flying from her
mother's teeth, and Rumi was fairly sure she was holding back some
fairly serious vitriol that had more to do with those who had
supercharged her than her wayward daughter.
"Now, first," Eivandt went on. "What did they do to you, Glum?"
"Dana and the big ape hooked me up to this nectarisite pile,"
said Glum, standing aside so they could see the misshapen, five-foot-
high heap of metal scrap behind her. Most of the pieces seemed fused
to the other pieces, though it had clearly not started out as one
lump. "I think they thought it would draw bioelectricity out of me,
and use it to supercharge their chip-controlled army on the surface.
It did draw my energy out, but it changed it somehow as it did, and
then it fed it back into me."
"They must not have liked that," Miguel said.
"The table went up pretty quickly," Glum replied. "I probably
have burns on my back, but I can't tell right now. Everything's
crackly. If my dress wasn't engineered to withstand massive voltage,
it would've burned away, too. I tried zapping Dana and Fancy, but
they got out the doors too fast, and locked it behind them. I've been
bouncing off the walls here until you guys... look out!"
The warning came too late. Demon monkeys appeared in droves
throughout the laboratory, many of them carrying guns of some kind.
Miguel snarled and swung his clawed hands out, but the two he struck
were only distractions that set up the following twelve with an easy
target. They moved as one, clinging to his fur and letting out the
howler monkey equivalent of a war whoop before teleporting Miguel
away. The Programmer, left behind, cringed and dropped to the floor.
"Miguel!" Cendra yelled. Numerous monkeys appeared atop her,
apparently determined to repeat their teleportational feat, but they
found that nagas--the snake halves of nagas, at least--were harder to
gain a firm grip upon than helpfully furry werewolves. Cendra
squirmed free of their initial rush, swatted four away with a swing of
her massive tail, and slithered headlong into a rush of bronze-gold
electrical energy.
"Oops!" Glum exclaimed as the light died away. "I was aiming
for... Cendra?"
Cendra staggered a bit, but stayed on her feet. She looked down,
as if to confirm it was feet she was barely staying on, rather than a
snake body, then checked the rest of her to confirm that her cargo
shorts, tennis shoes, and plain red t-shirt had reappeared. Then she
looked up at Glum.
"I don't know what you did," she said. "But... I'm not even
hungry anymore. I feel like... I...." She turned to look at The
Programmer, who was nearly at the doorway and gaining speed. "He's
going for the underground highway!"
"What underground highway?" Rumi asked, as she deflected three
demon monkeys with a psychokinetic pulse.
If Cendra ever answered, Rumi did not hear. The howls and
screeches of the demon monkeys filled the lab as dozens more moved in.
Tom and Alice quickly had their rifles taken away, and Eivandt only
managed a couple whacks with his broken banjo before he, too, was
captured. Glum yelled something incomprehensible as Eivandt, Tom, and
Alice were teleported away.
A new burst of bronze-gold energy flooded the room. It blazed
against Rumi's shields, forcing her to fortify them until she thought
her head would burst.
When it subsided, only she, her mother, and Cendra were in the
room. Glum's eyes were wide, and she was looking at her crackling
hands as if she had never seen them before. The hissing and snapping
light that surrounded her was, Rumi thought, noticeably dimmer, and
she wondered if that meant the supercharge was finite, dissipating
with each use until Glum returned to her normal bioelectrical levels.
Rumi realized The Programmer was missing, and was unsure as to if
he had been teleported away, or if he scampered on his own. Before
she could ask, the demon monkeys returned. As Miguel had been able to
sense their attacks, so had they apparently been able to sense Glum's,
and had simply teleported away split-seconds before they would have
been fried. But not all of them were back, just a few---
"Hey!" Rumi yelled, as four of them latched onto her--two on her
thighs, two on her arms. The world twisted and shivered and became a
darkened corridor. Rumi tried to psychokinetically push the demon
monkeys away, but only the ones on her arms were dislodged--and this,
with far less force than she had intended.
Before the demon monkeys could reattach themselves, Rumi took to
the air and flew down the corridor, hoping she would not hit a wall or
any debris. The demon monkeys clinging to her legs had clearly not
been prepared for a target that could fly, and made that clear with
their alarmed screeches and ooks.
One fell off, bouncing off of walls before sliding to the floor.
Rumi rounded a corner, trying to catch the single remaining monkey on
the edge but missing. The monkey attempted to climb up her leg to her
abdomen, digging its claws into her skin. She cried out, spun, and
hit the wall.
This succeeded in knocking off the demon monkey, but it
recovered in mid-air and teleported to her, landing on her shoulders.
Mercilessly, it went for her eyes, and only her panic allowed her to
psychokinetically push its paws away. She felt she ought to be able
to just blast this one back, but she felt woozy from being teleported
and the adrenaline rush of the attack and the chase made it hard to
concentrate.
Then she flew under a low-hanging beam, and the problem was
sorted out, as the beam struck the monkey and peeled him off her back.
Its howls of monkey fury and monkey vengeance echoed behind her, but
were soon lost as she flew on.
Rumi took random turns through the darkened corridors and
junctions to ensure the monkey could not keep her in sight long
enough to teleport back onto her. Much of what she flew through was
dimly lit with emergency lighting; the rest was not lit at all. And
she saw nobody.
She landed in a corridor, and felt herself wobble as soon as she
let gravity have its way with her. Though she managed to keep her
balance, she felt off, somehow. Probably a lingering side-effect of
being teleported by demon monkeys, she thought, though why being taken
a short distance by them was more off-putting than being taken a long
distance by magic, she could not say.
She thought about her mother, and how they had argued.
Nominally, she thought, it had been about not staying out of danger
like she was supposed to, but it was really a continuation of the
fights over Rumi coming to Earth for a year, just because mom and dad
could not stand to stay away any longer. And though it was possibly
because of having all that strange bronze-gold electrical energy
bouncing around her head, her mother had given in and said she could
go back to Planet California. She had gotten what she wanted.
Only... was it still what she wanted?
It had been a strange and trying day, one that was not yet at its
close. Strange and trying... but certainly not dull. She recalled
her father telling her about his adventures, and thought about how
they must have felt while they were happening. How alive he must have
been. She thought now she understood why he wanted to come back.
She took a step, stumbled, then took to the air before she could
fall on her face. If this was what feeling alive felt like, she
thought, there was something to be said for being bor---
Rumi stopped. Listened.
She heard it again.
"Esteban," someone had said. The someone said something else,
but Rumi could not make it out. Someone else replied, a stream of
indistinct soft words. Rumi wobbled in mid-air, then headed where she
thought the voices were coming from. Not wanting to draw demon
monkeys to her, she stayed silent as she flew.
"You're hurt," said the owner of one of the voices. "God, you're
bleeding..."
More indistinct words. Rumi flew through a dimly-lit junction,
then into a corridor with grates for flooring. There was more than
one level to this underground hideout, she realized.
Now the voices were closer. The next words she heard were clear
enough for her to recognize their owners.
"It's my fault," said Esteban Veracruz. He sounded tense, in
danger of panicking. "You're hurt and it's my---"
"No," Lemon Rydell interrupted. "Listen, Este, it's not your
fault."
"But---"
"But nothing. I barged in where I shouldn't have. I got
translocated here instead of Shadebeam. It's my fault I'm even here
in the first place."
Rumi slowed. The voices were near, though she could not see the
people who owned them.
"I was aiming for the monkeys," said Esteban. "I ended up
hurting you..."
"It was a scratch," Lemon said, giving his voice a reassuring
edge. The same edge it had held before, back in Malaga, when Esteban
had expressed anxiety over his ability to be a superguy with only half
a suit of powered armor. "And the bleeding's mostly stopped. See?"
Silence. Rumi slowed further, sure they were close.
"Yeah," said Esteban. "I see. But..."
"Esteban," Lemon interrupted. "Este. Look at me."
Silence.
"You kept the monkeys from taking me away. You drove them off.
They didn't come back."
They were below her, she realized. Two forms barely visible
through the floor grating, lit only by the emergency lighting from the
level she was in.
"You're a superguy," said Lemon.
Rumi hovered closer to the floor, until she rested atop the
grate. She peered through.
"My superguy."
She had just enough light to identify who was who. Lemon's
'Wile E. Coyote' t-shirt was off and wrapped around his upper left
arm, which was streaked with blood. Esteban was the one in the black
'Gorillaz' shirt and the enormous bronze-gold metallic pants known as
Los Pantalones. Their faces were quiet and close, so close they could
have been...
Not could have been. Were.
It was then that something slammed into the grating, very close
to her ear. The grating collapsed, and Rumi tumbled down, recovering
enough to shield her from receiving a concussion on hitting the floor.
She rolled and looked up.
Lemon and Esteban now stood apart. Lemon looked surprised, and
perhaps a bit amused. Esteban, meanwhile...
Esteban looked terrified.
Rumi had no time to process this revelation, much less figure out
what it meant for her. Something large came down from the opening in
the ceiling grate and landed next to her, the impact of its feet
thundering in her ears. It was followed by a less-large something
which made a more graceful landing.
"Interesting," rumbled Erasmus Fancy, as he looked from Rumi to
Lemon to Esteban. "Aim for one, catch three." He hefted what looked
like a large and unnecessarily vicious-looking laser rifle and aimed
it at Rumi. "And the owner of Los Pantalones, no less. Here I
thought it would be so much more difficult to bring you in."
"What're you waiting for?" asked the other invader--a woman in
the black suit, white shirt, and black tie. Dana Wader, Rumi guessed,
though she had changed her look somewhat from her father's old rogues
gallery. The thoroughly evil and borderline-batshit-crazy grin was
unchanged. "Grab her and let's go."
"We have additional hostages now," said Erasmus. "Ones useful
against more than just Glum. Observe, neither of them dare move, so
long as I threaten her."
Lemon and Esteban said nothing. Esteban's eyes went from her to
Fancy to Dana and back to her, and Rumi thought he looked as if his
head was about to explode. She wished her head did not feel the same
way.

