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[RFC] [Meta-riffic] The Untitled Multiverse Project
 
#52
I'm ALIVE! BWAHAHAHA!!!

*ahem*

So... My inspiration is a lot low for the moment, so I'm warning that the next part will quite probably be later. I don't want this to dry up before the end of this chapter, so I'll keep plugging away.

For all that they were very much an adolescent civilisation, Dr. Oliver thought, they did have good tech. The gecko adhesive technology was a godsend for archaeology, allowing lights to be set up without damaging the structure and self-supporting platforms for pathways. He hoped that the trade delegation got their recommendation for that.

Due to the rush, Opel didn’t get to enjoy the scenery; no, he was briskly moving down the corridors to the next shaft, attaching the cable traverser (helped by the display on the data glasses he’d been issued), dropping down to the next level, and disconnecting. Repeat twelve times.

The little drone (a quadcopter he’d heard it called) sat on the floor, waiting for them like a large insect. At the Mobian’s approach, it came to life and raised itself to head level.

“In position.” Captain Green said to the comm net.

The controller up top replied.

“Drop a tag Mizuhara.” The captain ordered.

The lieutenant reached into a pouch, then reached out and slapped a 2 cm patch to the nearest wall.

Control acknowledged.

“Roger. We have a fix on the signal yet?”

Professor Karif came on the line.

“I thought fusion reactors were safe Captain?” Oliver asked to fill the silence.

“Normally are.” The captain replied. “Any reasonably designed reactor is virtually impossible to overload by accident. Plasma hits the walls, loses all heat and the reaction dies. Maybe it’ll breach, but people are unlikely to be around it at that point. It’s when you have gravitics involved things get tricky. Make the energy densities higher and the units smaller, but also allows more violent plasma expansion. Tellurics make it worse.” He shrugged. “That’s where you really want to be careful with ancient reactors, the control systems are FAR more likely to malfunction thus making an ‘accidental’” Here he made air-quotes “overload possible. Forced overloads are by design hard to pull off. One in a million it’s a control system malfunction for an overload, and it’s only that high due to human error. No software’s entirely bug free. The other times its deliberate action, sabotage or booby trap.”

Opel didn’t need to be an experienced archaeologist specialising in ‘advanced’ civilisations to follow that thought to its conclusion. He’d been on enough Belkan war dig sites to know about that.

Control piped up.

A blue wireframe diamond appeared in the display of Oliver’s data glasses. But…

“Control, that’s down at least two floors.” The captain complained.

Professor Karif said.

“This will be fun.” Lieutenant Mizuhara said sarcastically.

***

“Y’know Doc,” Colin said as they tried to find their way. “I’ve always been puzzled by that fact places like this are so empty. Surely there’d be some sort of hint of purpose, or that someone lived here.”

“Magitech cuts down on the clutter. Plus it allows for teleportation, so we can clean up after ourselves.” Dr. Oliver replied. “It’s the simplest theory we have.”

“So it’s a device of some sort they built, but couldn’t take apart so they left it moth-balled. Got it.” Colin summarised. “Still, there’s always why they upped and vanished.”

“You’re talking about the Sublimed.” Eve said sceptically.

“War’s fairly obvious, especially one that erases a people.” Colin put in. “Anyone with the capacity for transworld ops is gonna be too hard to hit with bio-chem weapons. That means getting the high ground and pounding the fuck out of them.”

“We have barriers to contain combat.” Opel interjected. “It rotates target mages a few degrees out of phase with the world. Any damage done there doesn’t translate back to the world outside the barrier.”

“Have to be a pretty big one to be of any use.” Colin mused after a minutes thought. “And I can’t see it being useful where you have lots of mages in the population if you want to keep casualties down.”

“What are the Sublimed?” Opel asked as a signal interrupted.

“Way down. Finally.” Colin muttered as the image appeared on their HUDs. “Stairs too. Time to hoof it. Tag the walls as we go.”

Dr. Oliver found himself dragged along as the two couriers raced down the corridors to the stairway, only just getting a float spell active before the two of them took the stairs 4 at a time.

“Checking map.” Eve said as the two armoured forms swept the bottom of the stairs. “Still ten meters high, but forty closer.”

“Still fifty meters of rock one way, and we’re facing backwards.” Colin grumped. “Too bad all the drones were in use, a swarm would help with the mapping.”

Opel manage to catch his breath, and called upstairs.

~ Oliver to Control. Has anyone done an analysis on the structure we’ve mapped? Common structural elements might help us get to the signal faster. ~

Professor Karif replied.

The voice of Major Whitedale, FOB commanding officer, entered the discussion.

“Sir.” Colin said respectfully. “Good point. Try looking based on size. You only make things big if you need to.”

“Or have an overblown ego.” Eve added snidely.

