The Shield, the cruise ship sporting giant outriggers that was the Balanghay House Boat of the Order of the Sun and Sky, hung on the flat sea like a bug stuck on a flypaper. It was still docked across Dakobalud resort in Tubo Island. It had not moved since the Battle of the Resort.

The avatars of the Order had gathered in Cafe Pahuway watching Tunga state TV News after their regular lunch. With them were Elam (the young recently Occurred Anachronista), Sukola (President of the ethno-linguistic and decentralist NGO Kaluwasan and now fugitive from Dumot avatars), Walay and Tala (DATA agents), and Lili (DATA agent and holder of the Sun and Sky Seal). The latter three were on reward leave by mandate of the Veiled Commission itself after helping expose Commissioner Lima as a Demon Empress; and they spent most of it in the Shield, Lili involuntarily since she had been grounded. Combat avatar Chef Luto and his Waiters had just served dessert. A nondescript broadcaster with green hair was reporting.

‘There still has not been any word from the World Defense Force as to the government of Alogostan’s request to the Veiled Commission for more Dumot avatars. To recap, a mere four days after the start of Order 999 against the Unitemple chapters of the Nations of Iladistan, Alogostan, Dalokistan, and Cephalia, in which our loyal government was the main participant, the WDF’s Dumot avatars with the aid of valiant Alogostani soldiers managed to liberate the whole of Iladistan from the oppression of the Unitemple. Thereafter, Hilistan and its traitorous coalition of central Antiguan Nations launched a massive troop invasion from the west not seen since WW 3. Not deigning to fight man to man, the Hilistani coalition overwhelmed the Dumots and our servicemen by their long distance cowardly artillery and air bombardment in the Western Iladistani plains. In particular, the coalition has been using new hypersonic missiles, thermobaric rocket artillery, and ten ton aircraft-dropped bombs nearly round the clock. Intelligence reports say that the Hilistanis aim to secure a path to the Iladistani energy-rich Trough Region in the north east.’

‘Subsequently, our government requested for more Dumots. WDF then officially released a statement that it has turned over the implementation of Order 999 to our intrepid government of Alogostan and all Nations that may want to ally with us, indicating their faith in our loyalty and capabilities. Consequently we have been given full control of the Dumots.’

Bantay (head of the Shield’s security) slammed a hand on the table, his huge shoulder muscles beneath a polo shirt rippling. Like most of the other guys, he wore cargo shorts and flip flops. ‘Bull! As a combat avatar in the Great Dark War, I’ve seen similar incidents. It’s double talk for, ‘Sorry there, stupid. You now have the war that you want. We’re not covering your back. You’re on your own.’’

‘Yeah, what the hell is wrong with the WDF?’ Tukib (spy avatar together with Tahum) asked rhetorically. ‘It’s almost like they want Alogostan to lose a war that’s officially theirs. The Hilistan coalition has taken both Dulonan and Linaw bases. Even Dumot avatars can’t withstand a week of round the clock carpet bombing and shelling. Preternatural strength and speed does not prevent you from getting blown up if a ten ton bomb lands near you.’

The TV broadcaster was continuing his scripted monologue.

‘Without new Dumots, the brilliant leader of Alogostan, our very own President Tagas, with the full authority of the WDF, has implemented a failsafe plan. He has ordered the withdrawal of the surviving 500 Dumots into Buwag Mountain range in Western Iladistan. The forests provide them with adequate cover from the Hilistani’s artillery and aircraft. So far they have held the mountain range with the aid of our troops and conscripted Iladistanis that have abandoned the Unitemple. In view of the Hilistani coalition massing up in the plains of Western Iladistan, this morning our President unveiled our new super weapon, the King of All Bombs. It is a giant thermobaric bomb equivalent to 60 tons of TNT. Its power is comparable to the legendary nuclear weapons of the pre-Shift era, now rightfully banned by the WDF. One of our strategic bombers escorted by our most advanced fighters successfully dropped a KOAB on Papas city, where the Coalition’s first division had encamped, thereby totally obliterating it. More KOABs will follow. Hilistan will regret its criminal rebellion.’

‘Yeah I’m curious how exactly you reprogrammed her,’ Elam asked. ‘All I saw was you touching the Seals on your forearm to her head after you touched them on the interphase pad of a computer in the Tower Command Room.’

Lili placed an elbow on the table and knuckles under her chin. ‘After Alwana knocked Amok 10 out, Captain Sugo and I wrote a virus program, which I then spell-transferred to my Seals, and then uploaded into her. It’s difficult to describe if you don’t have a Seal and can’t do dark spells yourself. I don’t fully understand the physical mechanism of it, yet trained Masters of Dark Energy can do it when we fall into a specific trance. I believe that the Seals are a kind of computer and its programs, written into the Tela itself, the fabric of realities, and it somehow can be accessed with the conscious mind.’

‘Ahem.’ Amok 10, the Dumot avatar in question was raising her hand. The other avatars turned their heads to her like the hand of a clock sliding.

‘Speak up Amok 10,’ Lili said.

‘If I may say so, I remember the time when I was programmed by WDF after the death of my Maestro. It was done by Commissioner Duwa. There was an argument among the Commissioners whether to proceed or not with more Dumots.’ Amok 10 spoke in Alogostani-accented Sinayabi. She had learned the language after a mere week’s of deliberate study and practice while on board the Shield.

