33. The Malignant Shard

The group were eager to move on, but Nox had to rest. Another smack from a metal fist had sent her flying, and she feared what they were about to face. The entity, or something like it, that had taken away their home and enslaved their community was just the next passage. Bashing up automatons was Fureva-Yung battlefield, and finding quick and decisive ways to turn the tide of battle was Marius’ and Jaden’s. But her battlefield was always in the datasphere, in the electronic pathways where the entity hid. She didn’t want to go into that fight unprepared. The others waited, chatting quietly amongst themselves as if nothing was amiss. All the while Fureva-Yung’s head kept being drawn towards the tunnel ahead. She could hear voices chanting low, while another voice called in high urgent tones.
 
We should get moving, Marius said pointedly, not looking in Nox’s direction.
Yes, Nox finally agreed, standing and following her friends.
 
 
A short set of steps spiralled to the right and opened into a large cavern. Lining the walls of the passage and the back of the cavern were the Deep Craven. Nox saw Ickus and Mal amongst the group.
She sent them a small encouraging thought, Watch and remember. Regardless of what happens, you will need to tell future Deep Craven about it.
 
Beyond the spectators, seven fanatics bowed and chanted before an altar flanked by two sets of stairs. On either side of the altar, huge servitors stood, humming quietly. As the group came into view, the humming increased, filling the room with menacing vibrations. Against the back wall was the altar made of salvaged parts and metal scraps towered above them. In its centre, a monitor depicting the pictogram red eye glowed. Framed by the red eye, a Deep Craven holding a key-shaped staff stood before the Altar. Above everything, three Monitors hovered menacingly. Everything turned to see the intruders.
 
Fureva-Yung, her black armour unscarred by battle, led the group forward. Beside her, Marius and Jaden to her right and left. Nox walked behind, her eyes flicking from the staff in Glazemar’s hand to the conglomerate of tech that made up the altar. Standing behind the fanatics, Marius, his hands glowing, surprised everyone when he began talking in the language of the Deep Craven.
 
“Your priest, Glazemar, has led you well to this point. We are here to free you from the Allseer. We have defeated all the Allseer sent to destroy us.”
Jaden stepped up, swatting Marius in the back of the head.
“Please translate for me, “ She said quietly to him before turning her attention to the assembled Deep Craven present.
“Yelf and his people ran away, knowing the Allseer was bad. Ulfa and those sent to kill us only did what they did out of fear. Both now live at peace away from the Allseer's interference.” She pulled out a cypher, a mental image that showed one memory of her choice. She saved a memory of Sharavellian’s mushroom garden, the movement of the musical fungus, and the floating pink jellyfish. She showed it to the Deep Craven present, and everyone who saw it were in awe.
“A gift to the tribe, but not the Allseer. We have travelled far. To the tribe, we mean only friendship. Before anything happens today, we would like to talk.”
 
The fanatics fell silent. Awed by the beauty they had never even imagined beyond their world of the Spire. If talking was something they were interested in, it was never heard over the deafened roar from Fureva-Yung. Taking a deep breath, she focused her thunderous boom at the Altar. It hummed in harmony with the robots, creating a tense chord of expectation. With a leaping bound, Fureva-Yung soared over the fanatics and landed with a jarring thud on the stairs to the left, in front of the automaton.
 
“Do not listen to their lies!” Galzemar screamed back, holding the sceptre high. A beam of red light emitted from the top and struck Marius in the chest. Marius disappeared. The monitors descended, attacking Nox and Jaden. Jaden dodged, but Nox didn’t move in time. As the electrical zap hit, her senses went numb, and she stood stunned and helpless. Fanatics looked to Galzemar and back at the group, unsure what to do, as Jaden pulled out an iotum. She aimed for Galzemar, but still unsure she wanted to injure even this Deep Craven, she missed. The beam flashed over their head, making in a crater in the stone wall. The guardian servitor confusingly did nothing. Their humming sound intensified, adding a more urgent note. The guardian in front of Fureva-Yung did the same, adding in a punch for good measure. Fureva-Yung dodged it easily, slipping under its slow guard to get up onto the platform.
 
