“Or remorse?”

  “None.”

  Ed walked off a bit, hidden by tall mirrors.

  “I must give you credit, Michael. Like Valentin, you approach the end of your life as an honest man. You have clarity about who and what you are. Yet one key difference remains.”

  “What’s that?”

  “Valentin tried to atone in the most appropriate way. His ambition had opened a dangerous door. His sacrifice closed the door long enough to give humanity a fighting chance. How far will you go to make right all the tears of your countless victims?”

  “I-I don’t know.” Throbbing pain erupted in his abdomen. “I’m coming apart here.”

  “Yes, you are. If not for me, the collapse would have begun hours ago. Soon, you will need the phasics. You will spend days on the edge of death.”

  “But it’s not the end?”

  Ed approached.

  “How far will you go to set things right?”

  “Will I still be able to see through the mirrors?”

  “I wish you had atoned today, but I will keep my end of the deal on one condition. When the time arrives for all paths to converge, you must set things right, Michael.”

  “I can’t bring them back, Pop.”

  “No, but you can give hope where none now exists.”

  Michael wished he’d never left Aeterna. He thought of calling for Rikhi then stared at Ed one last time.

  “I can’t promise, Pop.”

  Ed’s voice replied, “All you can do is try, Mike. The rest will take care of itself. Now, on your feet. To the phasics while you can walk.”

  24

  The Origin

  18th century of training

  R OYAL AND MOON WERE GODS. All the indicators said so. They mastered time, defied the physical laws of nature, spoke the tongue of the Creators, sang to “the boundless travelers” imprisoned inside Splinters, created any object with a thought, and used the silver rain called syneth to change their form at will. They possessed the power to destroy worlds and re-enter time at any point after the moment they disappeared above Hokkaido.

  The two mightiest beings in all the universes, chosen from obscurity to save Creation from desolation, reflected on their long journey and reached three conclusions.

  No. 1: The whole damn experience had been a blast.

  No. 2: None of it was real. Yet.

  No. 3: Time to fight!

  They walked through a cloudbank they created together, leaping from one syneth pad to the next. Far below, the blue grid was hard to spot through the diversity of custom-designed land formations, populated with animals they found while studying the Creators’ ancient history. Many varieties of dogs ran loose because somewhere in the fifteen century, Royal and Moon committed to loving dogs after they finished saving Creation.

  Humans? Not so much. Some might be worth the investment, but killing them seemed a much simpler option than loving.

  “They’re ready to set us free, partner,” Moon said.

  “So they say.” Royal drank from a bottle of Pinochet wine, its sweetness barely discernible. “When our backs are turned, they have second thoughts. Hear them?”

  Moon swigged Shiaran whiskey from the Creators’ home world.

  “You sound surprised. We’re more powerful than they predicted.”

  “Yep. They know we got our own plans for the universe.”

  “They’re not happy about it, partner.”

  During the fourteenth century, Royal and Moon learned how to bar Theo and Pia from listening in on private conversations. They created a demarcation inside the Cartalingus. By the sixteenth century, they devised a backdoor to penetrate the Riders’ thoughts and emotions. Fluency in Quesh-n’o helped.

  “They can’t do a damn thing to stop us after reclamation.” Royal sang a creation sequence in his mind; lightning flashed in nearby clouds. “Holding us back is not an option. They know we’ll decipher the escape sequence in a few years.”

  Moon laughed.

  “C-a’ln mo-ti barze ator siq-aun g-a’ln y-mo te’azun.”

  Royal snickered at the joke.

  “That’s rich, my man. Think they’d be dumb enough to fall for it?”

  “Tu c-a’ln gok.”

  “Yeah, no. It’s clever as hell, but I say we come at them straight up. Y-mo ti y-mo.”

  “Zun.” Moon whispered the whiskey bottle out of existence. “What if they push back? Say we’re not quite ready.”

  “Yeah. Ask us for another century to fine tune.”