‘Argument?’ Lupad (pilot of the Shield’s helicopter Big Mov) was raising his blue eyebrows.

Amok 10 nodded. ‘My memories are murky. As you know, they delete all our previous memories, so I can’t even remember my former Master. However, during and right after the programming, we sometimes can recall events vaguely. They were talking about some dangers.’

‘Dangers?’

‘Yes. About opening portals to other realms, about Tera’s star Sol, about invasions, about disguised darklings, about a flash drive.’

‘What flash drive?’ Bodhi interrupted.

‘They described it as the Anachronista’s USB.’

‘Damn!’ Alwana nearly shouted in surprise. ‘Father’s missing USB flash drive.’

‘Your Maestro?’ Amok 10 inquired.

‘Huo, yes. Where the hell in Tera is it?’

Amok 10 looked puzzled. ‘They talked about it as if it were not in Tera.’

‘Huh?’ Elam commented in a bewildered voice.

Amok 10 turned her head to him. ‘I must have been confused as I also heard that it was acquired by an agent of theirs and given to the Circulus Cartel’s leader, Commandant Doughty. And that’s all that I know.’

Elam looked around. ‘Uh, why is everyone looking shocked?’

Oisa the Warrior beside him tousled his head affectionately. ‘I like the way that you ask the most obvious questions, iho. Mesen is the Nation south of Cephalia in Nova Continent. Circulus is its top drug cartel, which also happens to be the biggest in Tera. Most of the metamphetamine, cocaine, and opioids in Tera are imported from Mesen.’

Elam frowned. ‘You talk as if they are legal?’

‘They are illegal drugs in Antigua Continent and in Cephalia. They are illegal in paper in Mesen. The government there condones it mainly because it has been heavily involved in protection rackets. Besides, it’s Mesen’s largest source of revenue. Mesen has always been involved in shady activities. We’re quite familiar with it because most of the Avatar vs Darkling international gambling business was based there, before the WDF banned it.’

‘I’ve been wondering about that,’ Sukola unexpectedly interrupted. ‘Why not just legalize these drugs? Alcohol, caffeine, and marijuana are legal in Alogostan after all.’

It was Aya the Medic who answered her. ‘Metamphetamine, cocaine, and opioids are physiologically addicting and may cause behavioral changes that can be destructive. Actually so is alcohol. So why is alcohol legal while the others are not? In my opinion, it has something to do with Tera’s history. Alcohol simply seems to have been socially accepted in pre-Shift societies, while the others were not. That tradition continues until today.’

Tahum rapped her fingers on the table. ‘Whatever. I say we should find that USB. Everyone with me?’

As if nothing had happened, the avatars began to move normally again. ‘Yes, I think we should do as Tahum suggests,’ Bodhi opined. Choruses of yes were heard all over the café.

Lili shrugged. ‘Fine. How do we do that since we’re grounded? It’s lucky the Veiled Commissioners did not execute me outright and sell you off to the highest bidder. They even allowed Sukola to remain here in sanctuary, but I take it that it’s because of our actions that saved their asses from Lima, a favor repaid. They might not be so lenient next time.’

Walay raised her hand. ‘But I’m not grounded, and I’m not officially part of the Sun and Sky. I’m also on reward paid leave for two months.’

‘Hey buddy, so am I,’ Tala interjected excitedly. ‘Let’s go find that USB. I love new adventures! Besides my mother came from Mesen. She was an economic immigrant to Mainland Alogostan. She used to speak to me in Mesenian all the time. I’ve actually gone there once before on a DATA assassination mission.’

‘Me too,’ Sukola interposed. ‘If it’s in Nova, there are no Dumots there to hunt me. There’s only about a month left of their lifespan, and the Alogostan Senate hearing on devolvement has been deferred indefinitely because of the war. Meanwhile I have nothing to do, and I fear that staying here all the time worsens your relationship with the Alogostani government. I can join Walay and Tala, and after the Dumot avatars expire, I can come back to Alogostan and attend the Senate hearing when they do announce it. Kaluwasan has already been given an invitation by Senator Naluoy. ’

Walay shook her head. ‘It’s too dangerous for you, Sukola. Not meaning to be rude but you’re not a trained spook. Tala and I are trained DATA agents and Hybrid Tamawo. If things turn violent, we have nearly strength and speed of the Maranhig Possessed- vampires and werewolves. You don’t.’

‘Yeah, but both of you look like high school girls; and you don’t have DATA’s support personnel who treat you as adults. If you are going to approach this drug cartel, you might want someone who’s at least in college to front up for you. I have a passport and school ID’s.’

Sukola looked around, avoiding Amok 10’s eyes. ‘Please. It’s all that I can do to repay you for saving my life.’

After a moment of silence, Tala gallantly announced, ‘Sure why not? We’ll protect you. I know the place, or at least the city where I was assigned in a past DATA mission. Just promise to stay out of dangerous scenarios.’

Combat avatar Ihap spoke up. Unlike the other girls who were dressed in denim miniskirts, tank tops, and flip flops, she was dressed formally in office uniform- a short blue skirt, blue blazer, navy blue shoes, yellow button shirt with the tag ‘Avatar Ihap, C.P.A.’ on the left breast pocket. As usual her hair was set in an elaborate and elegant coiffure by a long blue hairpin. ‘You are technically going on an infiltration mission. That was my specialty in the Great Dark War. Sukola is right. You Tamawos look too young and pretty to be taken seriously by people who happen to be the most violent drug pushers in Tera. You need someone you trust to front for you.’

