Symphony Book 3: Edited Chapters 25-28

Chapter 25: Testing

Walker looked over his recent gains. 

It would be easy to say that everything he'd just received impressed him, but that wouldn’t be true. Mainly because its reception went against what he’d told the Founders time and again.

Rewards should be earned.

But he'd take them, and he'd take on even more if he could find a way, because he wasn’t using what he received on himself. These rewards were just another step on the path toward the singular goal he had in mind. 

Create a world filled with wonder. 

Besides, in the long run, his gains were only a piece of what was needed to succeed. A hundred of them could drop in his lap right now, but it wouldn’t satisfy the necessary systems required for his Founders, nor fill in the gap of power between the sapients and monsters. Those were things only he could do.

Within an hour of his time, he'd just about doubled his active abilities. A cursory scan of each filtered the information into his memory, where he found a peculiar trend.

When he had added each strand back to his resources, he’d done it in a specific order, moving from Cosmic to Cyclical, Energy, and Exotic. Looking again, Walker realized the rewards also appeared to follow that order. This meant they hinted at what he could do with each strand if he reasoned them out correctly. Specifically, with Dimensionality giving him an upgrade to the Pocket Dimension ability.

The upgrade added not only Life strands to the mix but also increased the size of any new dimension created. In particular, the ability stated it could now hold non-sapient living beings.

If Walker was honest with himself, that pissed him off a little bit. He’d gone through a lot of effort to ensure Mac was set up and given access to organic material. And here the system was, giving that same access to his ability without a care.

It made him very angry, and he regarded it as a bad move.

However, something else occurred to him at that moment. Something to do with the Vaults he’d sold to the council. The Pocket Dimension ability had never said it could be upgraded. Scratching his chin while he continued to think, he started to ramble out loud, knowing that it would help him reason through a particularly difficult thought.

“If the Council doesn't have an upgraded ability for Pocket Dimensions, then that means they don’t know that these can upgrade. Right? And if they don’t know that these can be upgraded, they likely haven’t seen them before. Unless they’re fucking around with me.” Walker looked up, but the view was the same as everywhere else around him. 

It was space.

He shook his head, “Nope, so they haven’t seen them before. There likely aren’t even records of them either.” A few more dots connected in his mind, “That means that the upgrades are entirely unique. So that leads me to this, where the fuck are the upgrades coming from, and who, in fact, made them?”

That was the million-note question. If systems were built by people, inhabiting and modifying universal souls, and the council had no control over the ability upgrade, as they didn’t even know it was happening, then something funky was going on. Walker looked into the ability again, but even with darkness covering his eyes, he didn’t see anything written down by the former administrator.

Shaking his head at the thought, he looked at the rest of the rewards. Drawing lines in his mind, he found the Cyclical category, specifically Life, Death, and Karma, gave him the now-defunct upgrade to increased evolutions in his beings, as well as two evolutions he wasn’t sure he’d ever use.  

Kinetic gave the Shield ability, and Potential Energy halved his magical resource requirements. That could be problematic as it affected not just him, but also the entire solar system he was creating. It meant his Founders would have an easier time creating items with the Territory system.

“Is that a good thing?” he asked himself. Pausing to think it through for a few minutes, Walker shrugged and figured there wasn’t much he could do about it except maybe apply a magical tax. 

Infuse was tied to the purple bar of Essence, which was interesting, although he had no idea how the strand really worked.

Consciousness was connected to the Multimind evolution, and it really stood out to him. It modified the mental capacity of any entity to allow for simultaneous thoughts. He almost wished he were a creature of Symphony, just so he could test out some of the evolutions on himself.

Walker pulled up the description of the Null Field ability.

Ability: Null Field

The Creator gains the ability to establish an expanding field that disallows the use of other Strands. Nullification resources are required for initial creation and continued use.

Restriction: Primordial energy cannot be nullified.

“That makes sense. If all strands are just pieces of Primordial energy, then that same energy’s ability to negate or ignore the Nullification strand is purely logical.”

After all, the multiverses were made of Primordial energy. If Nullification could effectively delete it, the universe would cease to exist every time he used it. This also caused him to think of another scenario.

His overlay.

What exactly was it? An interdimensional storage device? How was he able to pull strands directly out of it at all? 

Primordial energy was the only answer for what it was made of; otherwise, pulling Nullification out would destroy it as he’d just learned. So some things, similar to a few of the systems he’d seen in the designer, used Primordial energy to run.

Walker pulled up the last ability he’d received.

Ability: Prediction

The Creator can see potential outcomes based on predictive fields. Uses a small amount of Causality resources for activation. Can be extended for longer periods of time at the cost of greater resources.

Strands were tools, no doubt about it. Magical tools, but tools nonetheless. And he didn’t like this one.

He was not a god, and he had no intention of falling back on the issues he’d seen in his brief time with Kwaya. He didn’t want to lose his morality. It was a slippery slope to start trying to affect the future. It didn’t mean there wasn’t any potential to the Strand, only that he was very hesitant to use it.

For now, he chose not to use Causality until he had a better understanding of everything. After all, there were tons of different combinations to look forward to. Not using one wouldn’t get him killed. As for burning through all of his resources during this exploratory adventure he’d put himself on, all he had to do was combine the different strands, and voila, he’d get paid. 