  “We’re up to speed, Royal. They got nothing left to teach. We spent eighteen hundred years preparing. I want real action. I want to be a god in the flesh.”

  “We earned it, Moon. Y-mo ti y-mo.”

  “Agree, partner. It’s time to force their hand. What’s the plan?”

  Royal learned an important lesson centuries ago: Egos run far and wide in the company of gods. He decided to start there.

  “We begin with the eyes.”

  Moon lent a mischievous smile. They blinked, and their eyes turned catlike and green.

  “The hair,” Royal said.

  They whispered in Quesh-n’o until the syneth replaced their tattoos and bald scalps with thick sienna manes. Moon created a hand mirror and admired himself.

  “We could pass for their cousins.”

  “Closer, I think.”

  “Gingerbread would be jealous.”

  Royal thought of the Overseer who led them into Bessios and trapped them inside an eternal prison.

  “He’ll be the first to die.”

  “Let’s do it, Royal. Knives out. You take Pia. I’ll snag Theo.”

  Their foot-long blades glistened in the artificial sunlight. The unofficial gods disappeared in a blur, streaking through time and arriving precisely on target, their blades at the necks of unprepared Riders. Yet the ancient beings recovered in a blink, shapeshifting into carnivorous creatures the size of beavers, their teeth chomping through guts and spilling out the other side.

  Royal and Moon dismissed the pain and the simulated innards to transform into gold-plated warriors who tossed changeling nets onto the creatures. The ancient devices, which the new gods learned of without the old gods’ knowledge, wrapped Theo and Pia inside a hard seal similar to a stasis module.

  They caught the Riders off-guard before, but today set a precedent for effective containment.

  Royal bent over the animals, who squirmed inside the glowing net.

  “Nice try,” he said, “but you’re losing your touch.”

  He dissolved the nets and watched the Riders regain their form.

  Theo and Pia shook it off with an amused chuckle.

  “Well played,” he said. “You caught us unaware.”

  Royal winked. “There’s no off button on the genius switch.”

  “The changeling net was a surprise,” Pia said. “We planned to introduce it soon. It’s a lovely tool for suppressing Overseers.”

  Moon snapped at her.

  “We know. We’ve had it in our toolkit for seventy years. Strange how you never bothered to mention it.”

  “Dear Moon. You’re agitated. We introduce tools as needed. The same protocol we’ve always followed.”

  “Right.” Royal gazed at the woman. She seemed quite satisfied for a creature they now had the power to kill. “Feed us until our bellies are full, so we’ll never suspect you’re holding out.” To both, he said: “We’re stronger than you, and you got nothing left to hide. We know all the tricks. We tested all the tools.”

  “Ah. I see.” Theo wrapped an arm around Pia. “That explains your appearance. The symbolism of transforming into Creators.”

  “Actually, it’s an homage. We thought you’d be flattered.”

  “We are,” they said in unison. Pia continued:

  “You wouldn’t have been so arrogant if unsure of your strength.”

  Theo added: “It’s not difficult to ascertain your strategy, gentlemen. You wish to leave this place.”

  Moon generated a spear which pinched Theo’s outer garment.

  “Today.”

  “Why the rush, Moon?”

  “You’re predictable, Theo.”

  “After all this time, I’d hope so. What is your claim to regain your body today?”

  Moon deferred to Royal with a nod.

  “There’s nothing left to learn,” he said. “We know all the techniques for killing Overseers. We know the war will last a century. We’ve got a shitload of territory to cover and thirty million of your people to slaughter. That only happens after we raise an army. Best we calculate, we’ll win Prelude somewhere roundabout two thousand years after we entered the Origin. That’s long enough. We want out. Now.”

  “Then go.” She nodded to the far horizon. “You to your tube, and Moon to his. I assume you have the escape sequence.”

  “You know we don’t. It’s the only shit you’ve been able to hide.”

  “Because of its risk factor.” Theo jumped in. “If the trigger mechanism to expand your consciousness beyond the Cartalingus fails, you could find yourself trapped in oblivion forever.”