There was a murmur of assent around the café.

Everyone looked at Amok 10 in astonishment.

She looked uncomfortable, but proceeded to speak out, looking straight at Sukola. ‘My shelf life ends in forty days after the death of my Maestro. I was reprogrammed as a Dumot to kill Unitemplists and Alogostani secessionists, but now I am free, thanks to Lili’s virus. Yet I am also not really free because I have lost my purpose. What better last mission in life could I aspire to than to aid the woman I would have murdered and to atone for the assassination of her friends?’

No one spoke for several seconds.

‘What the heck!’ Sukola finally blurted out angrily. ‘You beheaded them!’

I'm glad you do.

Good point. In any case, I've laid the groundwork for extra terrestrial scenarios by introducing the Ares colony in the previous books. There will be some action there.

For dinner, the avatars had transferred to Café Tubangtoo, at the bow’s starboard tower. The prospect of finding their Father’s missing USB drive had cheered them up. The TV was on, but the avatars were talking about their recent adventures.

‘You’re smiling and talking a lot more,’ Elam noted.

‘Of course, silly,’ Tahum (the Order’s spy avatar together with Tukib) beside him said. ‘We have a new mission. Human psychologists call it self-actualization, but being programmed avatars, purposes are what we live for, never for ourselves.’ She was biting into a piece of mackerel.

Henloa (one of the Majordomo avatars) brushed her silky blue hair back from her anime-perfect features. ‘Lucky too. Imagine what would happen if someone like me who is at least four times stronger than an undead suddenly decides she wants to rule the world. Or a combat avatar like Bantay, Luto, or Ihap, who could squish vampires and werewolves into mango puree. Or someone like any of our Arch Wings who can crush demons and probably have the power beat up some of the Pantheon gods if they exist? Purposes larger than ourselves brought us into existence and keep us alive.’

‘Yeah, remember I was so depressed when we lost control of our accounts. I must have had a death wish then.’ Ihap was shoving rice into her mouth with a spoon, Sayabi style, taking care not to spill any of it into her uniform. ‘Delicious!’

‘You don’t really need to eat organic food, Ihap’ Sukola reminded her. ‘You can subside entirely on Bugu coins.’

‘Who wants to eat coins all her life? Anyway, it doesn’t matter. In our normal human mode we like human food.’

The conversations stopped momentarily when the TV broadcaster suddenly announced, ‘Breaking news!’

‘The Ares colony settlers last week have discovered what looks to be the remains of an ancient civilization! We now turn to our resident anchor in Ares, Pulabato. Bear in mind that the time delay of more than ten minutes necessitates that his reporting will be a monologue; it’s the time span for electromagnetic communication to reach us at the speed of light from Ares. Tunga state TV News has slated the next hour for this surprising update. Mind you, we and the Dalokistanis are the first to reveal this phenomenal event, ahead of other national Teran networks, thanks to our excellent relations with Dalokistan.’

The view shifted to a small hill covered on one side by ice. Machines that looked like cranes with appendages tipped with circular saws were harvesting the ice. A red haired reporter was standing in front of one of the cranes.

‘First of all I would like to thank my sponsor the government of Alogostan and President Tagas, and Dalokistani President Don Dako, the CEO of Dako Conglomerate which owns both the Ares Colony Enterprise and the Ares Transport Company. I am your host Pulabato of the Tunga state TV News.’

‘We are in the fringe of the north polar ice cap of Ares, which is made mostly of water ice overlain with a thin layer of frozen carbon dioxide or dry ice. Deposits of ice are easily harvestable. As you can see, these ice harvester machines are doing a great job of cutting off ice. They get loaded into those hydrogen fuel-cell powered electric vehicles.’ He pointed to five dump trucks near the ice harvesters.

‘From there the ice gets into a processing plant just a kilometer away. Here you can see it.’ The camera’s lens zoomed in to a large building.

‘There water ice and dry ice are separated and melted. The liquid water and gaseous CO2 are transported via inter-latitude pipes into the colony. The CO2 is used as a source of carbon for all kinds of important chemicals. The water goes into factories, farms, and to the settlers and tourists for drinking purposes.’

Alwana looked at him curiously. ‘Not if they’re powered by incremental fission of ordinary lead. The technology is relatively simple, similar to the way Bugu coins are harnessed for plumbum fission in Tera’s machines and industries. Dark AI entities cause lead to fission into specific non-radioactive iron peak elements, which have a higher nuclear binding energy than the former. The difference in binding energies is released as kinetic energy of the fission products. These are then blasted out of the tail of the spacecraft. Since the darkAIs can control which isotopes of the fission products to produce and by what quantities, the result is a controlled steady stream of particles blasting out of the spaceship’s butt. The daughter products are mostly non-radioactive nickel, whose nuclides have the highest binding energy in the periodic table of elements, and stable isotopes with magic numbers such as calcium-40, calcium-48, oxygen-16, and helium-4. There are a few free protons and loads of free neutrons, which can transmute an atmosphere’s nitrogen-14 to radioactive carbon-14, but the darkAIs are spell-programmed to transmute half of them into protons, and they are emitted as stable helium-4 with two protons and two neutrons each.’

‘What’s with taking off from Mesen?’

