***

“Something’s wrong Mae,” Sarah said, running her hand along the rocky wall, slick with moisture. “I haven’t seen the Astral actualize this solidly since the Crisis.” The astral realm they had entered had changed form from when they had entered the last time. Before it had been the typical fuzzy detailed unreality they were used to. Now it was like they were in a realized space. It took on the appearance of an underground cave with meandering paths and rocky walls with a low ceiling. A floating orb of flame hovered near each of them, curtesy of Tristan’s ability, casting flickering shadows over the textured surfaces.

They had not yet encountered any of the creatures that had broken through the breach, as they made their way through the maze of corridors. Still, there was a sense of growing dread as they wandered deeper in, an increasingly heavy weight tugging at their chests.

“It’s not our job to speculate on the nature of this event,” Mae said, all business. “We just need to find the source of the anomalous activity and repair the fracture.”

“Still, what the hell kind of beings are these?” Sarah shuddered while gesticulating. “Giant hands. Little hands. Hands?! Not the type of nightmare creatures we’ve ever had to deal with before.”

“I think he’s having bad dreams,” Tristan said.

“I thought he didn’t dream anymore,” Sarah returned. “No detectable activity in the brain since they induced the coma.”

“It’s either that or we’re dealing with a cosmic entity that has a thing for human hands,” Tristan said.

“Let’s just focus on finding the core,” Mae said. “In fact, I think we’re getting close.” She turned a corner and stepped into an expansive cavern, lit by a soft amber light. All three of them looked in awe at the crystalline structures jutting from the wall.

“Pure amrita deposits,” Sarah whispered reverently.

“We should probably do a little mining while we’re here Mae,” Tristan suggested. “It’s been a long time since we’ve been able to enhance our abilities. This is a rare find.” Mae nodded her ascent but kept a wary eye on the rest of the cavern. “Don’t worry,” he said, noticing her expression. “I’ll be quick. I am uncomfortable with what this amount of raw amrita actualizing means for how much time we have left.” He pinched his fingers together causing a warm glow to appear between them, as he pulled them apart a ball of flame appeared and then lanced out in a searing white beam, cutting off sections of the crystal. He took several large pieces and placed them into a bag that looked entirely too small compared to what he was putting in them.

A skittering sound pattered in echoes throughout the cavern, bouncing off the various surfaces. All three turned in the same direction simultaneously, sensing the source of the noise. An emerald bow appeared in Sarahs left hand and she plucked and arrow from then air behind her back, notching it into a glowing golden string on the bow. Tristan ignited a fireball in each hand. Mae drew her katana, electricity arcing along the blade. A thousand tiny hands swarmed towards them, like an infestation of plague rats fleeing a coming flood.

***

“So, you’re telling me it works?” Derek said.

“I’m not saying it works,” Ryan corrected. They were having a hushed conversation at their usual spot during the lunch period. Lisa had gone off to do, whatever it is girls did, and Ryan had used that chance to talk about their jailbreaking project. “We won’t know if it actually works until it runs out of HP.”

“But still, it is deducting health from itself without even getting to the lying part. I think that means it knows you will know it is lying and determines it will lose the health regardless. That’s some serious predictive reasoning.”

“It is one of the most advanced personal AI’s on the market,” Ryan said. He had just finished his meal and stood up to toss it in the trash. The bin was only five or six feet away, and he’d made the shot a thousand times, but on this day an unexpected gust lifted the Styrofoam container up and popped open the latch, causing the half eating burger to flip out and land on the one shoe in the whole school that it shouldn’t have.

Jeremy Witkins looked down at his once pristine sneakers, mouth agape. His toadies scoffed, covering their mouths and pointing. The bustle around the yard grew silent. Jeremy visibly pulled himself together and then looked up to see Ryan frozen in the mid throw position, eyes wide with horror.

“So, it’s not just losing to me at the writing contest,” Jeremy said. “You’re jealous of my shoes too?” He looked down at Ryan’s sneakers, which were admittedly a little worse for wear. “Still,” he said, sitting down next to Ryan on the bench and putting a friendly, consoling arm over his shoulders. “You didn’t miss out on much. The grand prize was a lie anyway. The whole line of PerSpectives were recalled due to faulty software or some such. My father has already filed a lawsuit for false advertising. We’ll probably make more in the settlement than those stupid goggles were worth. All I got for my efforts was this SmartPaper.”