But first, he needed to complete what he'd come out here to do.

Symphony needed a new form of AI. Something that hadn’t been seen before. And he couldn't let the Protocol know about it.

Walker reached into his resources and palmed the Dimensional strand again, only using a few as he wasn't sure what would happen. He didn't want to cause a collapse of cosmic proportions by just throwing energy into space. There were no guarantees he'd survive, after all.

Transferring it to his left hand, he palmed space in his right, then mentally steeled himself. Slowly, ever so slowly, he collapsed his hands together, applying an extra drop of darkness while he did so.

They merged smoothly, and Walker unconsciously squinted his eyes against the possibility of another explosion just before opening his palms.

A blue floating hexagon sat in the center of his hands. Unlike the transparency of a pure Dimensional strand, when mixed with space, it had become completely opaque. Walker watched as a small haze of color drifted off his creation, floating out before dissipating.

He considered what he should do with it. If he detached it from his darkness-covered hands, should he throw it in case it exploded? Or, even as solid as it seemed, should he try to rub it across his body like most of the other strands he’d worked with?

Safety came foremost in his mind, which told him to throw it out and have a little faith in his survival. Cradling it gently in his right hand, Walker pitched back his arm before lightly lobbing it forward.

The blue hexagon floated out to the reaches of space, then slowed down before coming to a full stop. A moment later, a tiny explosion occurred, and a large black door shaped like a hexagon opened before him.

Walker waited for a full minute just to make sure nothing else occurred before gently pushing himself toward the gate in space.

Taking a breath from his personal vault, he looked at the result, not quite believing what he was seeing.

Sonata sat on the other side.

“What the fuck?” He said as the small greenish planet continued its merry way within the protocol. “So, it makes portals, or mirrors? Maybe a monitor?”

He’d bet his bottom dollar that it was making portals, and that’s how they worked when the Evolvers used Primordial energy. The waste they must have accrued in using pure Primordial energy must have been terrible.

Walker watched as the combination fizzled out after five minutes, matching the number of Dimensional resources he’d placed into it. He decided to test things to better understand them.

The Creator started by adding one resource of Space to four Dimensional, and noticed that while it looked the same overall, its size was much smaller upon expansion. It was now just large enough for a single hand to fit through, and popped after four minutes.

“So, the more space I add, the larger it gets, while the more Dimensional strands I add, the longer its uptime. But how does it know what minutes are? If minutes were one hundred seconds rather than the Earth’s standard, would it exist for longer? Is it subjective?”

More questions with no one to provide the answers but himself.

Needing his free rewards, Walker gathered the Dimensional and Space strands together again. After a powerful amount of effort, it slid into his overlay.

Congratulations Dante!

As the first to discover a new strand, any future combinations, per your agreement with the Alpha Protocol Council, will automatically be siphoned to your resources.

Would you like to name your discovery?

Yes/No

He clicked yes and thought about it for a moment. Then, went with the obvious answer.

The Translocation strand is named.

...

...Analyzing...

Due to your discovery, future use of the Pocket Dimension ability will be free.

You've been granted a bonus reward for your finding!

- - -

Reward for discovering a non-standard use of Translocation energy:

Congratulations Dante! You've been granted bonus resources!

Your Teleportation ability has upgraded!

1000 Primordial resources.

An amount of equal value in Translocation resources.

That was a nice set of circumstances for him. Looking at his rewards, Walker did the same thing he’d done with the Pocket Dimension ability; he compared the Teleportation ability's original description with the new one. Not much had changed, except for one line.

Universal teleportation restriction is lifted for:

Creator Dante only.

Was that an escape hatch?

“Did the fuckers attempt to give me a way home?”

The ramifications of that were interesting. He’d first seen the ability when they received the reward options for making the Primordial Collider. He hadn’t taken it, as Life-giver and Pocket Dimension had just seemed better. Now, in hindsight, he hadn’t used Life-giver once, while being able to teleport would have been much nicer to have in multiple moments. 

“Interesting,” He said while scratching his chin in thought. He considered opening another portal for Earth, but decided not to. The temptation to hop over set off alarm bells in his mind. 

The moment he stepped down would likely alert the council of what he’d done, and to their knowledge, he hadn’t received the Teleportation ability. Plus, there was a chance that the system wouldn’t work there in the first place. No, it was better not to tempt fate.

Recognizing that he’d chosen not to return to the Earth further reinforced his resolve to do well in the protocol. His Founders, Assistants, and Primigenials were all relying on him, not to mention his Monsters. He’d made a choice to stay here, and that’s what he would do.

It also made him think that when, not if, he completed the protocol. He promised himself that he’d look in on his home planet to see about helping them out, feeling his Icon heat up at the thought.

For testing, Walker threw another gate out and waited for the image to coalesce into a location he guessed was only a few miles away. A moment later, he walked up to it and, with a slight push of force, threw himself through.

The next moment was a haze of pain and screaming. Everything in his body felt pulled, stretched, and pushed back in simultaneously. It was as if a god had decided to shrink and expand his body all at once. In a smoky thought, he knew his body was trying to heal him through it, as he felt ligaments tear and then repair themselves moments later.

