Arrivals...

Earth-31/45, 2010 AD. January 18th.

A small winter storm had just blown over Southern California and a hundred miles offshore the residual waves were still lapping rhythmically against the steel hull of the ship. Designed originally for sale to a paramilitary defense contractor, the behemoth-carrier now resembled more of a behemoth-yacht. In spite of its size, life boats were staffed only to accommodate 100 people. This was enough to seat everyone stationed on the ship as well as 40 of their friends, if any were allowed on board. The owner ran a tight ship, in more than just the prohibiting of non company personnel to come aboard. The winds were dying down but the few flags above the bridge were moving steadily. This early mid-January morning had the storm moving to the east and nothing but clear skies were seen to the west.

Juntha II was not moving at all, the ship had settled precisely on these coordinates for 2 days ago. Advanced maneuvering thrusters had prevented drift of more than a yard over the last 25 hours. Presently there were seven men below the surface as well as three large unmanned lifter subs. They were all involved in extracting a certain type of ore that had fallen thousands of years ago in the form of a meteorite. It was this ore that fueled some of the prime technology that powered the new Pax Concordat and it was now a race for this material. The U.S. government had recently developed a high demand for Crynadium as well. Since there was less than 10 tons of the material on the planet acquiring all he could was top priority right now. The team aboard Juntha II was bound and determined to prevent the loss of any more of the material to competitors.

One of the seven men, Lance, was down there today simply to act in a defensive matter should things go awry. As head of the Combat department, Lance was accustomed to conflict and tension. He was not however, accustomed to silence and inactivity which he was getting in spades today. Over 300 feet below the water’s surface and encased in a thin Gortex suit, he stood nearby the matter converter that used an encased beam of energy to extricate the material in such high demand.

“Where do we stand up top? Anything on the scope yet?” Lance asked in a slightly tired sounding monotone. He secretly hoped for an invasion, a missile attack or something to break up the monotony. Having been a company man for over 100 years now led to more self-discipline than he was displaying.

“Threat level zero in all quadrants.” A computerized voice replied without further comment.

The rest of the retrieval exercise went without incident and in a total of 4 hours the men were entering together into a luxurious meeting room around a table set for 18 chairs. The ‘captain’; of the ship was already in the room awaiting them along with the android Eve, the Prime Keeper of the ship.

“Asche, for the love of all that is good, tell me the next retrieval is in Fort Knox and we need to break in without nothing more than a few light hand tools.” Lance was the first to speak in an almost patronizing tone and a stern unsatisfied look on his face.

Asche stood almost a head shorter than Lance and was nowhere nearly as muscular as the black monster that was Lance, but the pair had a deep history between them. Asche’s cloud grey eyes simply made contact with each of the seven men as if he was measuring their moods. The captain was a very versed leader of men and was not intimidated by much.

“You know better than anyone on this ship that if we must, we will run an assault into the world governments to get the materials we need. Fortunately for everyone involved we will not be needing to do that anytime soon.”
Asche spoke with a controlled and firm tone.

“We still have over 30 percent of all the Crynadium on the planet. According to current reports, were only in competition with the US and they only have just over 4 percent. Add to that fact that we have access to all of the known sites where more can be found but offer higher difficulty in extraction; if anyone starts to mine it, were going to move in and take over. It is also serendipitous that there are no nova’s or enlightened on this earth to compete with. For now, gathering more Crynadium is a non-issue.”

Crynadium was needed to power the entire heightened tech line that Pax Con had claim over, from their plasma pistols to their scanners and communication devices. The silver oily substance was the only element Asche knew of that could act as an anchor for the primal energies he used to power some the reality breaking technology Pax Con developed under his lead. The US had no idea what it was used for but mined some it by accident in other under water expeditions, where it was refined and wasted.

Now speaking as leader and ultimate commander did not come easily to Asche, at least not to these men and women. It was not that long ago in his perception of time that he acted only as a consultant to such men. It was only after a many great catastrophes that Asche was asked to lead in the manner that he now did. The situation now however was light and did not require a heavy dose of firepower or due import; things were business as usual for the most part and the world looked like it was going to be fine tomorrow with or without the Company that these men represented. This offered Asche no small comfort and peace of mind.