***

On the bridge of the _Subtler Than Light,_ Rad watched--and
enjoyed delicious canapes--as Capella spat orders at her demon
monkeys, telling them to raise things and adjust the vibratory
magneto-whatsit to that and so on. Though it all sounded terribly
important, she shouted at her crew as if they were amateurs, and Rad
could tell from their disgruntled monkey expressions that they were
not used to it. Nonetheless, they obeyed.
"Charge up the electro-vortex cannon!" Capella exclaimed. "Move
our ship into position over the elevator shaft, and do not allow the
_Vander Harkness_ anywhere near!"
"Like, um..." Rad began.
Capella glared at him, before softening her expression.
"I'm sorry," she said, "but the reward I earlier promised will
have to wait. I'm afraid you've been downgraded from ambassador to
hostage. Ringbob!"
The canape-serving demon monkey, whose name was apparently
Ringbob, saluted with his right paw, his left still holding the canape
tray.
"Hostages," Capella said, anger in her tone, "are not... to be
served... *canapes!*"
"Like, well, then," said Rad, as he willed his psychokinetic
power to cover him in a protective shield. "I guess, like, I'm going
to, y'know, upgrade myself from, like, hostage to, like, dude who's
gonna, like, bring you down, y'know?"
"What?" Capella asked. "I didn't follow any of that."
Rad grinned. Even in the modest light from the recessed lamps,
the glow made Capella and Ringbob squint.
"I never, like, thought I'd, like, be happy to hear that,
y'know?"
He kicked the canape tray out of Ringbob's hands, sending the
canapes flying. Catching the tray, he threw it at the nearest
chandelier with full psychokinetic force. It sliced through the
chain, sending it crashing to the ground atop several demon monkeys
who had been too surprised to teleport away. Rad fired a
psychokinetic bolt that severed the chain of the second chandelier,
causing that one to fall atop the command chair. The monkey noises
from that direction told Rad that Chochim was particularly vexed about
this.
Six demon monkeys vanished from different places on the bridge,
only to appear well inside his personal space. A half-second after
that, he knocked them back with a hard psychokinetic pulse. Before he
could wreak further havoc, hot bronze-gold light exploded across his
chest, sending him hurtling behind the bar. The bartender, who had
managed to teleport away in time, reappeared and made anguished howls
and screeches about all the bottles that had been knocked to the
floor.
Rad could still feel the sting on his skin. Though his shields
had protected him from the worst of it, part of the bolt had gotten
through. He flew up and saw Capella, bronze-gold light drifting as
smoke from her outstretched arms. Her grin was sharp and mirthless.
"That... felt... *good,*" she said--Rad guessed as much to
herself as to him. She lowered her left arm, but kept her right
squarely pointed at him. He kept his right arm aimed at her.
"Like, what was that, babe?" he asked.
"It's been a long time since I've been able to do that," Capella
replied. "Even discounting when I was in slow temporological
aether... ten years for me, over a century for your world. In the
aether, my mind could not access the power. But in your dimension,
with its rules... different story."
"You're, like, not going to---"
"They were forced upon me when I was last in your dimension,"
Capella went on. "1898. I'd been captured by Erasmus Fancy, taken to
his hideout. His ally then was a mage who called himself the High
Technocrus, though he said that was just his accreditation, or some
such nonsense. Tall, pale-skinned, bald, wore a rich brown cloak and
black-lensed goggles, that's all I saw of him."
Rad, realizing that Capella was likely to go on like this for a
while, looked at the demon monkey bartender, then gestured to the
bottle of mojito mix on the far end. The bartender ceased his cleanup
efforts, and started to mix the drink.
"So they experimented," said Capella. "I have no idea what they
hoped to accomplish, or if they suspected what would happen. Had the
Dweller in the Shades not disrupted their work, I'm sure I would have
been disposed with afterward. There was a fight... it's all in one of
Richard Cartier's journals, if you want the details."
The bartender handed Rad his mojito. Rad took a sip, and gave
the bartender a thumbs up.
"It wasn't until later that I found I had this... this energy...
inside me," Capella went on. "They left some nectarisite embedded in
me, and the color of what I project derives from this. But when I was
forced to flee, to return to my home dimension, my powers shut down as
well and what am I *doing?*"
Rad, sensing a change, finished his drink and handed the
bartender his glass. The bartender took the glass. He was already
holding several unshattered bottles.
"Damnation!" Capella exclaimed, a snarl transforming her
features. "I always exposit too much in this dimension! As soon as
my brain gets in it, I just have to ramble on and on about this or
that and hey, did that bartender give you a mojito?"
She did not wait for an answer, instead sending another bolt
toward the bartending demon monkey. The bartender vanished with his
rescued bottles.
"No mojitos for hostages, either!" Capella yelled.
Rad fired a psychokinetic blast at his distracted foe. It caught
her shoulder and sent her spinning into the wall. Not waiting for her
to recover, he tried the door he had come in, only to find it would
not open no matter how he tried to imitate the hand-wave she had
earlier done to open it up.
"Doors... are probably disabled," said Capella, as she extracted
herself from the wall. She clutched her right shoulder, though
otherwise she appeared unhurt. Rad was impressed, and wondered if she
had armor on beneath her uniform. "Being in your dimension... doesn't
agree with the programming, so much. Problems... when there's no
syntactical aether to run in. Fortunately, our magnagravitic-vortex
engines were designed to be dimension-independent..."
She unclutched her shoulder and shot a bronze-gold beam at him.
He tried to deflect it with his shields, but it struck his arm and
knocked him back. The wash of pain told him a patch of his skin was
burned.
He was about to fire back, when a host of agitated monkey noises
from the front of the bridge caught both his and Capella's attention.
"Chochim!" Capella called. "Chochim! What's going on!"
Chochim screeched and ooked, pointing to the front viewscreen.
The scene depicted was not of the approach of the _Vander Harkness, or
battle outside Dodger Stadium, or even the nectarisite lake inside
Dodger Stadium. It was of the clear night sky. Only the stars were
visible, the glow of Los Angeles at night... and MeltDown, barely
noticeable until someone, presumably Chochim, caused the screen to
focus on her.
A moment later, a purple-orange-and-midnight-blue blur obscured
the screen.
A moment after that, a huge impact rocked the bridge. Everyone,
including Rad, was knocked from their feet. Several workstations
exploded in sparks. Canapes flew everywhere.
"What... was that?" Capella asked, as she struggled to stand.
Her task was made more difficult by the way the _Subtler Than Light_
began to tilt toward its starboard side.
"Like, just a guess, babe," said Rad, as he wobbled to his feet,
"but I'm guessing, like, we now know, like, where Mighty Guy and
MeltDown, like, go to, y'know?"
"They brought down our shields so they could bring down our
ship," Capella said. "Chochim, where are you on reestablishing the
aether?"
Chochim ooked and eeked his reply.
"I don't *care* what's going on in the parking lot!" Capella
angrily replied. "No matter who's showed up now, our forces should be
able to keep control of the elevator shaft. Tell me about the
aether!"
Rad saw that Mighty Guy's broadside had, indirectly, opened up
part of the wall between the bridge and the corridor outside. He
looked back at the front of the bridge. More demon monkeys were
appearing, most of them wearing black uniforms and carrying sleek
guns. Between Capella and the arriving security, Rad saw his chances
of overwhelming the bridge crew rapidly dwindle. He looked back at
the jagged opening between the door and the wall. A psychokinetic
blast opened it further, and he was through before Capella saw his
move.
He dodged several blasts as he soared down the corridor, hoping
he could remember the way to the ship's deck. The metal was extremely
tough, and he doubted he could simply blast his way through just
anywhere.
A moment later, he found the hole Mighty Guy had made in the
ship. He had hit on an oblique angle, punching up from the side and
coming out---
A bronze-gold ray blast shot past him, singing his hair. After
patting the singed spot down to be sure it had not caught on fire, Rad
took off up the newly-created tunnel, deciding the best way to find
out where it ended was to go there.
He was nearly at the top when his power faded.
"Whaaa--!" he exclaimed, as his momentum ran out and he fell. He
caught a jagged protrusion with his left arm, and grimaced as pain
shot through him.
"Damnation!" Capella called from somewhere further down. He saw
her on a lower ledge, being pulled to safety by a couple demon monkeys
on that level. She was looking up at him, enraged as ever.
"Lucky for all of us your allies don't yet have specs for this
ship," Capella said, loud enough for her voice to reach him.
"Otherwise we might have lost the magnagravitic vortex engines, and
that would have been catastrophic!"
Rad could have told her that use of Mighty Guy for pinpoint
target destruction was an iffy proposition, even with MeltDown along
to correct his more glaring course deviations, but doubted that would
mean much to her. Instead, he asked something else.
"You can fly, too?"
This caused her scowl to become, briefly, a tight smile.
"I'm not feeling exposit-y at the moment," she said. "Guess."
Capella then looked down at the demon monkeys who had helped her to
safety. "Get him!" she ordered, pointing at Rad.
The monkeys looked up at Rad, then looked at one another and
shrugged. They did not wear full uniforms, Rad saw, only collars and
toolbelts. Not security, though Capella did not seem to mind ordering
them about as if they were. They disappeared, and reappeared almost
instantly atop the protrusion to which he clung. They withdrew tools
from his belt and gestured at him in a manner at once threatening and
sullen. He guessed they were not about to help him up as they helped
Capella.
They did not have to. Abruptly, he felt the psychokinetic power
inside him surge, and he let go of the protrusion. Again he could
fly, which meant---
The beam caught his arm, breaking through shields and burning
him. Despite the pain, he directed a return blast at her, missing but
forcing her back.
The _Vander Harkness_ had re-established its beam suppressing the
aetheric field of the _Subtler Than Light,_ but it was clear that the
_Subtler Than Light_ had, for a moment, found a way to block it. Rad
decided he had to at least get to the deck of the ship before they
blocked it again.
Fortunately, it was not far. Rad burst through the opening and
into the night air. Around him, demon monkeys howled. A number
appeared in the air before him, only to be knocked away by a pulse
from his psychokinetics. He looked back, in time to see Capella soar
through the opening, her entire black-clad body trailing bronze-gold
light.
"Rad!" a voice crackled in his head. "Rad, are you there?"
It was not Elizabeth's voice, nor did it seem telepathic. He
remembered he had left the implant in his head set to receive radio on
a pre-set frequency, and realized whose voice he was hearing.
"Like, yah, Chalandra," said Rad, as he dodged a beam from
Capella that scorched the deck behind him. "Like, what's up, like,
y'know?"
"The _Subtler Than Light_ is adjusting to our attempts to
suppress their aetheric fields," said Chalandra. "You've got to get
off the ship before they entirely block us."
"Like, working on it, babe, y'know?" Rad replied. He swooped
between two turrets, and caught sight of the _Vander Harkness_. The
blocky, H-shaped ship was right in line with the electric projector on
the nose of the _Subtler Than Light,_ which Rad realized must be the
'electro-vortex cannon' Capella had earlier ordered charged. The
_Vander Harkness_ was keeping its distance, but it was clearly not
capable of outmaneuvering the _Subtler Than Light,_ or keeping away
from its main gun.
"We're lining up Mighty Guy for another shot," Dr. Gigawatt said
over the radio link. "Is that you flying around the deck the--look
out!"
Rad looked out, in time to see Capella rise to his left and aim
her hand. She had him dead to rights.
She looked at her hand, then shook it, as if it were jammed.
Then she looked panicked as she started to fall. Rad tried to fly to
rescue her, but found he could not, as he was also occupied with
falling.
He caught the curve at the base of the nearest turret and roll
onto the deck. At the same time, he glimpsed a number of demon
monkeys catch Capella. He tried to scramble to his feet, but his
entire body felt bruised and sore, so he settled for a nimble stagger.
"I think... Chochim's got it now," said Capella. "You won't be
escaping. Even if you go over the side... we can pull you back in."
"That blows," Rad succinctly opined.
*Rad,* said Elizabeth, in his mind. *There's something going on
below. New combatants entered Dodger Stadium five minutes ago, and
fighting's broken out again.*
*I can't help,* Rad answered, remembering Capella shouting at
Chochim earlier about new combatants showing up. *They've got me
pinned down here.* Indeed, he was now surrounded by surly-looking
armed demon monkeys. Capella, now on her feet, had her arms crossed
and a pleased and haughty expression on her face.
"Take him below," said Capella. "Put him in one of the cells,
assuming we still have some. If not, just find someplace secure. And
find a second place for Fancy, once we have him."
*Rad!* Elizabeth's telepathic voice exclaimed in his head.
*You've got incoming from the parking lot. Several surface-to-air...
um... what?*
A few demon monkeys saluted Capella and disappeared. Others
latched on to Rad's arms and started herding him toward a door set
into the nearest turret.
*Surface-to-air what, Liz?* Rad asked.
The assault was a blur. Several magnificent mountain goats,
their white, grey, and black fur billowing, shot over the side of the
_Subtler Than Light_ and landed on the deck. Their hooves scrabbled
against the smooth bronze-gold surface, but they appeared ready for
their difficulties, and stayed upright.
They wore belts around their midsections. Several painted tubes
were on each belt. Rad had seen such belts before, on such goats
before, and remembered them as being only cheap movie props. But that
did not explain how the goats that Criticalman had been keeping in his
Van Nuys studio had gotten to Dodger Stadium, or how they made it
thousands of feet into the air---
Light flashed from several of the goats' guntubes. Some of the
demon monkeys disappeared as this happened, only to reappear seconds
later. The monkeys fell to the deck, with darts sticking out of
various vulnerable parts. The other demon monkeys looked at the goats
with considerable alarm. Capella seemed no less shocked.
"I am Captain Silas, of Sector Nine High Command," the black-
furred lead goat announced, in clear defiance of its own jaw structure
and general common sense. "Lady Capella Sandoval Ookanaptra, by order
of the Hidden Empire, you and your crew are now under arrest."