After what felt like a thousand years of torture, Walker felt the coolness of space settle around him. He tried to breathe but remembered where he was. Pulling the Continuum strand directly from his resources, Walker quickly expanded a secondary temporal field around his location, taking a desperate breath from his vault immediately after.

It was hard to do as he continued to spit out large globs of hardened blood, but eventually, his body started to calm down. Looking at himself to inspect for any further damage, he noticed that he was fully nude. Again, his clothes hadn’t made the trip that his body had.

It was disconcerting to constantly be bare-ass in the universe.

Through the pain, he continually felt his body attempting to heal itself. It wasn’t as fast as some comic book characters he’d always loved and cherished, but it was still visibly quick as bruises appeared, only to fade away after a few minutes.

Once he felt a little better, he looked around.

The portal had already disappeared, leaving him here. Walker breathed a sigh of relief as he felt his right shoulder reconnect, dislocated in his travel through the portal. He wondered why he had received so much damage all at once.

Remembering his first evaluation of the Portal system, he recalled that Time, or the Temporal strand, was one of the limiting factors.

“But I was covered in time?” He said to himself quietly.

It made him think that applying the effects of the Strands to himself and to the area were two different things. Looking at the darkness covering his hands made him think that his Origin was the likely cause.

He didn’t know what his Origin's effects were on strands. Plus, wasn’t it a strand by itself? Something that the Evolvers just didn’t, or couldn’t, identify? 

More questions.

As his body shifted into a good enough state that he felt he could get back to his experimenting, he looked at the next ability he wanted to test: Null Field. Since it used Nullification as its base strand, it should be something sparkly and spectacular to watch. He spit out one last gob of hardened blood, watching it float in space for a moment, then clicked on the ability in his overlay.

Immediately, a menu option appeared.

Null Field activated.

Designate the amount of resources to be used.

He had no idea how many were necessary, so he took a guess and used twenty.

Twenty resources selected.

Designated radius is set to 2,000 miles.

Activating

“Umm,” Walker said, wondering if 2,000 miles would reach Sonata.

He didn’t have time to consider it as a burst of sparks erupted in a rapidly expanding sphere. Eyes wide, Walker watched as it quickly grew out of sight, taking away all of his Continuum and Temporal resources at once.

Quickly re-establishing the field, Walker stared at the fast-fading sparkles with a grin. If anyone ever tried to attack him with strands, he knew just what to do now. 

Trying another ability, Walker clicked on Teleport and went back to his original location before his Translocation test. 

It was time to really go all out in his experiments.

Chapter 26: The Art of the Possible

Teleporting felt just like when the Alpha Protocol translocated him. One moment he was there, the next, he was somewhere else. A notification struck him the moment he faded back in.

Teleportation use complete

You may teleport again in one hour.

Feeling the muscles in his face starting to smile, they stuttered and paused as a thought struck him. “Fucker, that’s an hour in protocol standard time, isn’t it?”

Nobody answered him as Walker rubbed a hand through his hair in frustration. 

“You know what? It’s fine. It’s fine.” He took a deep breath and noticed the space around him was missing the glow of Continuum. It took him a moment to understand that the Null Field had reached this far, so with a few quick moves, he reactivated it. 

“I could use a portal out there.” 

If he had a portal for his experimentation area, then not having access to Teleportation wouldn’t matter as much, plus, he hadn’t looked at it since he’d received his previous rewards. Clicking on the portal system, new options appeared. He clicked on the first one that stated members.

Please select any creatures you would like to be able to access the portal system. You may also create a schema of allowed members from other systems.

That told him he could now give people specific access to the Portals, and he would no longer have to work at it directly from each individual gate.

“What a welcome improvement,” he said with a smile.

The second section was a little different. The word network was written on it; if he was honest with himself, it made him a little nervous. What if, after clicking it, people could travel to any of his portals? What if the entire Multiverse came knocking at his door?

But no. No. If they came, he could fight. Better than that, Symphony could fight, or it would be able to soon. He had magic and a loose control of time and space. 

Walker was no longer interested in shying away from things; after all, most of his biggest improvements had come from happy little accidents.

Bolstering his resolve, he clicked on it, causing a node grid and a series of writing to appear in front of him.

Congratulations on unlocking the Portal network, Creator Dante!

…Analyzing…

…

Congratulations Creator Dante! As the sole individual to unlock the Portal Network, you have achieved mastery-level control over all portals within your universe. Due to your achievement, you can now access the entire portal infrastructure available within the system.

Now unlocking all standard-level portals for your perusal.

“What?” was all he could say before the nodes started to fill in with writing.

Initially, it just stated simple things that didn’t mean much to him. Small letters and numbers like 4AA1 and 4AA2. But then, the clumping of nodes stopped, and a new series sprang up beside it. 

The more the nodes populated, the more specific and informative they became. 3EF84 and 3EE105 turned into the Glaxton Hotel and the Fun Zone. Training Planet4 and We Sell Por-

“What the fuck?” Walker said at that last one. He had stopped reading it as he realized what it would say.

