Universe's End

I might have overdone it.

Taking deep breaths, Rory slowly caught his breath as he took in the sight.

Yeah, definitely overdid it.

The energy he’d unleashed in the attack should have created a crater miles across and just as deep; thankfully, the attack carried the conceptual intent of precision. So rather than a several-mile-wide crater erasing any proof that the undercity had ever existed, there was merely a 400-meter-wide chute that dropped into complete darkness, with much of the energy boring downward.

“Ugh, feeling queasy.”

Dropping from the sky, Rory plummeted two hundred feet, crashing onto the ground below and lying sprawled out.

There was overkill, and then there was whatever that was. Rory had just been so caught up in the utter venom he felt toward-

No. Can’t even let myself think of that thing.

“Enchain still needs work,” Rory said groggily to himself. The fact that a single binding skill had taken 80% of the pneuma reserves he’d had left was a far cry from usable in any regular situation.

“Notifications, oh notifications,” Rory mumbled, several beeping red icons alerting him to their presence before Rory swiped them away. He’d get to them later.

Lying there, Rory was left entirely alone, even as the teleportation temple was abuzz with activity now that the Bane was gone.

When someone finally did decide to approach, she squatted down, her knees nearly hugging her chin.

“So,” Zoey said, giving him a poke. “Several questions.”

“You’re not going to give me some time to recover?” Rory asked. “A lot of bad shit just happened.”

“Normally I’d have that grace,” Zoey said, the usual joking tone gone from her voice. “But you’re right, some serious shit did just happen, one more important than any of the others.”

“Yeah, that being?”

“Your daughter. You can be an idiot, but even you aren’t blind. She’s a Sensen.”

“Yeah,” Rory acknowledged.

Several seconds of silence later, Zoey spoke up, a sort of low growl in her tone.

“’ Yeah,’ that’s all you’ve got? C’mon, Rory, don’t play games with me. I would think we’ve been best friends for long enough that you can spill.”

“Best friends? Does it count if no one else is around?”

“Rory.”

“Fine,” Rory sighed, knowing there was no getting around this talk. “Yeah, she’s a Sensen.”

“Where did you find her? Or are you harboring a colony of omnicidal maniacs?”

“No,” Rory snorted. “It’s a bit of an odd story. Years ago, after returning, one of the people in Ehkorrus gave me an item they’d come across, an item that would lead to things from a ‘lost time’ or whatever the description was. I assumed it would revolve around stuff from our universe. Following it led me to the very depths of tunnels dug by the former territory alpha of this place. At the bottom was this… canyon? Gulch? Whatever the technical term is. Anyway. Lo and behold, after exploring it, I found a ricochet ship of all things. From what I could tell, it hadn’t been there for long; something had ‘summoned’ it into this reality, where it was merged into the nearby rock after melding into this universe. It had been scrubbed of basically everything noteworthy; crossing the primordial soup of a doomed existence into a new reality tends to do that.”

“And?”

“I was getting there. Inside, there was a life pod or whatever. I managed to crack it open without turning the inhabitant into space goop. Tadah, a Sensen, and a child at that, maybe ten years old.”

“Your daughter,” Zoey said.

“Bingo. At the time, I wasn’t sure what to do. I could always pull a baby Hitler.”

“Baby Hitler?”

“You know, the joke about time travelers and baby Hitler?” Motioning with his hands, Rory mimed as if he were tying a pillowcase around his neck.

“That’s awful,” Zoey said, with a hint of amusement.

“Yeah, well, in the end, I had that same thought. I’m not a kid killer. Had it been an adult Sensen? Probably. But a child? No, just no, I couldn’t bring myself to do that. So, in the end, I ended up raising her as my own kid.”

“Why was she there? In a ricochet ship of all things?” Zoey asked, sounding confused. “That doesn’t add up with anything revolving around the end of our universe. In one of our ships? Hell, sightings of child Sensen’s were essentially unheard of; only a few pictures had been obtained by those from the Intergalactic Community.”