HAS IT REALLY COME TO THIS?
OUR HERO, SAVED BY GOATS?
GOATS THAT ARE APPARENTLY SECRET AGENTS FOR A FOREIGN POWER, NO LESS?
WILL HE REGAIN HIS POWERS AND ESCAPE?
WILL HE STICK AROUND JUST TO SEE WHO OR WHAT THE HELL ELSE SHOWS UP?
WILL RUMI SURVIVE LONG ENOUGH TO FIGURE OUT LIFE ON EARTH?
WILL SHE MAKE SENSE OF ESTEBAN AND LEMON?
WILL THE PROGRAMMER REACH THE UNDERGROUND HIGHWAY?
WILL HE FIND OUT WHO OR WHAT GAVE HIM HIS NEW POWERS?
WILL HE FIND OUT WHO OR WHAT BROUGHT THE BANJO?
WILL HIS DREAMS OF CONQUEST BE JUST AS UNREALISTIC AND INEFFECTUAL
IN TERRA SUBTERRENE?
HOW WAS BHOSSI'S STREEP?

On second thought, forget those questions. Let's talk about Mitchell.
--
Elizabeth Tirkoff appears with permission of Eric A. Burns-White.
--
Copyright (c) 2009 by Gary W. Olson. All Rights Reserved.
--
Gary W. Olson
swede at novitious dot com
Superguy LiveJournal: http://community.livejournal.com/superguy_list/
Superguy DreamWidth: http://superguy.dreamwidth.org/
Superguy Facebook: http://www.facebook.com/group.php?gid=47273370926

SG: Rad #98 (2/3): Not to Be

(continued from part one, preceding...)

