1.11|Radiant horizon

 

1.11|Radiant horizon

 

Noble's transport vessel sped through the cosmos at full thrust, crossing interstellar distances in the blink of an eye. The stars became streams of light rushing past, rays of immense pressurized dust turned in perception to mere motes of light in the backdrop to speed back to the vessel's command. The two not-yet newlyweds held each other, laying back on leather within the cockpit. Their robotic guide through the great nebulas beyond Xi stood stark and stern, a steward of his passengers awaiting their final destination. "We're here." He said matter-of-factly, cognition of their arrival weighing on them like a plague across Thebes.

Protas and Raelyn clutched one another, looking at the form of the disc-shaped star station ahead, hiding between the floating array of asteroids pinballing lazily around its vast gravitational disrupter field. Raelyn gasped at the vast size and scale. A floating city around them virtually, it served as a citadel for the corridors between all space.

"What's that?" Protas squinted her eyes, looking beyond the translucent

screen. "That flickering behind the back wing?"

Noble steered their transport behind an asteroid, turning up the subsonic field resonators to hide their tracking frequency. "Embargo Lux.. it's a concentrated form of the Cascade the station artificially generates and projects. A Kaleidoscopic Compressor is required to keep it open and localized to one enterable location."

"Why?" She shielded her eyes.

"Project RoseNite."

"And that is, tinhead?" Raelyn knocked on his top dome with a thud.

"Interdimensional biogenic experimentation." He turned to them both. "I can get us in, but I need to warn you this will come with a cost. I  cannot guarantee you can return from this. This is a L.A.M.E. encrypted download that will negate aspects of the trans-temporal field which regulates sequential messaging, I'll be able to cast a false hail and everyone in the facility will flee believing Xi military ships are heading to wipe the station out from the false report. But in the process.." He turned his head away. "Time-Dilation near the Lux, at this location will be rebounded, kind of like letting go of a rubberband you stretched out for way too long. In other words, you won't exist on the same lock-and-step of temporal strata once you step on. There’s no guarantee how much time will pass while you’re inside. You could lose weeks, years or decades."

"What?! Why didn't you tell us before?" Raelyn yelled.

"You withheld this from us. But why did you even bring us here if we can't

leave?" Protas growled.

"This is simply as R.I.N.G. proposed to me. It's the only way we can get into a

facility like that and access their labs."

Protas shook her head. "What do you expect us to do?"

"I didn't ask for you to trust me.." Noble turned in their direction, breaking his steely forward-facing stance for once. "But if you want the truth, you'll find yourself in that station. If you turn around you can still go back to your jobs and old lives, but I cannot help you deal with your personal situations."

Raelyn reached for Protas. "What are we going to do?" There was a long pause, Protas glaring at the ship ahead. Everything that had been biting at her gnawed thrice as hard at the thought of living a live unlived.

She sat up and reached for the controls. "We're going in."

"Protas?" She rubbed her shoulders. "He just said if we do this, time will be all

topsy turny. We won't be able to return to our old lives. What will we have?"

Her girlfriend sighed. She looked at her other half warm, beaming like a

sunbeam. "We'll have each other."

Protas stared at the vessel ahead of them, the stars in their back, knowing that their lives were about to change. Noble and Raelyn glanced into a sterile, yet comforting gaze towards one another. He nodded. Protas continued. "I know you're afraid. I'm scared too. But I believe in it. This is our only chance, and I have faith, we'll both survive."

Raelyn looked at the curves and shadows of Protas's cheeks, threw her arm around her shoulder and tugged them into an embrace. "I can lose a lifetime.. But I cannot lose you. Let's go in."

Noble prepared the L.A.M.E. encryption and Protas piloted them in. The transport slowed to a halt in front of the large hanger bay. The two stepped outside. From the vessel,  a false hail was sent down the corridor. "We are a medical unit bound for the medical facility in bay three. We were damaged by Dark Guard vessels Xi sent to intercept us. Security code activating."

"Copy." A female voice responded back.

"What trace system dampener did you use to remove your pathway and

location?"

"T.S.D.? Ours subsonic field resonator was damaged.. they were following us a

 few lightyears back."