“So, wait. Wait…” He slapped a hand against his head to push the idea out of it. He didn’t need to see Multiversal pornography. Especially not that he now had the entirety of the Multiverse’s portals at the tips of his fingers. Scanning through the further node-sheets that populated, he didn’t find Earth. Most held the simple alpha-numeric system, but some few that glowed a little brighter had specific names.

Looking over at an empty spot in space, Walker created a portal, renaming it to “Walker Only: Keep Out or Die.” He was pretty sure it wouldn’t go anywhere, but in the fourth Rendition, who knew what might happen?

Then, another idea came unbidden. He hadn’t done it in a while but was curious about what would happen.

Walker pulled up the System Linking ability and selected the fourth option.

Option four selected: Sacrifice one of the Creator's abilities to empower a system

What ability would you like to sacrifice?

Teleportation ability selected.

What system would you like to empower?

The Portal system selected.

…Analyzing…

Preview provided:

Teleport ability definition: Grants the Creator the ability to Teleport anything from one location to another. May be used on organics or non-organics without the threat of harm. Space resources are required when not using a portal gate.

Empowerment for the entity subsystem: The Creator can create temporary portals in any location without a cooldown.

Note: Due to Creator Dante’s multiple upgrades, temporary portals will have no restrictions on where they may be placed, and all resource costs, with the exception of an increase in size, are funded by the system in their entirety.

Would you like to sacrifice the Teleport ability to empower the Portal system?

Yes/No

Walker inched his finger down and definitively hit yes, feeling a strong pull of ecstasy that his idea had paid off. Pulling up his ability chart, he watched Teleport fade into the blue screen he was so used to seeing now.

Although he had just created an unnecessary portal, he figured it was within reason not to show the entirety of the protocol that he could create instant portals when he wanted them.

Smiling, Walker got back to business. It was time to add Dimensional and Temporal strands together. Pun intended.

Walker palmed the two and gently combined them between his hands. Looking down, he found a small, mostly transparent pentagon floating off his skin. Unlike when he’d added Space to the Dimensional strand, it seemed more flimsy this time, as if it was barely holding itself together.

Feeling a bit of wisdom poking through, Walker took the strand and pressed it into his overlay.

Congratulations Dante!

As the first to discover a new strand, any future combinations, per your agreement with the Alpha Protocol Council, will automatically be siphoned to your resources.

Would you like to name your discovery?

Yes/No

Walker selected no for the first time.

Strand will remain unnamed until you make a decision.

...

...Analyzing...

…

Adapting future rewards based on new findings…

…

Congratulations Dante!

Due to your discovery, You’ve unlocked the Bounty system.

You've been granted a bonus reward for your finding!

- - -

Reward for discovering a non-standard use of unnamed strand energy:

Congratulations Dante! You've been granted bonus resources!

You’ve gained the Hologram ability!

1000 Primordial resources.

An amount of equal value in unnamed strand resources.

“Okay, so...,” Walker scratched his chin while thinking. Again, he gained resources that he was certain the Evolvers had no access to, further deepening the mysteries of his experimentation.

Knowing the strand has a tendency to relate to the rewards gained, Walker clicked on the Bounty system to see how it worked. That’s when a strange set of writing appeared. It took his translator quite a bit of time to understand how the series of intersecting lines worked.

…Analyzing…

…

…Analyzing…

...

Language located: Frayish: Pre-Origin

Adapting use…

…Translating…

- - -

Hello Creator Dante, and welcome to the Bounty system!

The Bounty system is designed to reward aspiring heroes for eliminating dangerous threats affecting their world.

As each threat is eliminated, there is a pre-designed chance that items may drop.

Each creator is responsible for creating and populating said items, although some models have been provided.

Please peruse the manual when you have a moment.

“Pre-Origin?” Walker said with a questioning tone, “What the fuck does that mean? Wait a minute…” He looked through the notification a second time, but it was no mistake. “This is a fucking loot system.”

Chapter 27: Reflections

As he calmed down from the sudden arrival of the Bounty system, he took a second look at its notes. Just the word Pre-Origin had huge ramifications, as it ran against everything he’d been told thus far.

According to the multiverse, everything had begun...in the beginning. Even the name Origin implied that this is where the Multiverse's historic timeline began. For there to be a time before the beginning implied that there was much more than meets the eye regarding how the Multiverse works, or that, as always, the Evolvers were full of shit.

Thinking about it, he mentally scraped together a timeline of the multiverse. Rather than working back to front, he started with what he knew best, meaning his own rendition.

Walker and his people existed in Rendition Four. Virgil had said that each rendition was built on a subset of advanced systems developed by the Evolvers. Each rendition wouldn’t come to an end until after a unique discovery was achieved by one of its Creators. Something that would completely change the game, as it were. 

Something huge.

At one point, Virgil had also said that it was likely rendition 4AA would be the only one, as Walker's discoveries had completely changed how the Evolvers would manage the protocol moving forward.

Thus, rendition Five, or 5AA to be precise, would be nothing like his current one. To a small degree, he was curious as to why the Evolvers didn't just stop his rendition and move on to the next. But then again, Walker was their golden goose. They couldn't toss him until everything had run its course. The more discoveries he made, the better the fifth rendition would likely turn out.