“Someone is well-versed,” Rory pointed out.

“I might have run away from home, but that doesn’t mean I completely stopped caring about important world news, or I guess universe news,” Zoey scowled. “It just doesn’t make sense?”

“Don’t ask me, I was basically just a lab tech and part-time helping out with athletics at a nearby high school, hardly any high-level diplomat or politician.”

“So…. She hasn’t been talking about murdering puppies, has she?” Zoey asked.

“Fuck no,” Rory said. “She’s the best damn kid I’ve ever known, and I’m proud to be called her dad.”

“Softie,” Zoey sighed.

Several seconds of silence hung until Rory coughed.

“That’s it?” He asked.

“I mean, yeah,” Zoey shrugged. “I’ve known you longer than I’ve known anyone else. I trust you more than I trust anyone else. You’re my partner and best friend, though if you ever repeat this to anyone else, I will punch you right in the snoz.”

“No one says snoz anymore.”

“Well, I’m going to bring it back,” Zoey said smugly as Rory let out a quiet chuckle.

“Thanks,” Rory sighed after a moment, the levity appreciated. “Bad shit happened here.”

“Yeah,” Zoey agreed quietly. “I didn’t see much. I only brawled with your bane for a few seconds through this place, but in those few seconds, I saw what was left behind.”

“I never took it seriously enough,” Rory muttered. “Life, death, that was the regular business. This? This was like a personalized hate crime. It’s been figuring me out for decades, until the point it could hit me where it hurt the most.”

“Are you okay?”

“From a certain standpoint, yeah. No one I knew personally, aside from the big snake, died. But children died, and my kid nearly died.”

“And that big ass snake?”

“The Khan of Blue Lightning,” Rory answered. “We’ve got a pretty long history, but safe to say he was the first ally I had on this world that was from outside my ‘people.’ His goal was to one day reach tier ten, where it would be able to free itself from the Maw. He was purifying this territory, making it into something people from Earth would liken to a paradise, golden fields and all that. You should see what it looks like beyond his influence. He was a friend, a friend I never took seriously enough.”

Rory’s gut hurt, and not from eating something uncooked, a pain of loss that he sequestered away.

“I’m sorry,” Zoey said.

“Don’t be, you didn’t cause this. Fuck, if it weren’t for you, I’d have lost my kid.”

Again, silence, before it was Zoey’s turn to break it.

“What was that power, by the way? Some intense shit I felt from you.”

“Faith or Belief juice is my guess,” Rory answered. “Only felt it once before, when Ehkorrus was very nearly destroyed in a Siege Wave that was hijacked by the same blight khan you killed. Re-killed, whatever.”

“That’s a thing?”

“I mean, it makes sense,” Rory said with a shrug. “Concepts, intent, significance, when you factor all that together, a bunch of people praying for someone in particular, someone they treat almost like a god, that’s probably got to translate into literal power.”

“Spicy shit,”

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“Yeah, but I’m going to make a point of not using it.”

“Why?”

“Not exactly an abundant source,” Rory said. “At least I’m not going to use it for fighting. And more importantly, it’s not my strength. Rely on something that isn’t your own too much; it will hollow out your own significance.”

“Hmm, I guess that makes sense,” Zoey said. “So… now what?”

“Now? I lay here for a while and second-guess all my life choices, eventually get tired of that, and move on, figuring out my next move.”

“What is your next move?”

“Speak to Apostolos, you met him briefly. Probably Irene, you also met her briefly. Then? Spend some time with Roxy. And then? Probably eat something.”

“And then?”

“That’s part of the ‘lay here and figure shit out’ phase,” Rory snorted.

And that’s exactly what they did, for nearly an hour.

During that time, Rory finally figured it was time to look at notifications.

The first was a genuinely interesting one, confirming his thoughts on the mystery ‘faith’ energy.