The female voice went deadly silent. "You, didn't dampen your trail? And they're RIGHT on our doorstep? Do I, have that right?" The operator started to shudder, she stumbled slightly, ran back and slammed a button setting off sirens and alarms. Thousands of staff paused, and panicked. All the docking bays were opened and evacuation procedures went into full effect.

In the storage, six medical droids emerged running at maximum velocity.

"Medical Unit, prepare for emergency transfer of the cargo."

"Copy that." Another responded. Shuttles and ships were leaving the Station

en-masse.

"There's a full security response team in the sector. We don't have time to lose

them." Raelyn turned to Noble.

"You're not going to be able to get us off the station, are you?" Protas looked

up at him. He turned his head slowly.

"So we're on our own. Thank you, for taking us this far." She gently stroked his shimmery cheek, flicking his forehead. "You're pretty cute. If I wasn't engaged and had more time, wish we could date."

He folded his arms, handing her a pocket Cloak operand. "Set stealth on, but avoid cameras if you can. There might be someone in the control rooms and monitoring stations taking their time." She received the device and held Raelyn's hand, turning translucent and see-thru with a click.

"Good luck you two." He said, saluting and backing away.

Protas stepped onto the ramp on the port side, reaching out and helping Raelyn thru. The docking bay door slowly slid aside, as she helped her in.

"Don't worry." She gently patted her arm. "My life's been threatened before.. I know how to protect myself." Raelyn grinned.

"I know you do." Protas proceeded in.  A team of security operatives were waiting, guns in hand. They hid behind a set of crates, stealth still engaged. Once the operatives failed to notice them, they squeezed hands tighter and crept along the corners of the room, eventually making it thru the entry gate and into the hallways. The two began infiltrating, seeing everyone in a hurry to evacuate as fast as possible. "Guess if they're too busy dogging out, they're not gonna sniff us like bloodhounds Proto." Raelyn whispered. The two headed into an elevator shaft.

Before the door opened, five others rushed in. They squeaked, standing behind the mob at the very back, looking at one another's transparent selves, trying to stand deadly still as the elevator ascended. Raelyn struggled to hold her nostrils in, before giving into a sneeze. Everyone went on alert and turned around, looking at the armored operative in back. "Bless you." They said.

"W-wasn't m-" Protas grabbed her, covering her mouth. The door opened and the other four went out. Holding a pistol to her neck, Protas dragged her out and Raelyn followed until they were alone in a supply closet. "Give me your security code badge and armor." She began to strip. When she was done, Raelyn nailed her fist into the nude lady and knocked her out. Protas left the closet suited up, Raelyn still cloaked behind her.

They continued to transverse several halls, noticing them thin out the farther they went. Suddenly another armored insurgent, this one a Llavalite she noticed called them out. "Where do you think you're going? All personnel have been ordered to evacuate! They'll interrogate anyone they catch remaining here."

Protas's voice turned raspy, Raelyn's voice quivering, the former took to the same side to face him and saluted. "Aye Captain, I'm just cargo maintenance.. They told me not to leave any precious, hidden documents behind." Protas said, sweating and hoping it'd work.

The Llavalite squinted his brow.

"Well you're going the wrong way. All documentation, labs and files are 'that way', other hall, before the 2nd right."

"A-aye!" Protas saluted, and swiftly marched away until they were out of sight. "Close.."

Raelyn pulled up the HUD map that Noble gave them, its holographic imagery rotating in her palm. "The medical department's our best bet. It's right up ahead." She looked into the distance, looking for any remaining staff.  "Are you ready?" She asked her love.

She didn't skip a beat. "No, I'm not." Protas grinned. "Perfect! Me neither. Let's do it then." The two looked at one another and pushed forward through a large gate with a black rose printed on it. Seeing no one inside, she locked the door and deactivated the cloak.

Raelyn stuck close behind her girlfriend. In the room, were dozens of tubes in rows, each containing carbon copies of Protas herself. They looked just like her, only with different hair colors, blemishes, slightly different variations, the same with a few details changed, each of them curled up in fetal position and attached to translucent tubes, hooked into their mouths. As they went forward the tubes held younger and younger individuals, some seeming unmistakable to Protas as teen and child versions of herself, the smallest tubes holding mere embryonic silhouettes. 

Raelyn put a hand on her shoulder. "You were right. They're all.. you?"