Lupad patted Alwana on her shoulder. ‘You must remember Elam is an Anachronista, not from this world. He doesn’t know things we take for granted.’

‘Mesen’s southernmost province is at equatorial Nova on solid continental bedrock. This has allowed the construction of a space elevator by the Anachronistas during the last years of the Great Dark Shift era. That’s what Mesen is famous for- drugs and the space elevator.

Elam’s jaw dropped. ‘A space elevator? I thought no structural material had been found for a tether. I do know that it’s basically a tether anchored to the ground on the equator, extending to a counterweight in space, with the center of mass just above the geostationary orbit.’

‘See?’ Lupad noted. ‘Elam still confuses memories of his Null World with Tera. Elam, you’re right. Ordinary material would snap. But the elevator’s tether is made of a carbon allotrope reinforced with dark energy from Bugu coins. Turn off the power and the elevator will snap. The Mesenian government has been maintaining it for more than four centuries as a kind of cultural monument. However, WW3 bankrupted Mesen. Consequently, the government sold it off to the Dako Conglomerate of MNCs. President Dako’s father had come up with the idea of colonizing Ares for profit using the old space elevator as launching pad.’

‘Yes, with the way that announcer is kowtowing to his sponsors, I can see it is a business venture. Ten million for a one way trip? I guess that means 20 million for an economy class tourist to get there and back. Plus millions more for food and services as he calls it.’

‘Except that many don’t get back. They seem to like it there, even if it means they have to work as the Dako owned MNCs dictate in private contracts. They think they’re pioneers on some grand adventure away from overcrowded Tera with its 30 billion humans.’ Tukib noted. Unlike the other guys, the spy avatar had opted to dress in button shirt, necktie, and slacks, and looked as handsome and debonair as ever. On his feet though were the avatars’ usual flip flops.

‘Would they not have trouble with the Sun’s radiation through the thin Ares atmosphere, and won’t their bones thin out in the weaker gravity?’

Tahum smiled, amused, which turned her looks from picture perfect to gloriously gorgeous. ‘The humans of the colony spend most of their lives in heavily shielded giant centrifuges spinning around near the top of a space elevator in the equator. Thus they have one G artificial gravity. Most of the agro-industrial complexes that provide them food and finished products are located around the base of the elevator. The colony is made up of the Residential Centrifuges, the Space Elevator, and the agro-industrial complexes. The new Ares space elevator was completed only ten years ago after 30 years of construction. The Dako Conglomerate, with contributions from other Dalokistani and foreign companies, has spent trillions of pesos for this endeavor.’

Alwana, proud to show off her scientific knowledge, butted in. ‘Large tracts of land have been transformed into farms walled in by transparent plastic in order to prevent the plants from freezing to death. The soil is made from Ares surface dust and human waste, and fertilized by locally made ammonia and its derived products. Dead plant matter is decomposed by bacteria brought in from Tera, and turns into humus. The soil becomes self-generating.’

‘What about the other things needed to make a modern human civilization? Where do they get the raw materials?’

‘Industrial plants can electrolyze many compounds into their pure elements provided there is lots of electricity. Most of Ares’ crust is made of oxides of iron, aluminum, magnesium, calcium, potassium, and there are also more sulfur and phosphorus than on Tera. In both Tera and Ares, the structural metals such as iron, aluminum, and magnesium in their pure form, are produced by high temperature electrolysis of their oxides. In traditional electrolysis the anodes are easily corroded. The most commonly used material for anodes was carbon and it transformed into carbon dioxide as it combined with the released oxygen from the oxide. This pre-Shift technological problem however was historically solved during the Dark War by Anachronista MDEs spell-infusing anodes with dark particles, which make them resistant to corrosion. The crucibles where this is done are also made heat-resistant with spelled-in dark particles. The other product of oxide electrolysis is oxygen, which is particularly useful in Ares, for the internal atmosphere in the colony.’

‘Electrolysis of water also produces oxygen and hydrogen, which in Ares is taken from the ice mining operation you saw. The hydrogen is used to reduce pure CO2, which is also taken from the polar ice cap or from the air which is 96% CO2, into methane and carbon. Methane in turn is used to make all sorts of petrochemicals, and pure carbon is used to make the Ares space elevators’ tethers. Nitrogen, which makes up nearly 2% of Ares’ atmosphere, is taken by fractional distillation of the air and combined with hydrogen, in order to make ammonia-based fertilizers for the surface farms, and also in free form to provide air inside the colony. The key is electrolytic dark particle technology plus a virtually unlimited supply of dark energy from Bugu coins imported from Tera. I guess you could not do this in your Null World because you did not have access to dark energy.’

‘Magic technology. That’s how people in my Null World would see this,’ Elam mused. ‘How in Tera did the Dalokistanis start all these?’

It was Lili that replied. ‘President Dako’s family company began the Ares project after they amassed billions of pesos during WW3 selling war materiel. There had been documents from the Great Dark Shift that indicate there was a Trough Region in Ares; but I guess it’s another of those ghost realities because none has been found by the settlers. When President Dako got into power, he channeled trillions more taxpayer’s money into the project, hoping to get to this potential Trough. As you know, a Trough Region represents a thinning in the Tela where one can obtain abundant dark energy.’