***

There was nothing to be seen in the dimly-lit corridor besides
an overturned computer-monitor cart and a body, but The Programmer
stayed where he was. To be fair, he could not have moved, as his as-
yet-unidentified captor was keeping him in place. She peered around
the corner as he did, as if she could see more than he could. Which,
for all he knew, was possible.
He tried to talk, but could not, as her left hand was still
pressed against his mouth. He tried to move her hand away, but she
kept her grip. For a teenage girl, he thought, she was amazingly
strong. He just wished he knew what she was waiting for. He had told
her the lab was just past the junction she was staring at---
A moment later, six demon monkeys appeared around the body.
Martial in their bearing, grim in their purpose and expression, yet
somehow adorable in their little black uniforms. They collectively
lifted up the body--a tech of some kind, she guessed from his not-so-
adorable brown jumpsuit. The tech let out a slight groan, indicating
he was still alive, but The Programmer could not tell if he was hurt.
The next moment, both the tech and the demon monkeys were gone.
They waited, but the monkeys did not return. The Programmer
continued to try to dislodge his captor's hand. She lifted it away,
and he exhaled.
"Why did you do that?" he whined. "I was trying to tell you to
look out for demon monkeys!"
"That's what I *was* doing," she replied. "Some appeared, took
the body that was around the corner, and left. I didn't want your
babbling to attract their attention."
"It's like I told you," said The Programmer, either ignoring or
not perceiving the last jab. "The monkeys are moving everyone to the
central hub. Guards, techs, it doesn't matter."
"But why?"
"No idea," The Programmer answered. "Maybe they own this place
and just want everyone to leave."
"Maybe," said his captor. "The junction is clear now. Take me
to the lab."
She allowed him to stand. He made a point of cricking his neck,
then his back, and then his knuckles. He thought she would belt him
if he attempted light stretches, so he passed on that idea. Gingerly,
wary of the shadows, he moved toward the now-open junction.
As they crossed the junction, the demon monkeys returned. In
greater numbers, The Programmer saw, five on each side. They were
surrounded.
He tried to hide his pleasure at this development. The monkeys
would take them to the central hub, and from there, he was confident
he could slip away and get to the underground highway he had seen on
his way in. The underground highway would lead to the underground
city, and likely other underground cities, all of which would be
filled with strange people and dinosaurs and necktie-wearing apes and
dodos and who knew what else. All unaware of his power. All ripe for
conquest.
He became aware that the girl who had caught him, plus all the
monkeys, were now staring at him. He realized his mouth was open as
far as it could be.
"Um," he said, after closing it some. "Was I... um... you
know..."
"Maniacally," said the girl. She appeared both surprised and
annoyed, which The Programmer thought odd. She was clearly a
superguy, despite her youth, and unless she was completely new at it
had surely heard maniacal laughs by now.
The demon monkeys got over their distraction first. Three
appeared on The Programmer--one on his back, one on each arm. The
Programmer made no attempt to shake them off. Two more appeared near
the girl, only to get blasted back. The blasted monkeys hit walls,
disappeared, then appeared on the ground, seemingly none the worse for
wear.
"Come on, then," said The Programmer. "What's the hold up?"
He looked over his shoulder at the demon monkey on his back. The
demon monkey was looking over *its* shoulder, so The Programmer tried
to see what had its attention.
It was massive and shadowed and had two gleaming eyes fixed right
on him. The demon monkeys that had been in that part of the junction
were suddenly no longer there, allowing it to step into the light.
Black fur over massive muscles, moving with a surprising liquid grace.
On two legs, like a man, but with a wolf's head and--of more
immediate concern to The Programmer--long and nasty claws on both
hands. It wore black swim trunks that were clearly being strained by
the containment job they had been given, and it was this last bit that
identified the creature to The Programmer.
"Miguel...?" he asked.
The werewolf looked down at him, snarled, then looked up at the
demon monkeys. They were also taken aback by Miguel Veracruz's sudden
appearance, but were not about to back down. As Miguel surged into
the junction and raised his clawed hands, several appeared before him.
"Miguel!" the girl exclaimed. "Don't let them bait you!"
Miguel swiped at the demon monkeys. Predictably, they
disappeared, and reappeared on the wolf's back. Less than
predictably, the wolf ducked down, turned on his heel, and continued
the swing of his hand, hitting two of the three monkeys and grazing
the third. The two struck flew back, hit walls, fell, and did not get
up or disappear. The grazed one screamed as blood flew from its
belly.
The Programmer mentally replayed the move, and realized that
Miguel had sensed the reappearance of the monkeys before he had seen
it happen. Possibly before it had even finished happening. No wonder
the monkeys had been caught.
If afflicted by a similar realization, the other demon monkeys
did not show it. The junction exploded in combat as the demon monkeys
swarmed over the werewolf, over the girl, and--of most importance to
The Programmer--over The Programmer. He immediately sprang into
inaction, curling into a tight ball next to the overturned computer
cart. He was not sure, but he thought the demon monkeys clinging to
him did roughly the same thing.
The combat went on for quite a while, and featured a fair amount
of screeching, growling, and the odd sound of air displacement that
came from the bolts the girl fired. At some point, the hissing of an
enormous snake was added, as were rifle shots and the unmistakable
sound of a banjo being used as a melee weapon.
After several minutes of this, the monkey screeches lessened,
then stopped altogether. The Programmer lifted the hand over his left
eye, peered out, and saw a massive snake tail slither by. He
immediately covered his eye again.
"Oh, get up, you wuss," said a new voice. The Programmer
realized he had heard it before. He lifted his hand once more, opened
his eye, and saw the snake body. More importantly, he saw where the
snake body ended and the woman began. "Miguel," she said. "Would
you...?"
Massive hands gripped The Programmer and lifted him from the
meager protection of the computer cart. One hand withdrew, leaving
him dangling from the other by his shirt collar. The Programmer, as a
tall person, was unaccustomed to situations where his feet could not
touch the ground, and felt himself panic as he tried to run but failed
to move anywhere.
"Programmer!" yelled the girl who had initially captured him.
"It's okay! Just calm do---"
"*The!*" The Programmer interrupted. "*The* Programmer!"
"--wn... right. *The* Programmer. Whatever. You've met Cendra,
right?"
The Programmer paused, and looked at the woman again. Black
hair, brown skin, defiant expression, naked torso... yes, this was
definitely the woman he had seen brought in earlier as a prisoner
by... wait. The Programmer mentally backed up to the 'naked torso'
part of the inventory and re-checked it. Though she had her arms
crossed over her breasts, it was, in all other respects, a naked torso
that was naked in its nakedness.
"Dude," Miguel snarled in his ear. "You seriously need to start
looking someplace else."
"But---"
"I'm a naga right now," said Cendra, sounding as if she had
explained this several times already. "Eventually it'll wear off,
I'll change back, and my clothes will reappear from wherever they go
when I turn into a random mythical beastie. And then I'll devour a