  “Nah. Won’t happen. If I’m trapped, you’re trapped. You didn’t go to all this trouble to spend eternity inside a tube.”

  “No. Pia and I considered every eventuality before we entered your bodies.”

  Moon and Royal shared a what-did-I-tell-you glance.

  “Moon and I figured you played the long game. You knew we’d die over Hokkaido, and you knew the Overseers would set a trap if you stayed inside us. You win the all-time award for patience.”

  “We thought, apparently mistaken, that our students had learned the value of patience and perseverance. Now here you are in a rush to wage war.”

  “Cut the crap,” Moon said. “We want the escape sequence. You can join us for the fight, or you can hide in here and watch. Either way, we’re going. Today.”

  The Riders gazed at each other, no doubt communicating behind what they assumed was a protected barrier.

  “Ca-l’o mur-zun, it-e sauyn,” Royal told Moon without speaking.

  “Ez-i baq.”

  Moon agreed to allow the Riders a moment of privacy.

  Theo and Pia hugged. She sighed like a parent who surrendered to the whims of her children.

  “We will provide the escape sequence,” she said. “There are two caveats we wish you to consider. These are not new but they take on greater urgency now.”

  “What’s the first?” Royal said.

  “Once you initiate the escape sequence, you will no longer be human. Your consciousness will reshape you to the genetic level. You will become a new species, unique in the universe. It is irreversible. Though you may take any form, including human, there will never be others like you.”

  “Your point?”

  “Do not discard your humanity without careful consideration.”

  Royal didn’t appreciate the stall tactic.

  “Pia, I’ve never been a real human. I was engineered.”

  “I gave away my humanity in the corral,” Moon said.

  “Fair points, gentlemen, but the transition will be harder than you believe. Yes, you’ll have purpose during Prelude and until you render the Final Verdict. Afterward, you will be alone until the end of time.”

  “Not alone. Royal and I will have each other.”

  “Until you drive each other mad.”

  The new gods laughed; the old ones did not.

  “Second caveat?” Royal asked.

  “Long ago,” Theo said, “you demonstrated barbaric qualities in the corral. We chose you because only monsters of uncompromising ferocity can finish the task ahead.”

  “What’s the point?”

  “We’re not certain you remain as committed. The problem is simple. You love each other. Your friendship runs deep; roots that cannot be dug out. Where there is love, there is a capacity for mercy and compassion. Those qualities will sabotage your efforts. You will face relentless enemies with overwhelming numbers.”

  “We’ll kill every last motherfucker,” Moon said.

  “Bravado is your essence, Moon. You must take me seriously. Both of you. Think back to your final days outside the Origin. You were driven by generous emotions. You died, Moon, because you focused on your father and your siblings rather than the harder work of killing your enemy. You suppressed the darkness inside until it was too late. And Royal? You died because you mistakenly believed you needed to be a hero. This mission does not require a hero; it needs a butcher.”

  Moon drove the spear into Theo’s chest. He spit out blood but showed no concern. The wound sealed itself, and the shaft melted away, leaving only the point embedded.

  “You’re stalling, Theo. Royal and I know what we are. If anyone comes between us and the mission, we’ll kill them. We won’t have to think about it.”

  “Oh?” Pia licked her lips. “The woman you loved in Bessios. Her name was Addis.”

  “What about her?”

  “What if she resists when you return? Much time has passed. She might have had a change of heart about Prelude.”

  “I’ll take her head and move on. I never loved Addis.”

  “What of the other familiar faces? Friends? Allies?”

  “They fight for us or they die. No middle ground.”

  Royal pointed to Moon.

  “What he said.”

  “All the right words,” Theo replied. “The proper tone. As we have discussed before, billions of people will die for the greater Creation to be saved.”

  Moon shrugged. “Then billions it is. We want the sequence.”

  Pia rolled up her right sleeve.