The third rendition had ended when a Creator discovered uses for the Temporal strand, although he still didn't know how that had been done. After discovering said strand, the Evolvers found a way to harness it and empower the Creators of the fourth rendition, thereby creating the Temporal subsystem. 

Walker still remembered Virgil telling him, after he'd made the mistake of creating dimensional portals all over Romulus, that some of the tasks had been traps. Now that he'd gained some experience and knowledge of how everything worked, he realized why the Council had done so.

"They don't know what the fuck they're doing."

By giving specific tasks regarding temporal resources, Creators across the rendition would find different ways of using the strand. Ways that they themselves couldn't, or wouldn't, discover on their own. They didn't know how the strand worked and thus only gave tasks to the Creators of the fourth rendition so they could discover it for them—farming out the responsibility to those who didn't know any better. 

Who cares if those same Creators unintentionally destroyed themselves or all of their hard work. The ideas they followed through on, the ones that worked that is, would inform the council of how to work the strand themselves.

"Guinea pigs," He said with a sneer. That's all they were to them.

While yes, the council had given him some rewards that greatly helped down the line, the idea that he was being used so harshly for the benefit of others didn't sit right. What if he'd been a happy family man with four kids when they'd taken him? How would he have felt being pushed into all of this if he hadn't just imploded his life?

He didn't know how Creators were selected, only that a "future image" of someone was used, whatever that meant, and even that had issues. Whenever he thought about Mr. Harrison's staff and the status of Earth, a weight settled on him. 

It made Walker consider that when all of this was over, he could somehow return and help his homeworld. After all, what was the point of all this power if he didn't use it when it was needed?

Moving back to the protocol's timeline, he considered the second Rendition. He knew that the rendition sequence had only ended when the Assistants were designed and developed. This allowed the Evolvers to stop focusing so much on only those few geniuses who could part and parcel worldbuilding together from limited information and power.

At the beginning of his work here, Virgil had done much more for Symphony than himself. But, intelligence only gets you so far. You also needed to be foolhardy enough to push the envelope.

By including those of a quote, less intelligent model, the Evolvers gained further innovation from the losers and rejects of the multiverse. Those people had to scrap and work for success within the Alpha Protocol rather than instantly knowing all of the right moves.

Naturally, Walker was a member of the failure cadre. Of course, he may also be the only Creator who was stupid enough to test out all the features of the Temporal Subsystem. That meant, to some degree, the Evolvers were right to include lower-caste members of the multiverse in their plans. But, by being just dumb enough to push forward with his time-play, while also not destroying his solar system, he'd gained access to not one but two abilities. 

The System-linker, and the System-splitter ability he still hadn't tested out yet.

"Plans on Plans," He mumbled to himself as he pulled up the ability in his overlay. He hadn't seen it since first receiving it and was curious about what they'd written in the description after all of this time.

Ability: System Splitter

The system splitter ability is unique within the Alpha Protocol. By selecting a system, you can choose to bifurcate, or split, it's many properties into independent though connected systems.

Restriction: Not all systems can be split.

Upgradeable

That still didn't tell him hardly anything. He distantly wondered if the Council had chosen to give the ability to any other Creators. Walker recalled that when first receiving the ability, it was labeled experimental.

Of course, they'd only created it after he'd asked Virgil to look into it, but how did they do so when they weren't system administrators themselves? He had to assume that somewhere in the Center was someone or something with the toolkit for doing so. A lesser System Administrator than Kwaya. 

But, that meant another Awakened. One who could play with the Universe's very soul; the overarching system.

Shaking his head at the thought, Walker considered the first rendition. This was the one he had almost no information about. He could make suppositions, but it wouldn't get him far.

He just knew that everything within the renditions before Walker's time must have been discovered using pure Primordial energy. That would have been dangerous as all hell, making him think that many Creators had died during the experiments.

The number of Creators that were sacrificed must have been pure madness.

Walker collated all his thoughts back to the timeline. Before the Evolver’s multiverse started, there was a place called the Origin, which was also the name of his empowered soul material…Which may or may not be another strand.

A mocking smile worked its way across his face, "Fucking unoriginal." It made sense that the Evolvers would use the same name for multiple things. After all, they didn't even have the creativity to figure out how strands worked, so why would they be daring enough to use multiple names?

The Origin, the location that is, was the basis for all of their wars. Memories filtered in from Kwaya's journey. The underwater world, the strange constantly passing seasons, and the odd way they would capture cities and towns using the system. 

Since the Evolvers didn't understand systems in the slightest and they predated the Awakened, that told him there was certainly something that came before. And apparently, his notification told him the same. Walker pulled it back up again.

Language located: Frayish: Pre-Origin

"So, there was a time before."

That implied the Origin wasn't actually the Origin at all. Plus, what was that tower he'd seen? Walker tried to pull up the memory, but it was fuzzy for some reason. It was as if something was messing with his mind, which was impossible as he understood it.

As always, there was more to learn. He didn't want to suffer the hubris of thinking he knew everything, but still, he thought he was starting to get a handle on things and better grasp the way everything worked.

"Apparently not."