plate of cheeseburgers because is my second involuntary shift today
and I am hungry as hell right now!"
"I told you," said Miguel, "you should've tried some free-range
demon monkey when you had the chance." Cendra scowled at this, then
rolled her eyes, reached out, and scritched his side. Miguel grinned,
giving The Programmer an unnerving view of his sharp teeth.
In addition to the girl who had captured him, the werewolf
Miguel, and the snake-woman Cendra, there were three others in the
junction. One was Eivandt Seconds, the vaguely Belgian man who had
been captured and brought in the same time as Cendra. The Programmer
remembered he used to be a member of CalForce named Doubt, and later
Willwarp, though he had lost his powers more than a decade ago. He
clutched a seriously damaged banjo, which The Programmer did not
remember him as having before--which meant someone else on the base
had gone to enormous and inexplicable lengths to bring banjo music to
their once-secret underground world. Next to him was Tom McCavish-
Laffalot, the former MicroVax, who seemed enormously entertained to
see The Programmer in a helpless position. Finally, there was an
armor-wearing, automatic-rifle-toting M.I.B. guard, who was in the
midst of removing her mask.
"We'd better keep moving," said Eivandt. "There's no telling...
er, Rumi. What are you doing here?"
Rumi. The name reminded The Programmer of something. There was
a superguy named Rad who left planet Earth back in the early nineties.
According to the Weekly World Schmooze, he and his wife Glum had had
twins, followed by a third, named...
"Rumiko Moroboshi," said The Programmer, looking at the girl who
had been his captor before Miguel had ably stepped in. "So the woman
you're looking for is Glum. Your mother, right?"
"Yes," said Rumiko, sounding annoyed. The Programmer could not
fathom why. "Look, everybody, it's a long story. I was magically
transported here by Shadebeam Moroboshi, along with Esteban and
Shadebeam herself. Something happened and we got split up, but I'm
sure they're around here some---"
"Esteban's here?" Miguel asked. He swung around, as if expecting
to see someone else close by. The Programmer yelped as he was swung
about in the process. "Why would Shadebeam bring *him* here? He's a
boy!"
"We needed the family connection for the magic to find you," said
Rumi. "The idea was, we'd come in, find you, then she'd send us back
and help you guys get out. But the spell circle got messed up, and I
showed up alone. And ran into him." She pointed to The Programmer.
"Can you put me down?" The Programmer asked. "Please? While my
neck still works?"
"Set him down, Miguel," said the woman in the armored uniform.
The same guard, The Programmer realized, he had thought seemed kind of
familiar earlier on, when prisoners were first being brought into the
underground base. As Miguel obeyed her, The Programmer remembered
where he had seen her before.
"You're the Coiling Woman, aren't you?" he asked. "You were in
Society. I remember! Alice something-or-other, right?"
"Seconds," said Alice, who scowled. The Programmer wondered why
no one seemed pleased to be recognized by him. "Willamette, back
then. Society and Coiling Woman were both a long time ago for me. I
made it here through luck and fast thinking. I got pulled outside by
those pseudo-zombies during the fight at his apartment---" She
gestured at Miguel. "--and saw the bus they had come in on. Snuck
over, knocked out one of the guards who were waiting, which was when
the zombies brought out him and Glum and my husband. I took the
guard's armor, got on the bus, and pretended to be a guard to get in.
Then, when things went crazy down here, I let those two out of their
cell---" She gestured at Cendra and Eivandt. "--and found those
two---" She gestured at Miguel and Tom. "--wreaking havoc in the
mess hall. Glum was the only one of our people still missing, or so
we thought, so here we are."
The Programmer, who had not really wanted all the details, just
nodded and tried to look thoughtful. Alice turned her attention to
Rumi.
"And if all Shadebeam needed was just a family connection," said
Alice, "why not just you and her, Rumi? Mother-and-daughter, brother-
and-brother, does it make that much of a magic-kinda difference?"
Rumi shrugged, seemed about to say nothing, then shook her head.
"He wanted to be here," she said. "He was going to find
Miguel... find all of you... one way or another. He wants to be a...
a superguy, and Shade saying 'no' wouldn't've stopped him."
Miguel looked doubtful at this, inasmuch as a werewolf could look
doubtful, but ultimately nodded. "So he got Los Pantalones working,
at least?"
"Yeah," Rumi confirmed.
"Lucky thing you found Shadebeam," said Tom. "Was she in L.A.,
or...."
"We'll get the details later," Cendra interrupted, looking from
Tom to Miguel and back to Tom. Miguel seemed not to notice the look;
Tom noticed but had no more idea of what it meant than The Programmer.
"We came to rescue Glum, so let's do that, then figure out our next
move."
"Which door is it?" Rumi asked, looking at The Programmer.
Seeing no way out of it, he led them into one of the corridors,
down to a set of sliding double-doors that from the outside seemed no
different than any of the others. There was no handle, only a keypad
next to the doors.
"You wouldn't happen to have the combination," Eivandt said,
indicating the keypad, "would you?"
"Prisoner," said The Programmer. "Sorry." He paused in
calculation. As loathe as he was to help the side of good, they were
now his best chance to reach the central hub of the base. And his
best chance of sneaking away into the underground highway would come
if they were not closely watching him. If they already had what they
sought.
He saw that Tom and Eivandt were about to do something to the
keypad with a banjo string and one of the portable circuit readers The
Programmer had earlier seen Tom using. He stepped quickly in and
placed his hand over the keypad.
"Let me try something, first," he said to their questioning
looks. "I was exposed to this system for a long time. I think I can
recall the combination, if---"
He stopped as he felt his hand pulse. His palm felt abruptly hot
and dry. He lifted it up, saw the skin was undamaged, then looked at
the keypad. The light was green.
"Um, yeah," said The Programmer. "I think... I think that did
it."
Alice regarded him with a suspicious frown, as did Rumi. The
Programmer lifted his hands as if in surrender. His mind was too busy
racing to even try to dissemble about what had just happened. Some
power had leapt from his hand into the keypad and had allowed him to
mentally bypass the entry code and unlock the door. He remembered the
sensation from his years as a villain in the nineties, but back then,
it had been the cyber-shirt he had engineered and worn that had
provided the ability. And somehow, he had known it would happen.
Somehow... the nectarisite interface, of course. Someone had used it
to draw him into c-space earlier, allowing him to witness Glum being
brought to this laboratory and hooked to the nectarisite pile. There
had been an energy surge that kicked him out of c-space... but what if
it had done more than that? What if, while he had been working in
c-space, someone else had been working in him?
"That's really annoying," said Rumi, who was looking directly at
him.
"What is?" he asked.
"The maniacal giggling," Tom said. "More precocious than
villainous."
The Programmer scowled.
"Stand to the sides," Eivandt instructed. "When this door opens,
there could be someone waiting to fire at us."
Miguel grabbed The Programmer--by the shoulders this time, though
in no less rough a manner--and drew him to the left of the doorway,
where Tom waited. Eivandt, Rumi, and Alice stood at the right doorway
edge. Tom pushed a button on the keypad.
Before the double doors even finished sliding apart, a flood of
electrically-supercharged bronze-gold light erupted from within the
lab and slammed into the opposite wall.