He pulled out what looked like a folded piece of paper, and then used it to wipe the ketchup stain from his shoe. “See, even a paper towel has more utility than this crap.” He tossed the stained paper onto Ryan’s lap. “Whoops,” he said. “Seems I’ve made it look like you soiled yourself.” There were various pained “oo’s” and chuckles from the crowd that had stopped to observe the interaction. The general feeling was that of disappointment, as Jeremy’s reaction to Ryan’s blunder seemed relatively tame. Still, Ryan felt the heat on his face that came with the inevitable blush of embarrassment. “Anyway, you can have it. I already have loads of this crap at home.” He got up and left, Ryan and Derek mouth agape at the departing kid’s back.

“What was that?” Derek said finally.

“I think,” Ryan replied, picking up the paper. “That was Jeremy’s version of being nice.” He looked down at his pants in dismay. “It really does look like I soiled myself. But I’m keeping this SmartPaper. I’m pretty sure it’s water resistant, so I’m going to go rinse it off in the bathroom sink. Maybe I can clean off the stains on my pants without making it look like I really wet myself.”

After cleaning off as much as he could of himself and his unexpected gift, Ryan put the paper into his pocket, sliding it right up against the marble he kept in there. The moment his fingers touched the Concentrated Firmament he felt a brief painful shock, causing him to jerk his hand away. “Ow,” he exclaimed angrily, sucking on his now numb finger. “What was that?” He stepped out into the hallway and nearly collided with one of the non-teacher faculty members.

“Jesus, Ryan, I almost ran you over!” It was Mr. Clark, one of the school’s IT Administrators. Tall, gangly, and strapped with a utility belt full of various tools of the trade, he was like the MacGyver of the technical world. Ryan shook his head at the reference from centuries past that most people wouldn’t even get.

“Where are you going in such a rush?” he asked.

“Oh, you know the life of a lowly IT,” opined the bespectacled gentleman, adjusting his black tie. “Always running from one crisis to the next.”

“What crisis are you running away from this time?” Ryan asked with a wry smile.

“Ahem, excuse me young sir,” the IT tsked with his index finger. “I am actually heading towards danger this time.” His brow scrunched. “Actually, this probably would be a good time to get your friend Derek involved. The best way to learn how to fix things is to deal with them while they’re broken.” Derek was also a part of the Information Systems club and shadowed the IT department during free period to learn the ropes of that trade. “If you see him, send him to the janitor’s closet on the west wing.” Ryan stopped breathing for a second.

“The j-janitor’s closet? What’s going on in there?”

“I’m not sure,” said Mr. Clark. “Something is interfering with the school’s network, and I think I’ve narrowed it down to the network stack we have racked above the ceiling tile in there. Anyway, no time to chat, I gotta get going. Don’t forget to tell Derek to join me when you see him.” With that Mr. Clark rushed off down the hallway. Ryan turned and headed back towards his friend.

***

“Mission Report,” Xavier Chandra, the Director of the Incursion Specialists division of the Ministry of Integrity’s Crisis Response department demanded as the three exhausted looking Travelers entered the debriefing room at their headquarters in the Ministry of Integrity. They had had bags under their eyes and their skin looked pallid. Tristan, cradling his brow in attempt to massage away his headache, was the first to speak.

“The node breach is secured. Locus repaired within 98% of its original form. There will be no more Incursions from that location.”

“That doesn’t sound like a ‘Mission Success’ kind of response,” Xavier challenged. “What went wrong?” This time Mae spoke up.

“This one was different boss,” she said. “There seemed to be an intelligence behind the anomalies. When we got inside there were millions of those little hands all over the walls and floors. They tried crawling up our skin and insinuating themselves into us. After I let out a chain lighting burst, they retreated and formed into what looked like a little child. He smiled and then sank into the Locus somehow. We were not able to detect him so we repaired it and the fissure closed…”

“…but it feels like this isn’t over,” Sarah finished for her. Xavier looked thoughtful, rubbing the smooth dark skin over the top of his bald head.

“It is possible He is trying to wake up,” he said. The entire group looked suddenly much more alert.

“Whoa, Boss,” said Tristan. “That’s a little bit of a leap. More like, he’s having a nightmare.” The burly man repeated his thoughts from when they were in the incursion space.