Still, this exercise helped him reason out the Evolver's plans. They wanted to get back into power, back into the Origin. That was the ultimate goal of all of the renditions.

A seat at the table.

And so far, he had greatly helped them along. He knew that needed to stop, but he wasn't sure how to do so without fucking over his own plans.

The stronger he and his people got, the more the Evolvers would siphon away that strength. When looked at with a clear lens, the protocol was a large parasite draining from the geniuses formed across their multiverse, not unlike their other parasite, the Godeater program.

He had an idea of how to start working around what they were doing, but it involved strands and taking big risks—dangerous risks. With that thought in mind, he stopped stalling and focused on what he needed to do.

Palming the Dimensional strand in his right hand, he transferred it over and placed five Temporal resources in the palm of his hand. Gently combining them, Walker took the plunge and rubbed it across his body, much like he’d normally do when simply holding Time.

A gentle ripping sound came from all around him, and the next thing he knew, he was looking at a mirror reflection of himself. Walker tilted his head as he looked, with the reflection doing the same thing. Only…

It tilted the wrong way.

“I see,” the voice of his doppelganger said, Walker eerily hearing himself speaking only ten feet away, “I’m a reflection of you.”

The Creator scratched the back of his head, “Aren’t you a little freaked out?” He felt it was a legitimate question. After all, he knew he was.

He watched his own head shake back and forth, “No. I don’t know why, but I know I’m not the original.” Walker watched a smile break out on his own face, “You’re wondering how many of your memories I have. All of them, bud.”

“I’m not your buddy pal,” Walker said, testing out the doppelganger's words.

“I’m not your pal, friend,” Other Walker said with a second smile.

“Alright, cool.” Original Walker nodded, his reflection doing the same, both with an understanding that the now classic joke was enough to know he did in fact have his memories.

“Soo…”

“Soo…”

“Yeah, we need to name these.” Original Walker said with a grimace, watching the same expression cross his doppelganger’s face.

“I’d prefer the word you, rather than these,” the reflection huffed. Looking at the sky momentarily, he appeared to enter a moment of deep thought. 

Walker looked at him, wondering if he looked quite as stupid when doing the same. A moment later, the reflection said, “Middle name?”

“As a name for you? Yeah, that could work. But how do we know you’re the only reflection I can make?”

“Valid. Numbers are boring, plus we already did that to the Founders once upon a time.”

“True,” Original Walker said with a nod. “Hrmm, what about-” But before he could finish speaking, the other Walker disappeared with a puff of air.

Walker looked around, wondering where he’d gone, then realized what that meant when he couldn’t find him. He took a moment to think about it.

“The Temporal strand,” He said as the reason why dawned on him. He’d a small amount of resources to create the reflection Walker. Scratching his chin, Walker created another reflection with the name David stuck in his mind.

With a rip, his reflection looked at him and spoke up immediately, “Around five minutes, right?”

“Yep, and David.” Walker confirming the new name. "Do you feel any different knowing you’ll go pop in that time?”

The reflection smiled and shrugged, “I’m you, man. The moment I go wherever I’m going, it’s not gonna to matter to me much anyways.”

“Fair,” Walker said with a nod, as that’s the same thought he would've had in that situation.

David clapped his hands together, “Okay, so let's go through what we were thinking.”

Quickly, they got down to testing out the strand.

David reached out, and Walker grabbed his hand, the physicality test a success. He definitely felt something, but it was strange. He felt…less. Thin. Like David wasn’t fully in here. His hand felt pressure from David’s, but it was still odd.

Moving to the force test, Walker stuck his ass out, and David kicked it. Sure, there were easier ways to test force, but who else could say they kicked their own ass? He’d felt pressure, but it was a light pressure. Like someone gently pushed him rather than the big wind-up and push-through David had just attempted.

“So, not the same strength.”

David shook his head, “Not at all. It means we can’t really make clones and just throw them into fights.”

Walker nodded, “Yep. Okay, Soul test. Give it a shot.”

David took a few steps away and then tried to activate his Icon. After a few moments, his face turned a little red, but nothing else occurred.

“Alright, so that’s a negative on soul. Hrmm,” Walker scratched his chin. “If adding Temporal gave more time, what would adding Dimensional do?”

David scratched his chin, “Won’t know till you try.”

Walker combined ten Dimensional strands with five Temporal and smothered it over. Looking at David to see if he disappeared after making another reflection, he nodded when nothing happened. David nodded back. Then, the third reflection nodded to both of them.

“So, we can have more than one.”

“Yep.”

“Yep.”

Original Walker smiled, “Yep. Now, kick my ass.”

Chapter 28: Trinity

“Ten more minutes.”

“I thought you had fifteen.”

“Fuck off, David3.”

“I’ll be the bad guy, and point out-” David2 said before disappearing with a pop.

“Focus, Guys!” Walker was forced to yell. “Think. Why do you all have the same Temporal distortion as myself.”

David4 looked at David3, shaking his head.

David5 continued to float in the middle of space, scratching his chin.

After a moment, David1 raised a finger in the air, “Maybe whatever strands are applied to you also apply to us. At least when you make us.”

Walker nodded, “That’s true. I mean, I already have a Temporal on me. Maybe that’s leaking into the Reflection strand before I pop you all into existence.”