‘Thus the Ares colony actually started as an exploratory expedition, which used in situ resource utilization right after WW3. The factories and farms came first before the elevator. When no Trough was found, the Dako conglomerate turned the project into a multibillion emigration and tourist business. The grand goal is to construct a series of space elevators encircling Ares’ equator that can host hundreds of thousands of people, and connecting them with one another. Work is already being done on a second and third elevator by the settlers. Each person that wishes stay permanently as a settler is required by contract to provide labor for a specific number of days per year. Most of the profits nowadays go into the pockets of President Dako, his family, and their cronies. Talk about war profiteers turning into space capitalists, and that’s what the Dako MNCs are.’

‘The amount of resources and engineering to do all that is just flabbergasting!’ Elam exclaimed.

‘Yeah and so is the amount of useless verbiage that corporate shill Pulangbato is spouting,’ Chef Luto wryly commented, serving mango pie for dessert. He was attired in his usual chef’s uniform, a white toque and double-breasted jacket. ‘He has not yet talked about the discovery, just how great it is to book a flight to and from Ares at twenty million pesos each. How much did Presidents Tagas and Dako pay this guy?’

A prerecorded video flashed onto the wide TV screen. It was an opening into a small hill. The video showed miners entering it. The small opening tunnel sloped down and then widened into a gigantic underground cavern. Inside was a huge circular structure.

‘The Mysterious Coliseum! Scientists say that the oxygen isotopes of this cavern and that of the structure you see are different from that of the Ares crust. Like similar ruins in Tera, it seems to have been torn out of the Tela from another realm or time. The MDEs here say it happened during the Great Dark Shift era more than four centuries ago. In this case, this building resembles the gladiatorial coliseums of pre-Shift times, where human slaves would fight each other to the death.’

The broadcaster chattered on, but the avatars were glued to the scene. It showed miners entering the coliseum. It was clearly a staged event, not a record of the original discovery. Already, numerous LED and argon lamps had lighted up the entire cavern.

In the coliseum’s center was a glimmering dark blue pentagram standing up in the air.

‘Damn, an opening into a Folded Connection!’ Lili exclaimed.

‘A Portal through the Tela into a mysterious realm!’ Pulangbato announced dramatically.

‘Don’t worry. According to our resident Masters of Dark Energy, it has been damaged and can’t convey humans and darklings. We have a few damaged unusable portals in Tera itself, leftovers from the Great Dark Shift and War. As you can see, there are artifacts scattered all over these grounds adjacent to that star pentagon. Over there that table-sized pyramid caught the attention of the Maestros. The MDEs say it’s actually an illusion projected by something etched in the Tela that’s full of incredibly strong spells, but for what purpose they still don’t know. There are also lots of oddball machines and life-like statues dressed in combat attire.’

‘One of the machines has been identified as a Tela increment drive vehicle.’

The view shifted to an ornate boat with outriggers.

‘Damn, that’s like our House Boat’s junior!’ Bugsay yawped out.

‘Please note that many of the statues look like darklings. Note their threatening postures, their spike horns, feral fangs, sharp talons, pointed hooves, razor wings. A few appear to be humans, brutes above six and a half feet and packed with muscle. However one is surprisingly small, and looks like a girl pretty enough to win the Miss Tera contest by a landslide. Already the miners are calling her names such as the coliseum beauty or the goddess of the gladiators. An economy tour to see her and other wonders costs a mere additional million pesos, and ten million for a luxury trip.’

The view zoomed in to one of the statues.

https://www.google.com/?gws_rd=ssl#...

When I visit certain web sites on the iPad, some will offer mobile page (yahoo.com), and other don't (cnn.com, or espn.com)

Some pages will modify content based on if I hold it portrait, or landscape (espn.com).

My company have MDM (Mobile Device Management) through MobileIron, and iPad qualifies.

So, in a nutshell, are these in-between devices 'mobile' or not?

I'm posting the message here, because it's really not CG.com's issue...

I just want to post it, because I'm me, <WannaBe>. And we've both been here long enough to know 'me'. And how quirky moi is.

=))

There was a mild uproar for the next several seconds before Oisa took the floor.

‘Lili, what were the specific terms of our grounding?’

Lili placed a thumb and forefinger beneath her chin thoughtfully. ‘Duwa told me: All members of the Order of the Sun and Sky, including you since you carry their Seal, are not to be seen in public by anyone outside your ship in Tera until we say otherwise.’ She suddenly perked up. ‘Uh oh, anyone thinking what I’m thinking?’

Bodhi nodded sagely. ‘Yes a loophole. We can go to Fire Star. It’s not Tera.’

‘Fire star?’ Sukola asked.

‘One of the old Sayabi terms for Ares.’

Elam shook his head. ‘How in Tera are you supposed to do that? Fly?

‘Yes,’ Bodhi assented.

Elam stared at her uncomprehendingly.

Aya decided to do some explaining. In a soft voice she said, ‘Not the other avatars, only us the Arch Wings, pangga dear. In some of our Aspects, we are particularly hard to kill. We can withstand the blast of a nuclear bomb; going off into space is nothing. We don’t need to metabolize as humans do, and can live off our body’s dark energy reserves without breathing oxygen. Our wings are a kind of Tela increment drive that works even more effectively in a vacuum. It shifts reality around us in a specific manner so that from here we are suddenly there in zero time. We can get to Ares, provided we have enough dark energy fuel, in just a few minutes. Probably less than that if we go as fast as we can, but we try avoiding that because going too fast may play havoc with the rules of causality. I cannot recall a time in this reincarnation when we traveled faster than light; our programming resists it.’