Protas cringed. "Each of them. Cloned. New name. Someone yoinks their personality and appearance, give them a new name, makes them a new cousin or sister in law or daughter of someone somewhere." She placed her hand on one of the tubes, looking at the floating duplicate within. "The other lives I encountered must've been made the same way they were. For what purpose? Why me?" She slammed her head against the plastiglass of the tube, fisting it repeatedly.

"Who AM I??!"

Raelyn stood uncertain what to do. She pat Protas gently and placed her head on her shoulder. "You're you. Po. My proto girlbro. I cannot imagine how you're feeling but, your life, your personality, it was always yours. You're not just.. just some.." she turned away and trailed out.

The two attuned to the encroaching footsteps. A man in a dark tux and a white mask, stretched by cat-like ears underneath approached, their hands folded together in front as if giving a prayer. They could feel a sense of brooding from his glooming stance. A perfect mirror of Protas's weighty apprehension.

The courtier had arrived, as if straight from her dreams.

Her heart skipped a beat for a moment. This was the man she'd seen in many lives, the one she'd witnessed in so many memories prior. She did not want to see him now. The only reason she didn't feel her heart beating was because her soul was so used to hearing his name.

"The authorities are going to be here soon! I don't imagine this is taxpayer

approved." Protas said.

"Let them come. I'll pay out of pocket." He said.

There was no use trying to fool him.

"You're the Courtier." She pulled off her helmet, letting her dark hair sweep.

They locked eyes, he did not break contact as if trying to pierce into her.

His face was blank. There was no trace of the emotion he'd shown when he'd

been looking for her. "You knew I was here."

"I could see it. In all those, 'other' eyes.." She pointed to the tubes. "What the

f*ck am I? Why am I here?"

He walked over and took one of the tubes. He lifted it. The plastiglass broke. Protas let out a gasp as the contents slipped out in a rush of liquid, and then the body inside flopped out. "They're all deceased." He observed the corpse of one of the clones. "There are other facilities, many were cloned here.. but these ones you see have reached the end of their stability point. It's a morgue you see."

He turned and looked at the dark figure of Raelyn behind her in the shadows, looking away after a while. "You should've stayed as a dainty therapist with your little girlfriend, gothy." She didn't want to respond. To see how this happened to her only to die and be cloned again and again. Her head rushed with thoughts, a current of personas rushing out of control.

Protas felt her heart skip as her thoughts of him flooded her mind with images of his eyes before and after a fight long ago, of his laughter at a joke, of her sorrow after she was in a tragic accident, her arms around another. The words of the song she was listening to in his car on the drive to the cemetery that she wouldn't forget, those words that made her fall in love once. Her heart raced even as she tried to control herself. No! Just no! These weren't her memories! This wasn't her! She couldn't go through all this again! It was torture.

"What's happening to her?!" Raelyn rushed towards the Courtier, with a flick of his wrist a rune of light appeared and knocked her back. "W-what the?"

"And you... Daughter of Ovid." He folded his arms, walking around her on the ground. "RoseNite was kind to you it seems." He glared at her peg and the scars revealed over the left side of her face. "More than Xi has, that's for sure." He cut her with a small scalpel and cut a spot on her arm. The swipe started to catalyze her blood, bubbling and releasing blue and green fluid that swelled into scaly growths across both arms. The growths spread over her chest, hips and legs.

Raelyn hid herself in shame.

He turned back to Protas.

"And you, Protas. Almost a perfect subject! That bratty Grand Magus must’ve loved you, they'd do anything to have a subject like yourself." He watched her clutch her head, trying to get a hold of her mind. "I knew that you would be back, that there would be an unforeseeable occurrence. I sent the Llavalites to kidnap you, only for them to betray me and cash in on that garbage prisoner deal, this was my chance."

Protas's body flickered, light teleporting her around the room in jumpy jolts.

"Y-your chance? What are you talking about?" The Courtier turned back to Raelyn. He took out a syringe and stabbed it into one of her bluish oval-shaped growths, taking out some jelly, before shooting it into his own wrist. "My chance to escape." He grabbed her arm. "Project RoseNite was to examine the unique sequences of the Llavalite horde that allowed them to manipulate the Cascade and survive its transdimensional luminal radiation." He watched the bluish tints spread into his veins. "Llavalites, and Technoids were believed to be originally one ancestral species that branched off along evolutionary lines eons ago."