***

On entering the room he had been told was the 'bridge' of the
_Subtler Than Light,_ Rad wondered if Capella had made a mistake.
Ship bridges, in his experience, did not have chandeliers--even the
small, low-hanging kind, of which this one had two. Or demon monkeys
serving canapes. Or wet... no, check that, he *had* been on a few
bridges with their own wet bars, though none with their own
bartenders. The demon monkey behind the bar paused in pouring what
looked like a lime mojito to gesture for Rad to sit at the bar.
Capella had him firmly by the arm, however, and steered him toward the
far end of the bridge, where a more traditional wall screen, control
chair, and assorted workstations waited.
"What's the situation, Chochim?" Capella asked, addressing the
black-uniformed demon monkey sitting at a console next to the command
chair. As Chochim regaled Capella with monkey noises recapping 'the
situation,' Rad walked up to a large screen next to the main wall
screen.
One section of the subdivided screen showed the exterior of the
_Vander Harkness,_ still trailing smoke and fire from the last
wounding shot the _Subtler Than Light_ had given her. Rad was glad to
see that it had sustained no further damage, though this was
apparently because the _Subtler Than Light_ had not sought to inflict
any.
The other three subsections showed aerial views of the combat
under way in and around Dodger Stadium. Or rather, what was left of
it. Dozens of demon monkeys surrounded the shaft that led eight-and-
a-half miles down into the Earth's crust to a lair currently occupied,
though not originally built by, Erasmus Fancy. The pseudo-zombies and
pseudo-ninjas, who earlier had been in close combat with the demon
monkeys for control of access to this shaft, were huddled on the
periphery of the parking lot. Between them and the monkeys were ex-
CalForcers Confusion, Criticalman, HotFlash, and Guido. Rad wondered
where MeltDown and Mighty Guy had gotten to.
"Erasmus Fancy's so-called ninjas and zombies have ceased to
behave as such," said Capella. "It seems the strike team we sent in
earlier was successful in disrupting Fancy's radio chip control
operations. Since they are, in fact, innocents used by Fancy and his
allies for their insidious schemes, your human and... humanish...
allies had to choose between keeping control of access to the shaft
and protecting their lives. Predictably, they chose the latter."
The demon monkey on the opposite side of the command chair from
Chochim made howling noises. Capella smiled, and sat in said command
chair.
"We have a video and audio link with your _Vander Harkness,_"
said Capella. "Come. We must strike a truce before things have a
chance to erupt in violence again."
Rad took a place next to Capella, though he remained standing.
This seemed to annoy Chochim, who had to look around him to see the
main wall screen.
The screen lit up with an image Rad recognized as being broadcast
from the command center of the _Vander Harkness,_ due to all the
damaged cubicle walls in the background. In the foreground was
Chalandra Harkness, formidable and cool in her tailored suit, her
centuries giving her an aristocratic edge that easily matched
Capella's, despite her youthful appearance. On her left was Elizabeth
Tirkoff, formidable and cool in her not-tailored-yet-fitted-very-well-
thank-you Red Sox t-shirt and blue jeans, regarding Capella through
her red-rimmed glasses with no sign of emotion. Closer to the bottom
of the screen was China Kyoko Moroboshi, who might have looked
formidable and cool in her black 'Juno Reactor' t-shirt if she had not
been blowing a large purple bubble with her gum. To Chalandra's left,
looking neither formidable nor cool, yet impeccably sciency in his
white lab coat, Dr. Giuseppe Gigawatt seemed in the midst of deciding
what he should do with his hands.
"I'm Chalandra Harkness," said Chalandra. "This is Elizabeth
Tirkoff, that's China Moroboshi, and this is..."
"Bosley," Gigawatt suggested.
"Doctor Gigawatt," Chalandra finished. "Whom am I addressing?"
"My name is Capella Sandoval Ookanaptra, of the clan Ookanaptra,"
said Capella. "You may address me simply as..."
"Capella, yes," said Dr. Gigawatt, who had gone with the classic
behind-the-back handclasp while Capella spoke. "We know who you are."
"You are... well informed," Capella said. Rad could tell she was
not pleased about this fact. "May I ask...?"
"You may ask," said Chalandra, "but we won't answer."
"Rad," said China. "You all right?"
"Pretty much," Rad replied. "Though my speech has gone all
weird. Are you sure you understand what I'm saying?"
"We'll manage," said Elizabeth, with a bit of a smirk. "Dr.
Gigawatt believes he knows what's happening to you."
"It's the aetheric field, is it not, Capella?" Gigawatt asked.
If Capella had been nonplussed before, she seemed close to fury
now. Anger seeped out in the otherwise tightly controlled voice she
used to speak.
"You are... very... well informed," said Capella. "Someone from
our realm has been telling tales." Gigawatt opened his mouth, but
Capella raised a hand. "It is as you say. Our ship generates an
aetheric field that allows us to operate as if we are in our
dimension, instead of yours. The fine control we maintain over it
allows us to harden it to deflect attacks, or admit..." She paused,
and glanced at Rad. "...potential ambassadors."
"Why Rad?" Chalandra asked.
"Opportunity," Capella replied. "We identified him before, but
had no means to signal our intentions to him. When he flew over our
ship, we had our chance, and let him in. We were surprised when he
stopped flying and started falling."
"But you must have known *something* would happen," said
Gigawatt. "Something always does, when one from our dimension enters
yours, does it not?"
"Does it?" Rad asked.
"Aether," said Capella, "is the medium through which everything
passes in our dimension. It is similar to aetheric theories once
believed in on Earth, before they fell out of favor. I'm sure, being
so well informed, you know how this happened."
"It had to be a fluid, so as to fill space," Gigawatt said. He
cocked his head, as if trying to remember the rest. "But a fluid
millions of times more rigid than steel, so as to support the high
frequencies of light waves. Also, massless and without viscosity, so
as not to affect the orbits of the planets. And completely
transparent, incompressible, continuous at small scale, non-
dispersive, etcetera, etcetera. That merely describes the problems
with the theory of luminiferous aether, the last of the aethers to be
taken down by scientific observation. The others, such as the
gravitational aether posited by Le Sage and later revived by Lord
Kelvin, the temporological and absurdelicious aethers championed by
the now-largely-forgotten contemporary of Newton, Sir Natural
Science---"
"Doc," said China, looking over her shoulder, "skip to the part
where there's a point."
Gigawatt paused, frowned, then stroked his goatee. Rad wondered
if he would ever add a mustache so that it would be a proper Van Dyke.
"The point is," he said, "that aether explains nothing... in this
dimension. But it does in yours, Capella. In particular, I am
considering the functioning of the brain. Electrical signals between
synaptic connections, for instance. A brain that functions in a
certain way in our dimension, suddenly immersed in another dimension
where an aether of some kind actually affects transmission speeds and
other properties... well. I would posit that it would make things...
and I use the scientific term here... 'screwy.'"
"Regrettably, this is so," Capella answered, sounding as if she,
in fact, held little regret about the matter. "In Rad's case, it has
inhibited his ability to exercise his psychokinetic abilities, and,
though I'm not sure why he thinks this, his speech patterns. There
may be other differences in his thought processes--there always are,
when your kind are in the aether. Motor and logic skills sometimes
exhibit slight degradation or enhancement--I do not know enough about
Rad to say if that is the case. Most often, the changes seem to be
subtle, and not immediately evident."
"Rad," said Chalandra, "any changes you've noticed?"
Rad, who had stopped paying attention while considering
Gigawatt's facial hair, and was now considering a selection of canapes
offered by a demon monkey in a tuxedo, looked up.
"Like, what?" he asked.
"Never mind," Chalandra replied. She then glanced away at
something off-screen before returning her regard to Capella. "Lady
Capella," she said, "what do you propose we do about the current
situation, now that we are satisfied with the... Ambassador's...
health?"
Rad tuned out again, as Capella began outlining a plan that used
words like 'cooperation' and 'mutual benefit' but largely seemed to be
about the _Vander Harkness_ backing off so that the _Subtler Than
Light_ could send more demon monkeys down in bubble-ships that were
insulated from the elevator shaft's defenses, for the purposes of
capturing Erasmus Fancy. He moved slowly away from Capella's side, as
if drifting toward the bar. Chochim made a gesture of thanks as he
got out of the demon monkey's way.
"Like, hello?" Rad asked, as quietly as he could.
*Rad,* Elizabeth's voice came into his mind--telepathic, not the
radio contact he had expected. *Are you receiving this?*
He looked at the screen. Elizabeth was still looking at Capella,
but as he looked, she glanced in his direction.
*Yah,* he thought back at her. Though he was not a telepath, he
knew Elizabeth, once she had established and locked contact, could
'hear' him well enough. *Like, what's going on, like, y'know?*
*Bhossi and Cla'rabhelle are testing something they've cobbled
together,* Elizabeth replied. *A vortex wave modulator, they said.
Right now it's just focused on your area of the ship. Your speech is
back to... um... what passes for normal for you?*
*Like, yah,* thought Rad. *Does this mean, like, I have, like,
my powers back?*
*Hopefully so,* Elizabeth said. *Be ready to be disruptive. But
wait until negotiations have broken down.*
*Like, why can't you, like, do telepathic, like, things, like,
y'know? Like, mess with their, like, heads?*
*Tried,* she replied. *Even now, I can't lock on to either
Capella or the demon monkeys. Not sure why.*
*Like, okay,* Rad replied. *I'll, like, be ready, like, okay?*
*Okay. Good luck.*
Rad casually walked back to Capella's side, to the great
annoyance of Chochim. Capella was winding up her proposal on the
post-capture mutual interrogation of Erasmus Fancy, which seemed to
come down to her interrogating Erasmus and possibly later telling the
_Vander Harkness_ what he had said. Chalandra seemed to mull this for
at least five seconds, then shook her head.
"I'm going to have to run this past my advisory panel before I
sign on," she said. "Will that be all right?"
"Take your time," Capella replied, making a gesture equally
expansive and dismissive. "I will be---"
"Here they come now," said Chalandra. She and Elizabeth moved to
the right side of the screen, while Dr. Gigawatt moved to the left.
Bhossi and Cla'rabhelle, their white lab coats flapping against their
bovine bodies, telekinetically hovered from off-screen to center
screen. Their brains, which extended a full foot above their heads
and were protected by transparent caps, were pulsing an almost lime-
green color.
Capella's reaction seemed harsh to Rad. She emitted a sound
somewhere between a screech and a hiss, and bared her teeth at the
screen. The superintelligent cows--or Mu'Kaos, to be proper about
it--seemed unmoved by this, and spoke.
"Mistress Capella," said Bhossi, though her mouth did not move,
"we meet again." Rad realized the sound was actually coming through
the speakers for the audio-visual linkup with the _Vander Harkness,_
and guessed the Mu'Kaos had some kind of invention for translating
their normal telepathic speech to regular audio.
"Only now," added Cla'rabhelle, "you are no longer our Mistress,
and we no longer cower beneath your rage... you left us to wander and
die, in the tunnels beneath Giza... but we have survived!"
"So I see," said Capella, all superior bearing gone now. She
looked, to Rad, ready to leap through the screen at them.
"Because we are people of the land!" Bhossi declared. "We are
the Kaos of the Lost Continent of Mu! We are... Mu'Kaos!"
"Mu!" Bhossi and Cla'rabhelle declared in unison. "Mu! Mu!
*MU!*"
All was silent on both bridges for several moments after this
declaration. Almost silent, anyway--Dr. Gigawatt, his hands clasped
over his mouth so tightly he was starting to turn blue, could not
contain his reaction, and several guffaws escaped before he gave up
and fell over. China looked over her shoulder at the now-chortling
doctor, rolled her eyes, and looked at Cla'rabhelle.
"It sounded better when you were doing it as Dame Judy Dench,"
she said.
"How was my Streep?" Bhossi asked.
"Enough!" Capella exclaimed, drawing all eyes again. What they
saw was an expression of barely-contained ferocity, though she was at
least trying to recover by adopting an arms-folded noble posture of
defiance. "I see now how you have become so well informed about me
and the Hidden Empire. Our negotiations are at an end. Stay out of
our way or we will destroy you." She made a gesture at Chochim, and
Chochim pressed something on the bronze-gold panel before him. The
main viewscreen went dark.
Rad only had one question.
"Like, what's going on, like, y'know?"