“That could be worse,” Xavier said. “Ok, I hate to do this to you guys, but we need to stay on high alert. Get rest, as much as you can, but be ready for another call. If you’re right, it will be sooner rather than later.” The trio sauntered out of the room to get some much-needed rack time.

“I’m not sure it was wise to mention him during your debriefing,” the man said. “That information is highly restricted.”

“Doctor Fuentes, I was curious if you were listening in. If my A Team can’t handle that level of information then they wouldn’t be my A Team,” Xavier said. “It’s all speculation at this point. If there really was any brain activity that would be a different matter altogether.”

“Funny you should mention that” the older man said.

“You’re kidding.” Xavier stated with a finality that suggested he better not be.

“It was just a brief spike,” the man said. “But the timing was a little more than curious. Right around when the node was repaired, in fact.” Xavier just stared at him. “Also, there was a power surge in District 7 moments later.”

“Don’t play coy with me doctor,” Xavier said coldly. “Just cut to the chase.”

“Sorry Director, we scientists don’t like to speak in absolutes. But I understand you need something actionable. Long story short, the prevailing theory is that whatever has caused the last couple of events has moved to the seventh district. We don’t know its motivation or purpose, but we believe it is only a matter of time before an Incursion event occurs in that district.”

“A brief power surge that happened to coincide with one of our operations is a bit thin to act upon,” Xavier said. “How can you rule it as anything other than a coincidence?”

“Well,” the doctor leaned forward conspiratorially. “And this actually is quite confidential,” he whispered. “But a person of interest was detected in that area just a few days ago.” The Director’s head tilted and his eye rose.

“Tiresias?” he asked.

“No, someone else we have been tracking since the Crisis. But we have strong reason to believe if he was there, the other had some influence on events. Either way, our predictive models heavily imply that the next event is most likely to occur in that area.”

“How much time?” Xavier asked.

“By our calculations, based off the recorded pre-phenomena of the last two incursions and the frequency of the pulse we detected after the power surge, we are estimating approximately thirty-six hours until a tear forms.” The doctor adjusted his frameless glasses, a nervous gesture he indulged in more frequently around the Director than anywhere else.

“Understood, I’ll get my team ready to deploy as soon as they’ve recovered from their last mission.”

“A wise choice, sir,” the scientist said, bowing slightly. “Anything they can do to ascertain the purpose of this entity will be greatly appreciated.”

“Of course, all the information from our mission logs is at your disposal,” the director said as a polite dismissal. After he left Xavier tapped a few times on his watch. The sound of Mae’s voice came through his earpiece after only half a ring.

“Boss?”

“This isn’t over, get your unit rested and ready to deploy in six hours,” he said.

“Sir, it will take longer than six hours to recover from a chemically induced projection,” she protested. Mae would never question authority in front of her team, but when it was just between the two of them, she wouldn’t hesitate to stand up for them. It was what made her a great unit leader, but Xavier had to admit it rankled him slightly.

“You can continue to rest up en route,” he said. “Analysis division says we have 36 hours until the next event.”

“Where we headed?” she asked.

“District Seven?!” Sarah complained a few minutes later after Mae had informed the two of their upcoming mission. “What are we doing going out to some backwater province? We’re a little high profile to suddenly show up there unannounced. Won’t that cause a huge panic?”

“You know better than to question orders,” Mae chided. “Chandra has a cover for us in the works anyway,” she added. “Apparently we’re going to be doing a little recruiting for the next generation of Travelers.”

“What, we’re assessing students for potential at the local high school?” Tristan asked. “That’s not a bad cover, if you think about it. The other teams have gone out to several districts over the last couple of years to find potentials amongst the applicants to the Astral Academy. Our boss is no fool.”

“No, he isn’t. Let’s get rested up as best we can, we leave in six hours.” Mae left them to it and headed for the shower. As steam began to rise from the hot jet of water, she tapped a panel on her left shoulder in a specific series of patterns and the skintight suit became slack, loosening so she could strip it off her body. A large, jagged scar flared from her left shoulder down across her back, stopping near the right side of her belly. The wound had healed long ago, but now it felt raw like the day she’d received it. She thought back to her time as a child, before everything in her life went sideways.

“Tommy,” she whispered. “Why..." she let the heat of the water absorb her thoughts.