The humming altar, physically shaking, exploded into shrapnel of a million component parts. Galzemar took the brunt of the damage as pieces bounced harmlessly from Fureva-Yung’s armour. Grabbing the sceptre, Fureva-Yung made a boulder out of her fist and propelled it at Galzemar’s face. The priest crumpled, just a rag thrown against the wall. The sceptre clicked, and Fueva-Yung, the guardian and the priest, also disappeared in a pop.
 
Things were looking desperate. With no idea what had happed to the other two, Nox reached out her Hedge magic and picked up the sceptre, pulling it towards Jaden she hoped Jaden could work the contraption. Jaden stepped forward but towards the second guardian. With a flick of a few switches, she disarmed the servitor, it's humming slowly winding down to silence. Zapped by two drones, she turned to Nox, who was being harassed by the third.
“Nexion! We are here. Aid us now!” Nox yelled into the room and, through her telepathy. A flickering of the lights rewarded her. A small blue glow at the edges of the room that wasn’t there before. As she did she swung the staff at the buzzing drone. Again the sceptre clicked, and now Nox and the drone were gone. The sceptre dropped to the ground.
 
Jaden was alone.
 
Marius was sure he’d been hit by something, but a hand to his chest soon relieved him of the concern of a deep and possibly fatal wound. He looked around him at a space like the one he’d just been in, and yet…. The altar was more impressive with red vine like wires coming together from all corners of the room to form the red pictogram eye. He was alone with the slowly creeping dread that he was in the datasphere in the entities realm.
“Oh crap, not again!”
 
Worship! Worship me! A voice whispered through Marius' mind, and he found that he did indeed desire to worship at the eye, the Allseer.
“I understand now! I didn’t know what I was doing!” He fell to his knees and started a litany of worship. It wasn’t until something large flew past his head that he looked up to see the mangled remains of Galzemar the Priest. Turning he saw Fureva-Yung standing dazed beside an automaton. Waves of sound energy emanated from Fureva-Yung, making her seem larger and more impressive than she was. From her vast shoulders he could see something lift and waft away like smoke on the air. The compulsion to worship seemed trival and ridiculous and it melted away in his companion's presence .
A clear-headed Marius turned back to the eye.
“Great Nexion! How can we serve you best,” He said, seemingly in worship, but evoking the name of the Spire’s Artifical Intelligence. As he did, an echo of his words came to him in another voice.
 
Nexion! We are here. Aid us now! It was Nox, a tiny voice in his mind and almost instantaneously, she was floating beside him, a monitor drone dragged through with her. Her eyes shut and hands clenched, he could see her fight against the compulsion. With a shake of her head, she sent her long hair flying in a cloud about her. Her eyes opened and a blue light streamed out. She seemingly ignored him as she searched for her prey of choice, the nexus of the entity's power, the eye.
 
A powerful roar and the whole space around them shuddered with physical waves of sound that rippled the fabric of the datasphere. Fureva-Yung was free of the entities will. Her chain crackled with blue lightning as she swung at the automaton.
Nice, Furry’s back, Marius thought, looking to see what he could now do to help. He watched the automaton as its whirling sound went up another note.
 
“Nexion!” Nox shouted, now not the tiny voice barely heard in his mind, but a voice physically and mentally all around them. From her eyes blue rays blasted, one hitting the drone, one missing the automaton and finally one targeting the eye. Blue light flickered throughout the space. Blue flickered in the iris of the eye.
 
 
Jaden was alone. The enemies had gone and something was happening as the Allseer’s eye flickered between red and blue. But, her friends were gone too with no clue as to what had happened. She felt the gazed of the Deep Craven all around her, some flickering between her and the staff fallen at her feet. Carefully, to avoid setting it off again, Jaden picked up the staff and investigated it. It was a key for moving material world into a pocket dimension in the datasphere. She realised there must be a similar device on the other side. Though thin and distant, she could still hear Nox calling for Nexion’s aid.
 
“Nox! The sceptre is a key. There must be another half at your end. See if you can find it.” She said out loud and in her head. She felt more than heard the nod of acceptance and knew Nox had heard.
 
Now what to do.
 