  “I win,” she told Theo. “I said eighteen. You predicted twenty.”

  He crinkled a smile while rolling up a sleeve.

  “You’ll never let me live it down.”

  Their blasé attitude told Royal the entire conversation had been a grand bit of theater. They saw this day approaching from afar.

  The Riders’ forearms developed blotches which glowed and glided beneath their skin like fireflies. Royal no longer doubted whether they were being set free. Theo and Pia told them about the D’ru-shaya but refused to reveal it until the hour of graduation.

  The Creators communicated through the D’ru-shaya. It allowed them to speak to each other across light-years or beyond the divides. They used it to navigate the land and the stars.

  Now, they shared it with the newly minted gods.

  Royal wrapped a hand over Theo’s exposed skin and watched the yellow flickers transition to a new consciousness. They brought the warmth of a midday sun. Royal’s vision intensified, as if he’d been set free from a life viewing the universe behind cataracts.

  He saw new colors and new layers to existence. Even here, in this projection deep within the Cartalingus, an invisible universe arose. Phosphorescent creatures drifted aimlessly in countless numbers like those at the bottom of the deepest ocean.

  Royal didn’t have to ask. He knew what this was.

  Am-zul ke.

  The true universe.

  The one that existed before the Creators built a new reality on top, held together by the Origin and The Hold.

  Now he understood why Theo and Pia waited until the last hour to deliver this gift. The escape sequence wasn’t their primary concern.

  “The whole human race is blind,” Royal said. “Gods are the only ones who can see.”

  Theo smiled. “It’s a treasure we never wanted to share with the lesser species. Humans seek truth to add clarity to their lives. Yet they have no idea the forbidden truth exists all around them.”

  “If you succeed,” Pia said, “this truth will become their truth. Allowing billions of blind eyes to see for the first time is both beautiful and terrifying. The adjustment will be difficult.”

  “What it will do is make people piss their pants.”

  “For a short time, perhaps. The lifeforms you see now will vanish momentarily. The lasting effect will be an awareness of the larger fabric. A more precise kinship to time. Heightened senses. Human evolution will accelerate.”

  “What’s that gonna look like?”

  “Barring devastation from future wars or natural cataclysm, we expect human intellect and productivity to increase tenfold in the first century. Afterward, growth will be exponential.”

  Moon interjected.

  “That’s why you created a new reality. You didn’t want the lesser species to challenge your dominance.”

  “It was part of the rational. Yes.”

  Moon curled his fingers playfully, watching the D’ru-shaya swim through them.

  “If we kill your people and save the universe, humans are gonna replace you someday.”

  “They’ll have the opportunity, but it will take thousands of years. By then, no memory of my people will remain, except in you. Assuming, of course, you succeed. There are no guarantees.”

  “Moon and I are damn well about as close to a safe bet as you’ll ever see. Right, partner?”

  “You and me forever. Let’s go to work.”

  The phosphorescent lifeforms vanished, but colors appeared more vivid. Royal heard the escape sequence play a song in the background and saw what would happen to his physical body the moment he triggered the sequence.

  “Any last words?” He asked the Riders.

  “Last implies an ending,” Theo said. “We won’t be able to help out there, but you’ve known that from the beginning. We will watch in silence while you kill our people for the greater good. We’ll compare notes from time to time. If you’re the merciless monsters we chose you to become, we’ll speak at the end of Prelude. If you’re not, you’ll be dead long before then, and the universe will follow.”

  Royal grabbed Moon’s hand, and they stepped away from the Riders. The D’ru-shaya circulated between them. They sang to the escape sequence in Quesh-n’o, telling it to activate.

  S’tov z-arq ut dra’s-cor, Royal sang.

  “I give up my body and take a new one.”

  Minutes later, the man once known as Ryllen Jee opened his eyes inside a stasis tube. He stared out upon a dark chamber deep within The Fortress of Bessios.

  His anatomy shapeshifted. New flesh for a new creature.

  Better than human.