David3 scratched his chin, “But that’s a tricky issue. If you cover yourself in flames and pop one of us out, does that mean we’ll all be covered in flames? Or will we just be really hot?”

David2 looked over at him, “Don’t be so down on yourself, three. You’re already pretty hot to me.”

“God damn it,” David3 said while shaking his head, “We’re really bad at focusing on one thing at a time.”

A few of the Davids lightly slapped themselves while Walker just shook his head.

“I think, unless you really need this many of us, you should stick to just one at a time,” David1 said with a shrug.

“Yeah, we’re not the best at controlling ourselves,” David3 said with a shrug.

Walker nodded, “I agree. What are your time limits.”

Each of them gave an estimate. Three of them would disappear in the next few minutes, while David5 would last another hour. Walker had been testing if adding extra Dimensional resources would enhance the time limit of the Temporal strand, and so far, that didn’t seem to be the case. 

After the original David2 had punted Walker deep into space, they'd learned that extra Dimensional resources increased their physical presence to a high degree, and that they could exist with only a single resource of it, even if they appeared almost transparent in their grounding to reality.

“Should we combine the three strands together?” David1 said while looking around.

“I mean, it’s the next logical step,” Walker said, although he was nervous to do so. Using the Dimensional strand by itself had caused an explosion of strangeness. Who knew what combining the three strands together might do?

“That is why we’re out here,” David3 said while looking at the others. “We’re not likely to destroy anything, at least.”

“True,” David1 said.

“True,” Walker echoed, scratching the back of his neck. They talked for a few more minutes before each of the Davids poofed back to wherever they went, and then he looked over at David5, the last remaining reflection. “So, what do you think? Is it time to combine a triple?”

David5 nodded, “May as well. Although triple is a bad name.”

Walker snorted, “Then you make up a name for it.” He smiled when David made a face, completely understanding what went through his mind. “Okay, so we’ll start out nice and easy.”

Walker put the Space strand in his hand and gently combined it with Temporal, taking a little more time than necessary. The wispy, ethereal Continuum strand floated just off of his left palm, gently drifting above the darkness of his soul. Looking at David one last time, Walker placed the Dimensional strand in his right hand. Before he could make another move, the strand immediately left his palm and joined its brothers in his left. 

There wasn’t a thunder, nor a crack, nor a pop as Temporal, Dimensional, and Spatial strands connected to one another. Instead, there was a quiet shimmer just to his left as time and space disconnected from each other. 

With their sibling, the three strands lifted up, floating on their own in the darkness of space, gently circling one another.

A pulse resonated from the convergence point as a white light began to take shape toward the center of the spiraling strands. Time slowed even further than Walker’s two distortions allowed, each moment seeming to be caught in the grip of something greater than his eyes could see. The area twisted and flexed, creating a cascade of tiny colorful explosions as space seemed to push outward.

In what felt like an hour but couldn’t be more than a few seconds, the ethereal nature of Temporal energy began to slow while its brothers only picked up speed. With a gulp, the white center of the greater strand seemed to swallow it, taking on the qualities of time within itself.

A shattering noise not unlike the tinkling of broken glass rang out, as Time seemed to stop all around him for a moment before roughly releasing its grip. David and Walker looked at each other with big eyes, but didn’t have a moment to speak as the Space and Dimensional strands moved into a colorful blur as they circled the white center affected by Time.

The blue of Space was the next to head toward the center of the strand, plunging deep toward the middle and disappearing as elements of the Continuum strand showed themselves. A hazy blue and white ball appeared, seeming to sit for a moment as if thinking. Without warning, it then greatly expanded, taking itself to the edges of his eyesight and beyond. 

As the edges flew into the distance in a spherical arc, the center grew as well. Walker felt it brush up against him and David, almost shoving them out of the Temporal bubble. When it reached an unknown distance, everything crashed down in front of him, forming back into a small ball.

When his mind readjusted, he found that Dimensionality almost seemed like it didn’t want to join its fellows. A spiraling rainbow continued around the central strand, picking up speed as both the Creator and his reflection could hear the passing of its movement, a deep thrumming sound forcing itself into their ears. 

All at once, the spinning stopped, and rather than follow the other two toward the middle, the hazy blue and white orb moved to meet it.

No words were spoken by either of them as, for a fleeting moment, they glimpsed the vast universe within the small ball in front of them. The Dimensionality strand sat still while first Temporal pulled itself away from space, creating the Reflection strand he’d just grown used to. A moment later, Space settled on them both, seeming to be sucked into the convergence as if a man needing a deep breath of air after a long dive underwater.

Walker felt a powerful sense of Vertigo as the edges of the Dimensional strand popped, becoming as seemingly real as anything he’d seen before. The Temporal strand exited the center of the strange hexagon in front of him, pushing to the edges and looking like nothing less than a barely seen flame blowing in the wind.

When it was finally done, Walker’s vertigo continued as he looked at it. It felt like someone was ringing a bell in his mind, demanding his attention. He looked at David and found that while he felt as if the skin was dripping off his face, the reflection seemed unaffected in the slightest. 

Haltingly, he spoke, “Soooo, what do you think?”