(continued in part three, following...)
--
Elizabeth Tirkoff appears with permission of Eric A. Burns-White.
--
Copyright (c) 2009 by Gary W. Olson. All Rights Reserved.
--
Gary W. Olson
swede at novitious dot com
Superguy LiveJournal: http://community.livejournal.com/superguy_list/
Superguy DreamWidth: http://superguy.dreamwidth.org/
Superguy Facebook: http://www.facebook.com/group.php?gid=47273370926

SG: Rad #98 (1/3): Hostages Are

RAD
Episode 98
[ Rad Returns, Part Eight of Ten ]
"Hostages Are Not to Be Served Canapes"
by
Gary W. Olson

***

"The one thing I want you to know," said The Programmer, as he
rubbed the back of his head, "is that none of this was my idea."
Rumiko Moroboshi, standing a wary distance from the supposedly-
former villain, nodded. She did not really believe what he said, but
she was willing to allow him his delusions of persuasion. Akane
Moroboshi, her aunt, had indicated to her and Rad, her father, that
The Programmer was someone who ought to be found, and she had found
him. More accurately, he had found her, after bursting into the
supply room into which she had only minutes before been magically
translocated. A misunderstanding centering on the demon monkeys that
were wreaking havoc in his pants had caused her to hit him with a
psychokinetic blast that had briefly made him faint. After he revived
and she had calmed him down, she confronted him about what little she
knew--namely, that a pack of pseudo-zombies had kidnapped her mother
and several of her friends, and that he was somehow connected. A
metal made of a mysterious element called nectarisite was involved,
and... that was more or less it--aside from a guided vision involving
a bronze-gold, demon-monkey-crewed airship called the _Subtler Than
Light_ in 1899 Central America that had no immediate relevance she
could see. Other than the involvement of demon monkeys.
Esteban Veracruz would have known more. His armored trousers,
Los Pantalones, were made of nectarisite, and she thought he could
have asked questions she would not think to ask. But he, and
Shadebeam Moroboshi, had not translocated with her as expected.
Esteban's friend, Lemon Rydell, had unexpectedly burst in and rushed
the magic circle as Shadebeam cast the translocation spell. But the
fact that she made it through and right away found The Programmer told
Rumi that she had reached the correct vicinity of where her mother and
friends had been kidnapped. She could hope that Shadebeam and Esteban
had made it through as well, and were not too far away.
"I haven't been a villain in six or seven years," The Programmer
went on, oblivious to her reflections. "I was working for an
insurance company. Only I was being used. They had these nectarisite
liquid-metal fibers that would come up out of my keyboard, poke my
fingers, and take over my perceptions. I did the programming and
circuit design work they wanted in c-space, and at the end of the day,
I'd be released with no memories of what I'd done."
"Didn't you find that suspicious?" Rumi asked. "I mean, if this
has been going on for years..."
"You ever work for an insurance company?" The Programmer asked
back.
Rumi shook her head. The Programmer continued.
"Then, just today, this limo shows up, and this woman's in it,
claiming she's an M.I.B. agent. Which is weird, 'cause I thought the
M.I.B. got disbanded over a decade ago. There were hearings about it,
right? Anyway, I'm made to get in, then she shoots me with a dart,
and when I wake up I remember everything about what I've been doing
for them."
"At which point you immediately protest and do everything in your
power to stop them?"
The Programmer snorted. "No, at which point I continue to do
their bidding because I'm a prisoner. Plus, if I don't, they'll get
somebody else to do it, and that person will totally get to put it on
their resume if it works."
"But, after what happened during the Genocidal War," said Rumi,
searching her memory of the quick brief on recent history she had been
given on the way to Earth. "Psybernet's mind-controlled army..."
"I don't know if that was the inspiration or not," said The
Programmer, "though references were made. I think they wanted
something that could be controlled without putting a super-
powered individual at the center of it. Something that could be run
by agents unquestionably loyal to the M.I.B."
"Mystery metal is an improvement?"
The Programmer shrugged. "As far as the M.I.B. is concerned,
metal is metal. As long as they're the ones issuing the commands,
it's all good. The way it works--or worked, I should say--there's a
set of default instructions based on a particular 'character' we want
the chip-controlled to embody. Diplomat, custodian, bartender, you
name it."
"Zombie?"
"Completely Secret Secret Agent Wader's idea. Same with the
ninjas. Maybe it's that sort of outside-the-skull thinking the new
M.I.B. likes about her. Anyway, when no one's on the microphone
delivering specific instructions, these recorded defaults go out to
reinforce for anyone watching that they are who they say they are."
Rumi considered the reference to Dana Wader, the former Empress
of the long-defunct Muuuahahahahan Empire, who was now working as a
high-level agent for a supposedly-defunct Earth-based secret agency.
Her parents had told her stories about Dana, through the years, ones
that impressed upon Rumi that Dana was thoroughly evil, to the point
where, if she had a mustache, the wind power its twirling generated
could power a fair-sized city. Rumi was sure that Dana found her
present circumstances galling, and that what she was up to here was
somehow intended to elevate them.
But there was little new The Programmer could say about *her.*
She went back to his statement, thought about it, then crossed her
arms. "So zombies on this world go around *announcing* they're
zombies?"
"I didn't write or record those tapes," said The Programmer,
spreading his hands in a gesture of helplessness. "One of the mike
guys told me they produced those based on this M.I.B. manual from the
fifties called 'Case Study on How to Stop a Zombie Uprising.' They
had another one for ninjas, and another one for bank robbers, and we
didn't really have time to come up with our own material, so..."
"They were worried about a bank robber uprising?"
"I think the word in the manual was 'spree,' but---"
"The bank robbery that happened this morning," Rumi interrupted.
"That was your 'bank robber' program in action?"
"A test run," The Programmer replied. "Um... do you mind if I
stand up?"
Rumi nodded. Despite his general tallness and looming nature,
The Programmer seemed no physical threat. Possibly, she thought, it
had to do with the way he cringed and cupped himself whenever she
gestured at him.
The Programmer got to his feet, though he continued to lean
against the wall opposite Rumi. "A test run, which a superguy called
Rad, who wasn't even supposed to be on Earth anymore, broke up. You
know who he is?"
Rumi nodded again. She had not yet given her name to The
Programmer, and saw no reason to give any other information unless she
had to. It was The Programmer who needed to talk.
"Dana blamed me for the failure of the system," said The
Programmer. "Even though I warned her... well, users never listen,
right? She had me come up with something that day to block these
alien comm channels, which I guess Rad uses so he can stay in contact
with the computer at his house. She used to be this Empress chick
from outer space, right, so she knows this stuff. Simple jamming. No
problem for me.
"Of course, I don't know I did this until later on, when she came
around in her limo and had me picked up. Shot a dart in my neck, and
wham, when I wake up, I remember everything. We get driven down
through this tunnel, which... um... was big. And then we show up in
this underground base, and I'm put to work."
Rumi frowned. The Programmer, up until this point, had seemed
more or less forthright. But there had been a look she did not like
on his face when he talked about the tunnel.
"It turns out everything on their timetable has been sped up,"
The Programmer continued. "And by 'sped up,' I mean they were
freaking out. Up on the surface, there was this nectarisite portal,
and they found out about it, 'cause they have some nectarisite too,
and that gorilla-sized bonobo who's working with Dana, he knows how to
use it to detect stuff. And that meant to him that the jig was up,
and the Hidden Empire was about to make its move to catch him. So he
and Dana send out kidnappers to bring in guys to quick-fix the system,
thinking they still have a little time, only, as you can see, they
didn't."
"Gorilla-sized bonobo," said Rumi, as a rush of alarm sped
through her. "Named...?"
"Erasmus Fancy," said The Programmer. "Totally made up, right?
Like some kind of circus gorilla. Only he could talk, right? He had
kind of a clearer head than Dana, from what I could tell. I got to
spy on him and Dana a bit, through c-space. The rest of what I just
told you was in their project logs. Did you know Dana can't spell
'eviscerate' right? I mean, she should, she uses it often enough...."
Rumi nodded, though her mind was on Erasmus Fancy. After the
cryptic statements made in her vision by Akane, she had half-expected
to soon meet the imperious Capella, the captain of the _Subtler Than
Light._ But Akane had taken the time to specifically identify
Erasmus, who had been in a nearby floating bronze-gold bubble along
with an unnamed Reptiloid, an unnamed Burrolan, and two unnamed demon
monkeys. Rumi tried to remember if Akane had said anything about
Erasmus she ought to remember.
"On the other hand," said The Programmer, "The gorilla was saying
some weird stuff about how some Reptiloids buried seven engines in the
earth, and this attracted the attention of the Hidden Empire to the
surface world. So maybe he was nuts, too, just better at hiding it.
Then he hooked this older babe to the nectarisite pile, said something
about how the nectarisite 'wanted' bioelectricity more than other
power sources, and---"
Rumi's eyes went wide. "Was she wearing a tiger-striped sun
dress?"
The Programmer blinked. "Um... yeah, I think. Why?"
Glum. Her mother. She narrowed her eyes. The Programmer
noticed the change in her expression and pressed further against the
wall.
"You've got to take me to her!"
"We've got to get out of here," he said. "We're eight-and-a-half
miles underground, did you know that?"
Rumi shook her head, this time masking her surprise. She had had
no idea that humans had underground dwellings this far down. She then
thought of the Burrolans she had earlier met in Malaga, and wondered
if what she was in human-built, or just currently human-occupied.
"Those demon monkeys that were attacking me," continued The
Programmer, "were trying to get me to stop running long enough for
more of 'em to pile on. It takes a bunch of them to teleport a human,
I guess. Anyway, they were trying to get us all to the central hub,
where there's this big elevator that goes to the surface. I'd... like
to be on it. And out of here. Um... please?"
He was leaving something out again. She could tell because he
was looking sort of shifty now, and he was actually trying to smile.
"Make you a deal," said Rumi. "You lead me to my... to this
woman in the tiger-striped sun dress... and--"
"And you let me go?" The Programmer asked, hope in his voice.
Rumi shook her head.
"I'll get you out of here alive," she said. "And I'll refrain
from demonstrating the meaning of the phrase 'psychokinetic wedgie.'"
The Programmer scowled, then nodded.
"She's on the other side of the compound," he said. "It's not
safe to take the direct route, via the hub, but there's a couple of
ring corridors that---"
The Programmer was interrupted when a two-and-a-half-foot-tall
black-uniformed demon monkey appeared near the ceiling and dropped on
his head. It screeched and swatted at him, and then Rumi could see no
more, as three more demon monkeys of similar size landed on her.
She realized she had made a mistake in relaxing her psychokinetic
shields, but found she was too occupied to spare a thought to raising
them. One monkey yanked her head back by her hair while the second
smacked the back of her knees and the third slashed at her stomach
with its paw. She retained enough control to deflect the strike,
though it tore a deep gash in her day-glo orange t-shirt.
The monkeys paused, surprised. One psychokinetic pulse later,
they were even more surprised, and now flat against the wall. They
disappeared, only to reappear behind Rumi, who had lunged for the
door.
"Ack!" she exclaimed. "Get... off!"
She swung her arm around and behind her, trying to reach the
demon monkey clinging to her hair. Her psychokinetic blast shattered
shelving and sent computer parts and monitors flying. The monkey on
her back screeched and tried to reach her eyes.
It was entirely unprepared for the hub router it received upside
its head. Rumi watched as it fell off her, then looked up at The
Programmer, who seemed as surprised as she that his violent move had
worked.
"They're'll be more," he said. "We've got to split!"
Rumi yanked open the door, grabbed The Programmer's wrist, and
ran into the darkened corridor.

