Tammy groaned and rubbed her left temple, while wincing at the light, even through her closed eyes.
Andrei? What just happened?
We got Banished.
We got what? But I'm not a god!
It's not just gods anymore, Tammy. Anyone with any supernatural blood is getting attacked. It's reached the point where Fred's hiring mundanes to patrol for DSS invaders, so they won't be affected by the Banishment.
Frak. OK, where are we? And is there anything we can do about this headache?
Sorry. Apparently migraines are a standard side-effect of being Banished. As for where we are, I'm still getting a reading on the quantum differential.
OK, well, let me know as soon as you can contact anyone, OK?
Of course. For now, I suggest going along with whatever these people are doing, until we find out what's going on and what you need to crush in order to get home.
=====
Going along with the Mads running this place, whatever it was, was easy enough. She certainly had enough experience with Mads since moving to Laputa to know the good ones from the bad ones. And these were definitely some of the bad ones. Still, the only trouble she ran into was when one of them tried to take Andrei from her. She put an end to that when she triggered his armor mode and extruded a very obvious particle beam blaster from the back of the armor on her arm, which she pointed at the one who had tried to take him. He wet himself, dropped a backpack in front of her, and held out a wristband, while stammering, "Here! Here! You need this! Take it!"
Tammy took the band from the terrified scientist and scooped up the pack he had dropped, then looked around for a chair to sit on while studying the items. Not finding one, she shrugged and pulled her legs up, crossed them, and floated about three feet off the ground with her legs crossed. She retracted Andrei's armor, and he returned to his wristwatch appearance.
The wristband is a focus for some sort of wormhole generator. Based on what I'm reading, my guess is that the generator is a fixed installation, and the wormholes are generated at a distance, using the bands as a sort of a lens.
Seriously? So my gut feeling that these people are evil bastards isn't that far off?
Not evil bastards. Idealists. My reading of their computers says these idiots actually believe they've stumbled onto something that will benefit humanity, and they just need to prove it before making a public announcement of their discovery.
Oh great. So, if Fred didn't have ethics....
Exactly. Hyperdrive is a lot easier than what they've come up with, but this system works on a planetary surface.
And without a fixed gate, apparently. Which means if there's a government on this world, it's going to get hold of it and use it for its secret police, long before there's any real benefit to real people.
Pretty much.
Andrei's comment cut off there, as the wormhole sucked them in and something - Tammy wasn't sure what it was, but she was certain it had lots of sharp, pointy teeth, just before she turned it into a greasy smear on the jungle floor - tried to bite Tammy.
"Frak! No warning before a jump? That's frakking insane! Where the frak are we?" Tammy blurted out, her disdain for the Mads responsible turned to anger.
"XR9," the band she had been examining stated from the ground, where it lay next to the backpack. "Tropical. Air: Breathable by Subject. Arrival State: Caution."
"Caution, it says," Tammy muttered. "Caution, it says. I get dumped here through a wormhole, something with a shit ton of teeth tries to eat me, and all it can say is caution? Andrei, tell me you've got a signal back home?"
"Not yet," Andrei replied, his Russian accent thick enough to cut with a chainsaw. Tammy, despite sounding as if she came from the upper Midwest, seemed to have no trouble understanding him. "My analysis suggests we are 738 points of resonance away from home, but the static is affecting my ability to make the connection."
"That implies they've already done some wormhole research, doesn't it?" Tammy mused. "From what I remember from school, the more quantum engineering a civilization has done, the more static there is around their universe."
"That is a working hypothesis," Andrei said. "I suggest you put the band on, so if the local researchers induce any further jumps, you don't get left behind. I also suggest you examine the contents of the backpack. Hopefully they included basic survival supplies in it."
Tammy turned black, and an arrow, which had stopped on contact with the blackness, where it would have penetrated the base of her skull, fell to the ground.
"Tell me someone didn't just shoot me?" Tammy groaned, incredulous.
"Thirty yards away, directly behind you," Andrei said calmly. "He's preparing another shot. Looks like a bow, not a blowgun."
"I don't have time for this," Tammy growled, swiveled, and pointed a hand at the being that had shot her. A pulse of gravitons smashed into the being's chest, slamming it into a tree about ten yards behind it and knocking it out, with a few broken ribs for its trouble. "Can you track the other bands?"
"I can," Andrei said simply. "Do you want to find them, or avoid them?"
"Find them," Tammy said. "Where's the closest one?"
"Approximately sixty yards on a heading of 223 magnetic," Andrei said. "I'll put the info in your HUD."
A moment later, Tammy's vision was filled with markers of varying colors and intensities, each marker showing the direction and distance to one of the other wristbands.