She looked around her. Galzemar and the automatons were gone, and the altar destroyed. Things were pretty quiet. The fanatics stepped away, fearful of the being who had killed their god. The other Deep Craven huddled at the back as before, unsure what it all meant. Jaden shrugged and clicked the button. A moment later she was gone and the sceptre once more clanged to the ground.
 
Fureva-Yung swung her chain up, waved of sound vibrating off it in all directions. Her opponent clanked up a gear readying its attack. At that moment, Jaden appeared, a crystalline version of herself and Fureva-Yung had to pull back her swing to miss her. The chain whiplashed back, striking Fureva-Yung in the jaw. Her head flicked back, and the datasphere around here went grey momentarily. When her vision cleared, she was on her back, the automaton looming overhead.
 
Jaden shook her head, clearing the intrusive thoughts that weren’t her own. She saw Nox flying, blue light blazing in her eyes as she dodged another attack from the monitor before reaching out and disconnecting it from the Allseer. she then blinked across the space to the altar before the monitor drone fell and clanged against the ground.
Nexion! We’re here. Hold on just a little longer.
“Wow! Nox!” Marius cried, leaping off his knees and giving Jaden a double take. She did the same, seeing his datasphere form as a creature of two halves, both covered in connector, plugs and ports.
“Alright there?” She said, gesturing to the ground.
“Never better!” He said, jumping to FurevaYung’s aid. Finding the source of the power build-up, he disconnected it, and the whine slowly died away. The automaton’s movements became sluggish and weak. It hit the prone Fureva-Yung who rolled away, not even a mark on her new armour.
 
Across the space, Nox hovered near the pictogram eye made of red and blue flickering conduit. In the altarpiece lay a component reminiscent of the key.
“Yes,” Jaden said, pulling out another iotum and aiming a blast at the eye for maximum damage. The eye pulsed blue. Blue light now took hold of much of the conduit around the room. Seeing the change, Nox fell upon a section of blue conduit and telepathically linked to the struggling Nexion, A.I. The collective force of both Nexion and Nox forced the red light out of the eye entirely. A flicker of red skittered down another conduit and away from the datasphere space. The automaton ground to a halt and stopped.
 
"MALIGNANT SHARD ESCAPED CONFINEMENT. RECAPTURE IS REQUIRED." Spoke a voice throughout the datasphere .
“Nexion?” Nox asked, excited finally to meet the true A.I. of The Spire.
“I AM NEXION.”
“And who are you again?” Marius asked to Nox exacerbation.
“I AM THE A.I. MANAGEMENT SYSTEM FOR THE SPIRE.”
“And what was your role on board this ship?”
“THIS IS A HOLDING FACILITY FOR THE SAFE STORAGE OF THE MALIGNANT ENTITY. I ALSO SUSTAIN THE TRANSMITTER UNTIL NEEDED.”
“Needed for what?”
“TO SEND THE MALIGNANT ENTITY TO THE GATE STAR AND PERMANENT STORAGE. ”
“Hang on,” Jaden interrupted, “You said something about a Malignant Shard escaping. What is that? Where is that?”
“SHARDS OF THE MALIGNANT ENTITY ESCAPE FROM TIME TO TIME. IT IS CURRENTLY DEEPER IN MY SYSTEMS...” At this point the A.I. paused, checking, “ I DO NOT HAVE ACCESS TO THOSE AREAS.” It almost sounded concerned.
“So, we need to recapture the Malignant Shard?” Nox asked, “But the first crystal is broken. Can we fix it? Can we make another?”
“THE ORIGINAL CRYSTAL IS BEYOND REPAIR. ANOTHER IS AVAILABLE.”
“Where? Do you have a map of the Spire?”
“A SPARE CRYSTAL IS STORED ON T2. I DO NOT CURRENTLY HAVE A MAP OF THE FACILITY.”
“So, where are we?” Marius asked, hoping to clear up the issue. It didn’t.
“YOU ARE CURRENTLY....NOT IN THE SPIRE. SOMEWHERE OUTSIDE THE UPPER DECKS.”
“You need to know how to talk to these things, “ Jaden said and asked, “Nexion, please provide a list of each floor starting from the top deck with the three control chairs.”
“CONTROL. INTERFACE AND TRANSMISSION, UPPER LEVELS A6 TO A7. CREW A1 TO A10. SYSTEMS, T1 TO T4. ”
“The spare crystal is on A floor above where we fought the little murder robots.” Jaden deduced.
“So, we get the crystal, connect it up, then somehow funnel this shard into the crystal before sending it off to this Gate Star?” Marius confirmed.
“TRANSMISSION WILL REQUIE ALL THREE OF THE ZIONS TO BE PRESENT. ”
Fureva-Yung pointed to her tattoo. The other two chairs on the command deck would have to be filled to complete the process.
“Oh.”
 