Tala was staring at her flabbergasted. ‘Traveling faster than light means going backward in time. Are you some sort of goddess?’

Bantay raised an eyebrow, ‘In some pre-Shift cultures, beings like the Arch Wings were considered precisely that. We Veteran avatars know better. Aya is forever just a kind hearted girl trying to be a nurse.’

‘You mean a nurse and a doctor. I was into medical school in the Dark War when the De-occurrence occurred.’

‘Yes but you first studied to be a nurse and shifted courses later.’

Lili interrupted them, breaking up another avatar debate. ‘OK, I recommend that you four Arch Wings do it. Investigate that Ares coliseum. Try to keep out of sight of humans. No one needs to know.’

‘Great, we go now,’ Oisa declared. ‘Boylo, better give us some of your Bugu coins from the Shield’s reactor plant. I’m still full from all the darklings we killed in the Defense of the Tower from Lima’s hordes, but we might as well bring additional fuel in case we need to expend energy in an emergency. Let’s change into our space suits.’

‘It’s made from carbon composite materials dear,’ Alwana explained to Elam before he could ask. ‘Father prepared it in case we get into a situation where we need to fly into outer space and carry things with us. He had us fly above Tera’s thermosphere several times in practice sessions in these suits. In our pockets are custom made vacuum poof videocams and other equipment that father deemed might be necessary in scientific expeditions. The entire suit and all its pockets and equipment can be folded into the knapsack at its back. In this mission we’ll fill them mostly with Bugu coins.’

Shortly after Boylo arrived in an eletrain with a large duffle bag full of Bugu coins.

‘It was nice of the Veiled Commission to give us a one billion peso award for saving them from Lima. Now we don’t have problems with money or avatar food. This bag here is worth 300 million pesos of especially minted rare hundred thousand peso coins. Here you go, hope you don’t get too hungry,’ he said, handing it over to Oisa. She distributed the Bugu coins among the other Wings, and they stuffed them into their suits’ pockets. Each one was marked ‘hundred thousand pesos’ on the obverse side; while the reverse side showed ‘Veiled Commission 450 D.O.’

‘If we do get hungry, pity the first darkling we encounter,’ Oisa grinned evilly.

‘So you just go off?’ Tala asked. ‘No goodbye speech?’

‘Don’t worry,’ Aya answered. ‘Nothing can harm us, barring an Emperor of the Night, or one of the gods of legend, if they even exist, or another Arch Wing, and there isn’t any other in Tera obviously. We fly up 90 kilometers into Tera’s mesosphere, above any noctilucent cloud, where we can have a good sighting of Fire Star. Then we fly toward it at near light speed. We’ve checked out its present position in the sky in the Alogostani College of Astronomy website.’

‘Yeah, which means we can save the goodbyes since we’ll be back shortly. I can’t wait to see what happened to Pana,’ Alwana stated. She abruptly jumped out of an open window and flew straight up. The other Wings followed.

‘Now what?’ Sukola asked.

The four Arch Wings were in Tera’s stratosphere when Oisa stopped.

‘This is the last time we can communicate by sound, which we won’t be able to do in thinner air, unless we use dark-powered voice, which wastes energy. When we reach the mesosphere above the last noctilucent cloud, Fire Star should be a red object somewhere there.’ She pointed up at a portion of the sky.

‘Yes, we checked out its position in our mezzanine computer when we put on our suits,’ Bodhi reminded her. ‘What’s in your mind, Oisa?’

‘Didn’t you feel disruptions in the Tela when you were in your Haloed Aspect in Lima’s Dark Realm? I did in my Black Aspect.’

‘Yes, but that’s natural, considering the amount of dark energy that was being released when I was slaying thousands of darklings. The Tela usually just stabilizes again.’

‘Not if a Sorceress of Lima’s caliber was also throwing in powerful Spells left and right. Last time a Demon Empress acted that way that I can recall during the Great Dark War, portals opened and realities shifted. Sometimes the Spells feed off all the free dark energy and unexpected results may occur.’

‘What are you saying Oisa?’ Aya asked.

‘You heard the reporter. The cavern and coliseum have different oxygen isotope ratios from that of Ares. The whole package must have been wrenched from some other realm. Perhaps its creation was affected by or even a byproduct of our recent Mission Dark Realm. Why else would a statue of Pana, who disappeared in that mission, be there?’

‘That coliseum must have been there for hundreds of years,’ Alwana pointed out.

‘Yes, but when did time matter when big reality shifts are occurring? Causality and temporal sequences go haywire. Radiometric studies could show it has been there since the Solar System first formed four and a half billion years ago, even if it ‘really’ just appeared last week after our Mission. The MDEs in Ares don’t know about our Mission, and will assume it’s a safe structure that has been there since the Great Dark Shift 450 years ago. In fact the entities behind the portal may still be active if it was only recently made, and can repair the damage fast. You saw the statues. There were darklings among them.’

‘If there are active darklings within the area, we would sense them once we get there,’ Aya pointed out.

‘Ah but they’ll sense us too, and jump back into the portal and warn the others,’ Bodhi noted. ‘I suggest a more prudent approach.’