Andrei? What just happened?
We got Banished.
We got what? But I'm not a god!
It's not just gods anymore, Tammy. Anyone with any supernatural blood is getting attacked. It's reached the point where Fred's hiring mundanes to patrol for DSS invaders, so they won't be affected by the Banishment.
Frak. OK, where are we? And is there anything we can do about this headache?
Sorry. Apparently migraines are a standard side-effect of being Banished. As for where we are, I'm still getting a reading on the quantum differential.
OK, well, let me know as soon as you can contact anyone, OK?
Of course. For now, I suggest going along with whatever these people are doing, until we find out what's going on and what you need to crush in order to get home.
=====
Going along with the Mads running this place, whatever it was, was easy enough. She certainly had enough experience with Mads since moving to Laputa to know the good ones from the bad ones. And these were definitely some of the bad ones. Still, the only trouble she ran into was when one of them tried to take Andrei from her. She put an end to that when she triggered his armor mode and extruded a very obvious particle beam blaster from the back of the armor on her arm, which she pointed at the one who had tried to take him. He wet himself, dropped a backpack in front of her, and held out a wristband, while stammering, "Here! Here! You need this! Take it!"
Tammy took the band from the terrified scientist and scooped up the pack he had dropped, then looked around for a chair to sit on while studying the items. Not finding one, she shrugged and pulled her legs up, crossed them, and floated about three feet off the ground with her legs crossed. She retracted Andrei's armor, and he returned to his wristwatch appearance.
The wristband is a focus for some sort of wormhole generator. Based on what I'm reading, my guess is that the generator is a fixed installation, and the wormholes are generated at a distance, using the bands as a sort of a lens.
Seriously? So my gut feeling that these people are evil bastards isn't that far off?
Not evil bastards. Idealists. My reading of their computers says these idiots actually believe they've stumbled onto something that will benefit humanity, and they just need to prove it before making a public announcement of their discovery.
Oh great. So, if Fred didn't have ethics....
Exactly. Hyperdrive is a lot easier than what they've come up with, but this system works on a planetary surface.
And without a fixed gate, apparently. Which means if there's a government on this world, it's going to get hold of it and use it for its secret police, long before there's any real benefit to real people.
Pretty much.
Andrei's comment cut off there, as the wormhole sucked them in and something - Tammy wasn't sure what it was, but she was certain it had lots of sharp, pointy teeth, just before she turned it into a greasy smear on the jungle floor - tried to bite Tammy.
"Frak! No warning before a jump? That's frakking insane! Where the frak are we?" Tammy blurted out, her disdain for the Mads responsible turned to anger.
"XR9," the band she had been examining stated from the ground, where it lay next to the backpack. "Tropical. Air: Breathable by Subject. Arrival State: Caution."
"Caution, it says," Tammy muttered. "Caution, it says. I get dumped here through a wormhole, something with a shit ton of teeth tries to eat me, and all it can say is caution? Andrei, tell me you've got a signal back home?"
"Not yet," Andrei replied, his Russian accent thick enough to cut with a chainsaw. Tammy, despite sounding as if she came from the upper Midwest, seemed to have no trouble understanding him. "My analysis suggests we are 738 points of resonance away from home, but the static is affecting my ability to make the connection."
"That implies they've already done some wormhole research, doesn't it?" Tammy mused. "From what I remember from school, the more quantum engineering a civilization has done, the more static there is around their universe."
"That is a working hypothesis," Andrei said. "I suggest you put the band on, so if the local researchers induce any further jumps, you don't get left behind. I also suggest you examine the contents of the backpack. Hopefully they included basic survival supplies in it."
Tammy turned black, and an arrow, which had stopped on contact with the blackness, where it would have penetrated the base of her skull, fell to the ground.
"Tell me someone didn't just shoot me?" Tammy groaned, incredulous.
"Thirty yards away, directly behind you," Andrei said calmly. "He's preparing another shot. Looks like a bow, not a blowgun."
"I don't have time for this," Tammy growled, swiveled, and pointed a hand at the being that had shot her. A pulse of gravitons smashed into the being's chest, slamming it into a tree about ten yards behind it and knocking it out, with a few broken ribs for its trouble. "Can you track the other bands?"
"I can," Andrei said simply. "Do you want to find them, or avoid them?"
"Find them," Tammy said. "Where's the closest one?"
"Approximately sixty yards on a heading of 223 magnetic," Andrei said. "I'll put the info in your HUD."
A moment later, Tammy's vision was filled with markers of varying colors and intensities, each marker showing the direction and distance to one of the other wristbands.
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