“Nexion, what do you know of the Malignant Entity?” Asked Nox, reminded of Fureva-Yung’s dream.
“DISCOVERED RATHER THAN CREATED, THE MALIGNANT ENTITY IS THOUGHT TO BE HAVE DESTROYED THE CIVILIZATION THAT FOUND IT. WHEN IT WAS DISCOVERED, AND ITS TRUE NATURE REVEALED, IT WAS IMPRISONED HERE. UNFORTUNATELY, THE MALIGNANT ENTITY IS KNOWN TO FRAGMENT INTO SHARDS WHICH TAKE OVER SYSTEMS AND CAN ACT AUTONOMOUSLY. CRYSTAL MATRICES ARE KNOWN TO IMPRISON A SHARD FOR DAYS. A CRYSTAL AND THIS FACILITY CAN EXTEND THAT TIME TO DECADES WHILE THE GATE STAR IS THE ONLY KNOWN INDEFINITE STORAGE AT THIS TIME. .”
 
“We travelled past a mountain of crystal. Is that part of the Malignant Shard escaping?” Marius asked, and Nox took from her pouch a handful of crystal shards.
“THE CRYSTAL IS A BYPRODUCT FROM A DATA LEAK FROM THIS FACILITY. ” That explained how a shard reached Cerelon.
“Can this crystal be used to create new storage crystals?” Jaden thought and was disappointed with the reply.
“THE MATRICES OF THIS CRYSTL ARE NOT SUFFCIENTLY DENSE TO PROVIDE APPROPRIATE IMPRISONMENT. ”
 
“The others,” Fureva-Yung joined in the conversation, “The Zions, where are they?”
“I CAN NOT TRACK THE ZIONS.” A disappointing answer, but not unexpected. The group knew that one lay somewhere to the east. They assumed the other was in the North but didn’t know. Once the shard was contained in the crystal, finding them seemed to be the next task.
“Nexion, who was I?” Behind Fureva-Yung asked. Nox gave a tiny cry at her friend’s vulnerability.
“YOU ARE ADMIRAL YUNG..” Fureva-Yung squared her shoulders a little. Her memories were real and were hers.
“Why am I here?”
“YOU WERE RECALLED BY THE ORDER WHEN THEY SUSPECTED A MALIGNANT SHARD HAD ESCAPED CONFINEMENT. ”
“Am I responsible?”
“I CANNOT ACCESS HISTORICAL DATA TO MAKE AN ASSESSMENT. ”
“You could have just said no and saved us a lot of heartache, Nexion.” Jaden grumbled under her breath.
 
“So, how about this place?” Marius changed the subject, “Is it working as it should? We had an altercation with an acid bubble.”
“FUEL CONTAINMENT OF DECK A5 TO A9 WORKING WITHIN PARAMETERS. ”
“And the lightning room…above the teleportation?”
“WORKING NORMALLY” Nexion replied as he had all questions, in a detached voice, neither male nor female and after a while, thoroughly infuriating.
“So, lightning in the elevator is supposed to happen?”
 
Nox and Jaden were in a conversation together about trapping the shard.
“We connect the crystal. How to we get the Shard into the crystal?” Nox asked. If the shard was in a part of the network even Nexion couldn’t reach, how can we?
“It’s arrogant,” Jaden replied casually as it were the simplest task, “Taunt him in.”
 