“Fuck me, man,” David replied, running a hand through his hair, “I almost felt like it was going to blow me away there when Space joined in.”

Walker nodded, “Yeah, it was…awesome…” He couldn’t help but give a broad grin. “It was an interesting experience, to be sure. I-uhhhh.” Walker felt something pushing up from the bottom of his stomach. A moment later, bits of his stomach acid floated out into the darkness of space. He pulled out his Vault and took a few breaths, handing it to David, who was also running low on air.

“Sorry,” Walker said a bit sheepishly.

David replied by just waving a hand at him, “Meh, I’d obviously do the same.” He looked back at the triple strand, “What do you think we’ll get for this, reward-wise?”

Walker shrugged, “I don’t know, man. But I do know that that shit was crazy.”

“Such apt descriptions, Walker. You’re a genius with words,” David deadpanned back.

“Weird to call me Walker?”

“A bit, and I’d like to say I’ll get used to it, but..”

Walker nodded, then pushed himself toward the strand. While they’d been speaking, it hadn’t done anything, just continued to sit in the middle of space, waiting to be claimed.

Walker reached out gently, feeling the cramps in his stomach growing more powerful the closer he moved. Grasping the strand, he tried to pull it closer, but it wouldn’t budge. Attempting to move it felt akin to trying to move a planet. There simply was no point in trying.

Walker threw up a little bit in his mouth, the coppery taste giving him a warning. Flaring his darkness helped alleviate the symptoms a little, but it felt like a drop at the bottom of a very large bucket. That meant there was a time limit to this, and he didn’t know what would happen if he ran out at a pivotal moment.

Not knowing what would happen if he applied it to himself, which was certainly nothing a sane person would do, Walker started to stretch his neck towards it in an attempt to place the strand within his resources.

“What the fuck are you doing?” David yelled at him.

“We doing?” Walker said through strained teeth. The closer he moved his skull, the greater the vertigo that struck him. At this moment, he felt like everything was spinning around him, or he was spinning around everything; he couldn’t tell the difference.

“That’s not funny, asshole. If you die, that’s the end of everything! I don’t even think you should touch that thing.”

“Trinity!” Walker said in a brief moment of triumph, the strand only inches away from his face. He coughed out a plume of blood into space, drifts of red smoothly floating away from him.

“What?” David said back in confusion.

“These triple combos, man!” A particularly powerful cramp hit him, twisting his innards. “Trinity! I came up with the-”

The strand touched his overlay, and to say it was rebuffed would be a gross understatement. Walker felt like his skull had been slapped around for a few hours, but he felt something ever so slightly holding him from behind.

“I got you, man!” David yelled. “If you’re all in, so be it!”

Understanding what he was doing, Walker nodded and continued to attempt to force the Trinity strand into his overlay. Pushing a double strand was difficult, taking several minutes and a great helping of effort. But this…this was a whole different monster.

Time moved slowly, but Walker couldn’t pay attention to it. All he could focus on was the strand and his overlay. He’d been rebuffed repeatedly, but each time, it felt like some form of resistance was beginning to give.

On the fourth time he coughed out blood, he felt something slight give in his chest. Something he felt like he’d probably need to continue living. The only thing he could do for a chance at success was to continue on. With that thought in mind, he doubled down on the pressure.

David had, of course, been speaking gently the whole time. Positive things like:

You can do it!

Walker’s number one!

And a few naturally impolite jokes to get him not to think about how it felt when his organs were all turning inside out. His most recent one forced Walker to give him a red smile.

“What’s the difference between a G-spot and a golf ball? A man will actually search for a golf ball.”

“Good one,” Walker wheezed out, “Parson is fuckin funny.”

“Shit yeah.”

Several more minutes of bleary pain continued. David was commenting on how Walker had stated his hand felt like an overblended can of soup, when something changed. The resistance holding back the Trinity strand seemed to crack finally, and without almost any effort at all, Walker felt it slide into his overlay.

A series of notifications blasted into his vision, completely skipping his requirement that they only be shown when he wanted to see them. Still, before he could even look at what had rolled down his reward mountain, he found his vision taken over by the Origin’s system.

The Tower reappeared, forcing his mind to completely blank out upon seeing it. He felt no pain, no joy in this moment. All that was, was the tower. It was the only thing that mattered to him.

His vision pushed him toward the gargantuan structure. As he moved forward, he began to notice the coloring. From a distance, it looked black, but it was certainly gray upon growing closer. He couldn’t see a single joint or cut in it. It was one singular monstrosity rising from a pit of emptiness. 

Just as he was close enough to touch it, the red door opened a small crack.

The vision ended before he could look inside, and Walker felt a shiver ripple through his body. He mentally pushed himself back into the moment, trying to place the tower in the back of his mind. That’s when he noticed David gently shaking him.

“Walker! Snap out of it!”

“Huh, what?” Walker replied slowly, trying to collect himself.

David overenthusiastically patted him on the back enough that Walker had to ask him to stop.

“I’m alright; I just need some time.”

“Okay, buddy. So, what’d you get? Was it worth it?”

“What?” Walker asked, then remembered the rewards. He pulled them up and felt his mouth drop open.

“Well…fuck.”