‘So that’s why you insisted on bringing dresses in our knapsacks and why we’re having this secret conference here, when we’re already on our way,’ Alwana observed, smiling slyly. ‘You didn’t want Lili to object. You could overrule her of course since you hold a Binding Compulsion on her, but avatars are also programmed to please the holders of their Seals as much as possible. She takes this WDF grounding matter seriously, and would rather have us remain completely invisible.’

‘So do we, but this is an opportunity to learn what happened to Pana, maybe recover her. So we slide under the rules. If we are successful, we can approach the coliseum as humans without sounding any darkling alarm, and keep the whole thing secret from the WDF. Anyway if we’re caught, we just say, Commissioner Duwa ordered us grounded in Tera, not in Ares.’

‘So we just walk in the colony, and book a ten million peso trip each to the Mysterious Coliseum?’ Alwana asked.

‘Yes. In order to lure in more tourists, the Dako Conglomerate doesn’t do id checks in luxury tours, as long as you have the money to pay for it. That Pulangbato reporter explained it while you were explaining the electrolysis industry to Elam,’ Oisa reminded her.

‘Well, each of us is loaded with millions of pesos worth of Boylo’s Bugu coins. But how do we walk into the colony from outer space?’ Aya asked.

Oisa looked stumped. ‘I don’t know. I figured there must be a way in. There are twenty thousand adult people, plus their children, in the Residential Centrifuges, the Space Elevator, and the Agro-industrial complexes at the Base of the Elevator all within a single roof so to speak. Everything there is connected and sealed off against vacuum or the toxic atmosphere. Once we get in one of the doors, we should not have trouble blending in. If someone asks, we simply say we lost or forgot our IDs. I don’t expect anyone will ask, since the whole colony resembles a self-sufficient small city, and who asks you for an ID in a Teran city, unless you’re going off to restricted areas with the no id no entry signs.’

‘We’ll walk in one of the factories of the Agro-industrial complex,’ Bodhi suggested. From documentary videos I’ve watched, trucks loaded with all kinds of raw materials keep on entering and exiting them. There doesn’t seem to be any kind of security at all. We do the flash and hide routine. Move at almost the speed of sound to a sheltered area, scope out the environment; move again to the next cover. No one should be able to see us until we get to the areas more frequented by tourists.’

‘We also can’t use tabcoms, as using them might identify us,’ Alwana reminded them. ‘However, we should inform the other Sun and Sky avatars and Lili of this change in plans once we get there. We’ll have to find a patron to do it for us.’

‘Fine with me,’ Oisa agreed. ‘Let’s go then.’

Flying near light speed it took the Arch Wings only 15 minutes to reach Ares, and much shorter from their own perspective, thanks to relativistic effects. They approached the planet below the colony’s horizon, as not to be detected. The planet’s surface loomed like red carpet capped on one end with white polar ice, the icecaps disappearing as they dropped to ground level.

‘Can you hear me?’ Oisa peeped.

‘Only weakly; the air’s too thin,’ Aya piped back.

‘I’m going to speak in dark-powered voice,’ Bodhi announced. ‘Bet you can hear me now.’

‘Yes we can,’ the other three chorused.

‘It wastes our bodily stores of dark energy, but I think we need to communicate this way until we get into the colony. Damn! I wonder what Lili would say if we got stranded here because we ran out of energy. Our Order would have to shell out another ten million pesos for each of us to get back to Tera; and with our little trip exposed, we might get in trouble with the WDF.’

‘No need to fret, Alwana,’ Aya said. ‘We move just above ground level at speeds invisible to the human eye.’

The Wings flew toward the equator. Ares rocks and dust seemed to flow below them like rusted lava. Ahead of them the Ares Space Elevator appeared as a giant needle reaching for the heavens. The ground sloped up and then leveled off into a broad plateau. Abruptly they stopped in midair. Visible below them was a sea of transparent plastic intermittently dotted with opaque domes and cones.

‘Those are the plastic-covered farms. The contoured buildings are the factories and depots. We’re at the edge of the colony,’ Aya noted.

‘We’re in luck.’ Alwana was pointing to one of the domes. ‘My dark-powered vision sees small trucks going in and out of that depot. It has a large transparent window and I can see inside. There doesn’t seem to be many people inside, but a lot of trucks, vats, and storage tanks.’

It was easier than they expected. The four Arch Wings whisked themselves in at near the speed of sound as a dump truck full of red Ares dust entered a giant airlock. They clung on the underside of the truck. The airlock door behind them closed and the one in front opened. The truck entered the depot. As it was about to dump its load of rocks and dust into one of the vats marked ‘Iron Oxides’ the Wings scooted out underneath the truck and into a small area between a tank and the building’s wall.

There were a few men and women in the depot, busy processing rocks and dust. Various cylindrical corridors led out of the building to other structures in the industrial complex.

‘Teran air, pressure, and temperature here,’ Bodhi whispered. ‘The gravity is only about 40% Teran G, but our avatar bodies automatically compensate when moving. Let’s head toward the direction of the space elevator. From the documentary videos of this place that I have seen, there’s an area there called the Elevator’s Base or more commonly the Circular Concourse that resembles a small urban town that winds around the space elevator’s foot.’

Not knowing the proper way into the tourist areas, the four avatars played their flash and hide game, always choosing the corridors that seemed to lead toward the elevator area. It was easy for them to do considering that they could move so rapidly as to be rendered invisible to the human eye. The depots, processing plants, and factories they passed also were cluttered by all sorts of structures behind which they could temporarily hide.