“Say, Nox, why don’t you ask about your blue people?” Marius turned to join their conversation when it was clear that Fureva-Yung had no more questions for the A.I.
“My people?” Nox had never said anything about being related to the blue beings followed their progress. Besides confessing to her Father, she’d never spoken of the one who had claimed to be her mother. Still, it wouldn't hurt to know if Nexion could provide insights into who they were.
 
“ I DO NOT HAVE INFORMATION ABOUT AN INCORPOREAL BLUE-SKINNED RACE, “ Nexion replied as frustratingly calm as usual.
“Um…one…one had a pendant… like this,” Nox pulled on the chord around her neck and withdrew her mother’s pendant. The black orb glowed with the same blue light as her eyes in Nexions datasphere.
“IT IS A TOKEN OF THE ORDER OF SYNC AND TRACE. THEIR MANDATE IS TO MONITOR WORLDS ACROSS DIMENSIONS FOR SHARDS OF MALIGNANCE. ”
“What? The same Order that ordered Furry to investigate the Shard?” Marius asked, intrigued that Nox and Fureva-Yung could be linked, “Is she also of the Order.”
“ADMIRAL YUNG IS NOT OF THE ORDER. IT WAS THE ORDER OF SYNC AND TRACE THAT RECALLED HER. ”
 
The questions petered out, and the companions looked at each other. It was time to leave. Nox was reticent to go. Here she felt strong, and able. There were answers if only she knew the right questions to ask or looked in the right places.
 
“Come on, the Deep Craven are probably wondering what happened to us,” Said Jaden with a wink, her crystalline features sparking. Nox took in the image of all her friends, each different, but each appropriate to their abilities. Jaden in particular had never looked more herself. Nox nodded her head and reached out for the Vertice, the other part of Nexion’s datasphere key. It did nothing.
“Now, really, we have to go,” Jaden complained and tried the Vertice. Nothing happened.
“Ur…don’t look at me. I don’t know how it works,” Marius shrugged.
Nox tried again, this time giving the Vertice a little push.
 
This time the room changed around them. They found themselves back in the altar room with a group of Deep Craven encircling the sceptre. Unfortunately, they entered up near the ceiling. Gravity grabbed them, and they fell to the rocky ground in a bundle of limbs.
 
“That’s going to take a little practice,” Marius complained as he regained his cuts and bruises again.
 
Jaden carefully picked up the Sceptre, “Nexion, can you still hear us?”
“I HEAR YOU, ” Nexion replied, its voice echoing through the cavern from loudspeakers in the crew quarters.
“New instructions. These people have made their homes here. They have been used and abused by the shard and deserve better. You have a new responsibility to protect them and give them a safe home. I would suggest that if the Shard returns to cause trouble you also warn them of the Allseer’s return.”
“PEOPLE?” It was the first time Nexion sounded confused, “YOUR CURRENT POSITION...YOU ARE NOT IN THE SPIRE.”
“Ah no. You will need to map these new areas as well. They belong to the Deep Craven.”
 
Nox spied Mal and Ickus and made her way over to them. She explained what had occurred and that the Allseer was in hiding. She told them what Jaden had just said and about Nexion, their new friend.
Please make sure everyone knows and understands that you are free now. Your lives are your own to decide.
“I’m wondering if our friends couldn’t keep an eye on the eye,” Marius added in the Deep Craven language, “Elders of the Deep Craven, may I introduce you to Nexion.”
 
Introductions were uneasy, the Deep Craven only recognising Nexion as the dread Allseer and Nexion having no senses available, could not identify the Deep Craven. A tentative agreement with the few Deep Craven that stepped forward as elders agreed to keep a guard for anything like the Allseer and let the group know. With that done, Marius got to work salvaging io from the two monitors and automaton in the altar room. Fureva-Yung found a piece of the altar that looked like it could be a chain link and pocketed it for later attachment.
 
Nox was almost asleep on her feet. They farewelled the Deep Craven and returned to the surface via the elevator. Sleep came quickly that night and in the morning they were all awoken by the delicious smell of mushrooms. Trade with the Deep Craven and the Community had already begun. The Companions enjoyed a reward of fresh fried mushrooms in flatbread for breakfast.