***

It was not the best kiss Rad had ever experienced, but it did
change the world around him. So it seemed, in the following moments,
when Capella broke the kiss and pulled away, letting him take in the
sight of the enormous golden temple. It glowed in the early morning
light, so brightly that Rad automatically reached into his jean shorts
pocket for his sunglasses, only to remember he had lost his shades
during the aerial battle that had brought him to the _Subtler Than
Light._ The ship he had, pre-kiss, been on. Capella stepped to his
side and gestured to the temple and the many equally-goldlike,
equally-glowing buildings beyond it.
"You're standing in Cibola... the City of Gold," she said, as she
swept a lock of her long blonde hair from her left eye. "One of the
finest cities of the Hidden Empire. My home."
"It sure is... bright," said Rad, shading his eyes with his
incredibly well-tanned hand. The 'like' and 'whoa' and 'I mean, like,
y'know' he had intended to say with the sentence somehow dropped out
when he actually spoke it, though Capella seemed able to understand
him despite these omissions. The change to his speech patterns had
started the moment he crash-landed on the _Subtler Than Light,_ but so
far, it had not resulted in any confusion from his captors. It
disturbed him nevertheless, because it felt symptomatic of something
else--as if his brain did not want to work the way it always had
before.
"Yes," Capella replied, shielding her eyes with her hand as Rad
did. "Not much cloud cover today. I'd offer you a pair of goggles,
but as you may have already guessed, we're not really here."
Rad, who had guessed no such thing, nevertheless nodded as if he
had. He squinted a bit, and could see people moving about in the
golden streets and golden sidewalks that ran between the golden
buildings. Though it was hard to tell with all the bright golden
haze, he guessed they were more or less human in shape and size, and
they appeared to be wearing--in stark contrast to Capella's black
military uniform--light tunics and sandals of varying colors. All he
saw wore gold wraparound glasses, and seemed to have no problems with
the glare.
The buildings themselves were marvels. Around a central,
hundred-foot-high flat-topped, pyramid-shaped stepped temple, numerous
smaller stepped buildings ranged. Rad thought he could make out faces
and shapes carved into the sides, though the golden haze made further
identification difficult. He raised a hand to his eyes and looked up
at the sun... and gasped.
The sky was a deep, perfect blue. Too perfect, Rad thought. The
patch occupied by the sun had the same strength as Earth's sun, but
felt wrong to Rad. Perhaps that had to do with the 'not really here'
thing that Capella had mentioned, but Rad thought it was more than
that. Such as how the sky and the sun rippled, as if made of water.
"It is the sun," Capella said, as if understanding his thoughts.
"Our sun, anyway, through the filter of the nectarisite barrier that
is our sky."
Rad considered it again. All the nectarisite he had previously
seen had been a uniform bronze-gold, but this, if Capella was to be
believed, was transparent. He wondered how the night stars appeared,
shimmering through the barrier.
"Why are you showing me this?" he asked.
"You must understand why we are desperate to retrieve Erasmus
Fancy," said Capella, taking his hand. "And for you to understand
that, you must understand our world."
"Your world?"
"The Hidden Empire," said Capella, as she turned away to look in
the opposite direction from the city, "occupies a world within your
world. Imagine, if you will, that the Earth is hollow, that its crust
is no more than thirty miles thick, and that, on the other side... is
this." She gestured about her. "What would you say?"
Rad thought about it. He thought about it some more. He looked
in the direction Capella was looking, and saw where, not too far away,
the deep blue sky met the blonde summer grass. A gold railing was at
this boundary, and Rad guessed the city was up on a plateau or cliff
or mountain of some kind. Which was a strange place to put a city, he
thought, but he had seen weirder.
"Well?" Capella asked. Her lips were curled in a soft smile.
"I... um... what was the question?"
Capella's smile disappeared. "Odd," she said. "When I was
informed you were once an Emperor, I thought you'd be... brighter,
somehow." She shook her head. "Anyway, I wanted to know what you
thought of the idea that the Earth is hollow, that..."
"Oh, that," said Rad. He grinned. "No way."
"Why not?" she asked. Rad became conscious that she had not let
go of his hand, and that her other arm had found its way around his
waist. There was no denying that she was attractive, though Rad
suspected that pheromones of some sort were at work. He doubted she
was trying to seduce him, though it was clear she thought she could
influence him. But to what end?
"Well," said Rad, again trying to remember the question. "The
Earth isn't hollow. Even if it wasn't impossible, and on top of that
absurd... we already know about the tunnels that lead to Earth's core.
They go through the liquid mantle all the way down."
"In other words..." she prompted.
"People have already been inside the Earth," said Rad. "It's
full up of stuff."
"And if I were to tell you that we're in another dimension, where
these tunnels you refer to do not appear?"
Rad tried to say 'like, whoa,' but nothing came out. He ended up
shrugging.
"Come, now," said Capella, sounding to Rad as if she took his
shrug as a denial. "You've had experiences with other dimensions, I'm
told. The Television Dimension, the Scary Dimension, the Kitsch
Dimension, the Silly Dimension, the Shadow Dimension... you've either
been to these or know someone who has."
Rad, wondering how she knew this, nodded.
She let go of his waist and hand, and started walking toward the
railing. He took a look back at the city, then followed.
"Call ours the Aetheric Dimension, if you must have a name for
it," she said. "We called yours the 'Mechanistic Dimension.' Though
I suppose we'll have to rename it, once we determine what 'quantum' is
and why you think it explains things."
"And you're just coming in to our dimension to get this Erasmus
Fancy," said Rad. "You're not interested in conquest or invasion?"
Capella laughed at his question, and Rad, who was usually a good
judge of such things, could not be sure if the laugh was genuine or
not.
"If you knew," she said, "how much trouble just coming to your
dimension is..." She shook her head. "No, we're not interested in
your surface empires. Even if we were... we have too many
difficulties of our own to deal with."
Rad remembered something said earlier by Bhossi, a
superintelligent bovine scientist on the _Vander Harkness._ "You mean
Terra Subterrene?"
Capella scowled, then resumed her friendly demeanor. "They have
been difficult, yes. We trade with them, for our mutual survival.
Long ago, it was more one-sided, to our benefit, which led to
certain... excesses. I'm sure your informants, whoever they may be,
hold sharper views on these. Terra Subterrene is still resentful--in
varying degrees, depending on which civilization you consider--which
is why we have crossed directly from our dimension to the surface of
Earth in yours in order to get to Erasmus's underground hideout,
bypassing the subsurface zones controlled by Terra Subterrene
altogether. War would be devastating... to both sides."
They neared the edge. The sky faintly rippled. In the distance,
hovering in the sky, Rad saw a metallic ring. Several bronze-gold
objects hovered beneath it--some moving closer, others further away.
Rad noted other bronze-gold objects hovering close to where the sky
rippled. They had tubes that went into the nectarisite and
disappeared.
"That's one of our trade gates," said Capella, indicating the
ring. "There are six fixed in place in the nectarisite barrier--
which would correspond, in your dimension, to the Earth's crust. We
use these gates for trade with the civilizations of Terra Subterrene.
The gate the _Subtler Than Light_ used to cross over to the surface of
Earth in your dimension, beyond Terra Subterrene's jurisdiction, is
similar, though it is not visible from this point. We can move it
about as necessary, though it is time-consuming to do so."
They reached the railing. Rad looked down... and gasped.
He could see the green and brown of a large continent below,
bordered by oceans on all sides. Two major rivers, a number of
smaller, barely visible ones, mountain ranges on the western edge and
the northern plateau. Thick clouds over the continent's eastern
seaboard, a haze over the south... and above the clouds, numerous
islands, floating without any visible means of support. One had a
tether that led down into a cloud bank, upon which Rad could see
something move. An elevator, he guessed.
Metallic airships floated between the islands, or between islands
and the world below. Unlike the _Subtler Than Light,_ these did not
seem to be made of nectarisite, and bore sails and propellers and
other visible means of support and propulsion. Some resembled
zeppelins, and some resembled longboats attached to large balloons.
Others seemed like nineteenth-century frigates and corsairs, which
should have been impossible, though it was clear to Rad that
'possible' had long since gone out for cigarettes and never come back.
Most striking were the horizons. Rad, who was no stranger to
seeing the curve of a planet while flying, thought there was something
off about the angles. They were wrong, in a way he could not quite
think to express. Narrowed, somehow. He looked at Capella, who
seemed to be contemplating the island with the elevator-bearing
tether.
"It is lucky that we were able to elevate Cibola in time," she
said. "The aether is still full and rich, here, though the
temporological aspect has lost most of its thickness, and the
luminiferous aspect could stand to be slower, particularly on days
such as these."
"I have no idea what that means," Rad said. He peered over the
edge of the railing, and saw no rock face leading down. A sign next
to the railing showed a stick figure leaning over the railing, with a
red slash superimposed. A second scene on the sign showed the stick
figure falling off a floating island, landing on the planet below,
causing some sort of damage to the stick figure's head. The stick
figure in the second scene had a frowny face.
"We need Erasmus Fancy because the aether is changing," said
Capella, looking up at him. He found it impossible to look away from
her large and compelling eyes. "The aether is changing because the
nectarisite has become corrupted. And we believe that only Erasmus
Fancy can restore the balance."
"So why don't you just..."
"He does not accept our good intentions," Capella answered. "I
suspect because he was the one who made possible the corruption in the
first place, and he fled our dimension to escape our wrath."
As she spoke, the world around them dissolved. Island and world
below and airships and golden city and rippling sky all vanished,
replaced by the bronze-gold, oval-shaped room he had been in prior to
her kiss. She did not watch the illusion dissolve; instead she
watched him.
"Now," she said, "will you talk to your people, and convince them
not to oppose us? Or, better yet, to aid us in apprehending Fancy? I
would... reward you, for your cooperation."
She ran a finger up Rad's chest to his throat, and Rad felt his
well-tanned skin tingle. Her meaning was clear, and he felt the
attraction... and yet, he hesitated. Not because of Glum--both he
and she had other lovers, and she would hardly have batted an eye at
this--but because there was a battle going on outside, and lives were
on the line. Because there was something more important at stake.
This thought, more than the loss of his psychokinetic powers or
the loss of the 'likes' and 'y'knows' from his speech patterns, made
him wonder what had happened to his brain. He wondered what was next.
A fondness for line dancing? A desire to winter in Minnesota? Or
even--he quietly gasped at the very concept--an urge to apply a
sensible amount of UV-ray-blocking sun cream to his extremely well-
tanned skin?
Capella seemed about to speak again, when a voice echoed in the
room.
"Eeeek ook aaak eek aaak!"
She frowned, then withdrew her finger from his throat.
"The _Vander Harkness_ has returned," she said. "They are
seeking to talk to you... and to me, I suppose, but they named you."
"What do they want?" he asked.
Capella shrugged, and waved a hand at the nearest part of the
wall. An oval-shaped door irised open.
"An end to hostilities," said Capella. "This is where you come
in."
Rad said nothing, allowing her to lead him out of the room.

(continued in part two, following...)
--
Copyright (c) 2009 by Gary W. Olson. All Rights Reserved.
--
Gary W. Olson
swede at novitious dot com
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