‘This place is huge,’ Alwana observed. ‘It must be kilometers to the space elevator. Are we sure we’re not going around in circles?’

They finally came upon a group of about 50 people inside a dome that sported a huge signboard declaring ‘Methane and Graphite Factory’. They were obviously tourists by the way they gawked at the equipment. A tour guide was explaining things to them.

‘Let’s join this group,’ Aya suggested. ‘There are teenagers in it. We can blend in.’

‘In this factory, pure carbon dioxide is pumped in from the distillation plant that we came from in that yellow pipe. Water is electrolyzed in that machine over there into hydrogen and oxygen. The O2 from the anode is released into our air. Hydrogen from the cathode is mixed with CO2 in that large box in the center of the building, and heated over a ruthenium catalyst to 400 centigrade. The hydrogen chemically reduces the CO2 and out comes methane and water vapor in that violet pipe over there. It goes to the condenser machine where the water is recovered as a liquid, leaving behind pure methane.’

‘The methane is transported to the petrochemical factory we toured yesterday via those red pipes and converted into all sorts of useful chemicals. Alternatively, it can also be pyrolyzed in that tank over there into hydrogen and pure carbon graphite. The hydrogen is recycled. Thus, the net result is that CO2 is combined with H to produce H2O and carbon, although there are other factories that do this directly at a higher temperature without passing through the production of methane and its pyrolysis. If you electrolyze the resulting H2O, the final equation boils down to decomposing CO2 into oxygen and carbon. Carbon is at a premium nowadays because it’s being used to construct the two other space elevators; and the vital oxygen that you now breathe comes from factories such as this.’

‘What about those oxide electrolysis plants we’re going to tomorrow?’ A tourist was raising her hand. ‘Don’t they produce oxygen too?’

‘Yes. They essentially convert iron, aluminum, magnesium, sodium, potassium, and calcium oxides taken from Aresian rocks and dust into their pure metal forms and oxygen. This is difficult to do with pre-Shift technology because these strongly electropositive elements stick tightly to oxygen, so they’re supervised by settler MDEs using dark AIs.’

‘Since air with too much oxygen becomes a fire hazard, most of the oxygen in the electrolytic factories are actually channeled from the anodes into storage tanks, through those green pipes you see. It’s released intermittently in the ventilation systems of the colony to keep the air at 19% to 23% O2. The carbon dioxide you breathe out is scrubbed out of the air by monoethanolamine and other alkylamines in air treatment domes, and recycled for use in methane and graphite factories.’

The tour guide stood up and waved at the farms. ‘We’re going to the farms tomorrow. Various food crops are being grown there. Human waste, Aresian dust, and imported Teran bacteria were admixed in order to produce the first soils, but once the plants started growing, their dead parts began to integrate with the soil, forming humus. The farms soon were producing their own humus laden soils. As of now, you can see that they are totally enclosed by plastic, which protects them from freezing in the cold and thin Ares air. However, experiments are ongoing, aiming to genetically alter the plants by DNA splicing and selective breeding in order to enable them to eventually live in the Ares outdoors. They are constantly being genetically modified.’

They passed buildings shaped like big domes and cones- the processing plants and factories of the agro-industrial complex. All these were connected by transport road-cylinders, some of which were connected to the one their bus was traveling in. Occasionally they passed not only other electric powered vehicles but also pedestrians on the roadside going to or coming out of the farms and industrial buildings.

A middle-aged green-haired man sporting diamond-set rings and gold earrings and necklace had taken his seat on the left side of the back row, opposite the avatars. He glanced at them. Alwana smiled at him coquettishly.

Encouraged, the man tried to start a conversation. ‘Hi, you’re new to our group, aren’t you? Are you on your own? Do you have relatives with you?’

‘We’re sisters. Our Father has passed away. His businesses have left us with some money and we’re touring on our own,’ Alwana answered nonchalantly. ‘Do you know where to register for the luxury tour to the Mysterious Coliseum?’

‘Sure, there’s a ticketing office near the bus terminal in the Circular Concourse at the base of the space elevator. I can accompany you there if you want. So you’re on your own? You’re too pretty to be alone, you know.’

‘You find me pretty? You must be a rich businessman on a recreational tour aren’t you?’

‘Well, now that you say it, I do own some businesses establishments here.’

‘Wow! That’s so cool. Can you radio Tera from your establishments? We would like to speak with our relatives back in Tera, you know.’

‘Sure, why not? You could come with me once we reach the Circular Concourse.’

‘May I sit beside you?’ Alwana proposed straightforwardly.

The businessman looked surprised. ‘Sure.’

Alwana slid over next to him. Soon she was snuggling and giggling at the stranger’s poor attempts at jokes.

‘What a slut,’ Oisa grimaced.

‘Or a predator of gullible males,’ Bodhi dissented.

‘She’s playacting. Combat avatars aren’t programmed to be sluts or predators of male suckers,’ Aya quietly disagreed, keeping her voice down as not to be overheard by Alwana’s partner.

‘Except on a mission, usually in order to glean info, and I think that’s what Alwana is up to,’ Bodhi mentioned. ‘It’s a specialty of Tahum, Ihap, and poor missing Pana when they’re on infiltration missions. Alwana is the best of us Wings in this genre. We three are no good at it, except maybe Aya; since by acting in her usual gentle manner, she often looks like the hapless maiden waiting for aggressive bitchy butches and predatory male maniacs.’