“True. We’ll look for big corridors. Supplies, transport routes, construction sequencing given we’re in a mountain…”

Major Whitedale acknowledged.

***

Professor Karif looked on as the Mobian contingent brought heavier systems online to run analyses on the structure. As a full holographic map resolved in the air, Major Whitedale turned to Dr. Reynolds.

“Can we get more drones down there to help with the mapping?” The major asked.

“Can’t get enough stock to make a dent on the numbers needed.” Dr. Reynolds told him. “It’d also take fifteen minutes to them to fly down there, following the direct route. We only have general use survey drones, and most are scattered around the site.”

“Professor?” The major turned to him. “I’ve heard about some sort of search spell?”

“I’m afraid you’ve been spoiled by encounters with the Navy.” Ishmael said. “They tend towards the high power mages. Most of my people, Kaiser even myself, couldn’t cast a search sphere and move it more than a hundred meters in a straight line. In the tunnels those who could wouldn’t last more than ten minutes before the drain got to them. Sorry Major. I asked Commander Suzuki for assistance, but I doubt we’d get much before it was all over.”

Alarms sounded as the holowindows gained a red border.

“Lost signal from Mizuhara!”

***

Opel Oliver froze as Captain Green’s gauntleted hand dropped on his shoulder.

“” He asked the figure 10 meters ahead of them.

There was no response as she continued down the corridor.

“” He yelled, to no response. “Doctor, cover your ears.”

Opel did, adding a dampening field for good measure as he saw the captain’s chest plate rise as the Mobian took a deep breath.

“EVE!!!” The roar shook the tunnel, the captain having turned up the external speakers on his suit to full.

At a line 7 meters ahead of them, dust didn’t fall. Dr. Oliver saw the tilt of the captain’s head as the senior officer thought, then the captain slipped his weapon onto his back, kneeled to pick up a loose stone, stood and side-stepped away from him, then THREW the rock.

As the augmented strength of his armour powered the stone toward his errant colleague, Captain Green side-stepped back toward the TSAB Doctor.

The rock crossed the invisible line of no dust fall and shot on to hit the back of the lieutenant with a soundless flash of purple energy. The lieutenant span round and dropped to a crouch.

In a direct line where the captain had been, there was a crunch as part of the wall disintegrated.

The captain held up his right hand and rather obviously made a series of hand gestures.

After a few seconds, the lieutenant stood up and replaced her weapon on her back, then gestured back.

He said to the comm net.

~ Relay four-seventy, theta sigma two two seven. ~ The doctor sent telepathically and via radio.

~ Double signal verified. ~ Control relayed back.

“OK Doc.” Captain Green said. “Time to experiment.”

The two of them walked up to the blocking field boundary.

“” Captain Green said. “” He did so. “”

Control responded.

“Doc?” Green asked, pulling his hand back.

~~ The doctor repeated the captain’s action. ~~

~~

“” Green mused. “”

The major asked.

” He made some more hand gestures to the lieutenant, then started pulling off his back pack to get at his tools.

With a mental ping, the lieutenant walked through the field and re-joined the comm net.

“That was…unnerving.” Mizuhara said, looking around.

“Jamming on the far side?” Green asked, carefully cracking the case on one of their tags with a screwdriver.

“Nothing noticeable. The drone signal was fine except for a blip as we crossed the threshold.”

Colin asked on a private channel, grabbing a pod-like device and putting it by the open tag.

[i] Eve admitted.

[i] Colin sighed, bringing his hands up to manipulate the AR controls.

[i] Eve objected.

Colin ordered.

Opel watched as the captain typed in mid-air (to his perspective) and tiny manipulators came out of the front of the pod. In the enhanced vision of his loaned data glasses they looked a bit fuzzy.

“Doctor?” The Lieutenant asked, dragging his attention away. “Can you try going through the field? We need to know of it blocks thought sending as well.”

“Good point.” Dr. Oliver agreed, stepping through and trying.

He got no response.

~ Control, field also blocks telepathy. ~ He sent after walk back through.

~ Roger that. ~ Control sent back. ~ Captain, I hope your relay works. ~

“” He replied, already fitting the end of some fibre to the internals of a second tag.

Opel and Eve stood silently in the darkness, as Colin tested and reprogrammed the tags.

“Right.” He said a few minutes later. “Let’s give this a try. Mizuhara, Doc. Take this end through,” He held up one of the tags. “And we’ll see if I need to fiddle some more. Careful, the lid isn’t solidly fastened at the mo and I’ve only got two meters of fibre here.”

Eve took the tag in hand and stepped through the field with the doctor in tow.

“” Colin noted.

Eve replied.

~ Confirming relay here. ~ Dr. Oliver added.

Came from the surface.

“” Colin noted. “”

Control replied as the others returned to Colin’s side of the field.

Eve deadpanned.
[/i][/i][/i]
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