He held his bleeding wrist up to Protas, the fluid spreading and dripping into the ground. "I have been given orders to carry out certain tasks in exchange for some time and resources to continue my research. The best of all worlds, don't you think?" He pointed to the tubes in the back room, where differently shaped figures laid in liquid rest. "Those like Protas were merely the Grand Magus's vanity project to have her toy recovered, it was started by my father. But RoseNite, that was my handiwork. A project to combine Llavalite genomic sequencing into other bioforms and create a Llavalite hybrid.." He turned and pulled Raelyn up by the wrist. "Like you."

"I'm, part Llavalite?" She asked.

He felt the scales and carpace slick surface growing over her limbs. "A hybrid, a unique creature of their ancestors. The only type whose mimetic cognition can survive the journey through the Embargo Lux and unconsciously control the Cascade and its energies."

"It's all part of my research." He pulled off his dark suit, and underneath it were three blue and purple tattoos on his arm, each with a different runic pattern dyed into soft fur. “You’re here now. All of you.” He said.

"All of.. meeeEEEeeEEeee.." Protas said, her voice gaining a lilt. She giggled. "Huh? Whaaat, where's my stage? I need my wardrobe room, who are you? Kyyyyaaaa!!!" She squealed.

Raelyn panicked. "Pro?" She reached to grab her by the shoulders. 

"Are you like, one of my fangirls? Signing your tits is extra!"

Rae shook. "No, I'm your girlfriend! I proposed to you, remember? You have to snap out of it! Protas!"

Protas looked at her oddly. She was Nadia Nitegood, right? Her mind raced as she tried to understand what was happening. Why was she remembering another girl and feeling this girl's distress, not her own? Why did she feel this way and remember this girl?

Nadia's brain felt like it was spinning, she was caught in a whirlpool of thoughts. She remembered pushing through protestors one second, and then smoking in a fancy club in a starlet dress the next. Raelyn herself grabbed her knife, and felt fury coursing through her. She ran towards the Courtier. "What did you do to her.. to Protas! H-help her!" The growl in her voice echoed as she leaped forward, stabbing the Courtier's leg in her leap. "OWWW! What's your deal psycho?" Raelyn started to feel near feral, she stabbed his leg over and over and over before sinking her teeth into his ankles. He shook his bloody leg and kicked her face off.

"I see.. Guess being part Llavalite has some side effects."

She couldn't stop hissing and growling, before catching herself in the act and being horrified. "W-what, what was that? That wasn't-"

The Courtier whistled. A medical bot came in, and then sprayed his leg with gel until the bleeding stopped. "Good bot. You're just in time. Come over here. I have work for you." He whistled at a new bot, who came in and grabbed the girl, who couldn't stop flailing and struggling to get free.

The bot placed what looked like a huge needle in the flesh of her left arm, pushing it in and out several times before Raelyn could feel the sedative kicking in. He went to a closet and pulled out a thermal floatsuit. "I have what I need. Now I'm finally leaving." He looked up. "Commandship. Route all energy to the Kaleidoscopic Compressor's quantum thruster engines. Invoke self-destruct protocols 0.8912. Password: Nicolo Francis." He zipped up and pulled a helmet over his head, walking to an exit hatch.

"W-wait!" Raelyn pushed off the droid, barely able to stand.

"Where are you going?" She asked.

He shrugged. "Home."

Raelyn slumped to the ground, feeling defeated.

He climbed a hatch and ascended up above the ship, exited the station and floated towards the twinkling, swirling pinwheel of light in space beyond. It swallowed him up whole until he was out of sight.

The power on the station lowered, all the lights started to dim. Protas was on her knees holding her head, feeling many lifetimes battling her. Raelyn curled up, the drug making everything hazy and dense. As the station's self-destruct countdown to almost nil, Protas leaned her head against the tiles of the shower wall, trying to hold it together. She let out a massive scream.

An overlapping boom released from her body and expanded out, stretching beyond the room. Beyond the entire station. The countdown slowed, then froze. The two were the only ones able to move in the midst of everything crashing down.

"What did you do Pro?" Raelyn asked.

"I'm not sure.." Protas said, seeing everything completely frozen around her, from the smallest fly to the ship's countdown.