Lance broke the short silence. “What then is our next course of action, are we all just s’posed to sit here and wait for the stinkin’ sky to open up and drop another paradox? You know I don’t do well with idle time.”

The rest of the seven team members looked almost nonplussed that Asche did not immediately return with the beginning details of the next mission. Instead they were greeted with a very few short seconds of silence as Asche feigned to look over a few pages of notes on the table in front of him. He made effort to make sure that the papers made noise as they moved. Then he slightly smiled and answered with words that most in this room despised.

“Honestly, there is nothing pressing at the moment and you all have earned some away time. Except for a few rotating shifts, all of you have leave. Let’s call it twelve days. Why not go out and explore this new world and see what makes it different from the last three we were on.”

There were some groans of displeasure in the seven. Most were so attuned to Company life that not having a direction to go literally meant they sat in their apartments and did nothing. Literally. Life without having to plan an assault or extraction or kidnapping or some kind of sabotage or espionage was one of the most grueling pains a lifer op had to endure. Knowing this, Asche made it sound like they were only on a furlow for 12 days; if he had told them the truth their might well be a fight.

“I am going to go ashore myself for a few days and prospect some things I detected recently. I will for the most part be in the Northwest, Seattle in specific, after a short visit to New York. Gwen will be acting in my stead until I return. Having no pending projects however, I expect that the days will be long and event-free. Why don’t you all go ashoe right now, you can make it for a great Southern California Sunset and enjoy breakfast from a real cook.”

As Asche began to stride out of the room, he said; “You all try to have some fun and actually go somewhere without carrying a weapon for a change.”

He was met with heckles and friendly threats but they all knew he meant well. All members of this current team aboard Juntha II were handpicked by Asche and all of them were familiar with his methods and his history. That meant that all were in some manner spared the death that the rest of mankind on their earth had suffered. Most here even felt somehow deeply indebted to Asche and had a deep measure of respect for what he must be enduring in being the last of his people.

It only took a few moments for Asche to be ready after he left Lances team. He walked the steel-lined hall ways and stair-wells for just under two-minutes and entered his quarters. His mind was not racing even though he knew there was a chance this was the last time he would see these people, at least for some time. It had been a long time since he had a level of uncertainty about anything. It used to make him uneasy and in the past, forced him into days of meditation and planning to try and see through the temporal wall of uncertainty that formed his doubts. He had seen this day now for several weeks and had already spent all the time he was willing in anticipations and planning. Now was time to act and see exactly where the actions of the day brought him.

Fate and Destiny were not something he or any of his men subscribed to however. They all had a confidence bred from a quiet, determined acceptance that they had done everything they could. Come be what may, if he was not ready for what came next, he would learn from this experience to be better equipped for the next time.

The energy readings he was detecting, and had been detecting for the past weeks, were odd but not entirely unknown. Asche was happy that he was able to see the energies at all; it assured him that the upcoming changes in the local cosmology were not the life ending Rend. That galaxy covering plague killed countless systems and came without warning or symptom. This time, whatever was coming, was not death causing, at least not on anywhere near the same levels.

His cabin was Spartan but functional; a bed was on the window wall. Next to it was a small desk and a chair with a computer terminal; at the end of his bed was a foot locker where some small-arms and equipment were stored beneath his most often worn light clothing. A small, one-door closet held half-dozen suits identical to the one he was wearing now and a small shower was in the corner next to the toilet.
The room was originally intended as a holding cell for prisoners and Asche declined to take one of the premier rooms for himself; he never needed to sleep anyhow and this room was more of a formality anyhow. It was simply a place he had in order to be able to say; “I’ll meet you at my quarters later,” or “Lets meet up at my room in an hour.” His free social time usually spent with Gwen in her room anyhow. She had a much nicer room.

Gwen had been with him now for over 60 years and the pair of them were largely inseparable. She had been his first terran human to be conditioned a hundred percent with what came to be called ‘Lonn-Tech’ by the Company. She had received the full suite; anti-agathics, nerve and muscle augmentation, hyper-regenerative conditioning and metafaculty training. Gwen was now still human, and she was much more than human. It was for her that Asche was here on this planet in the first place; he wanted with all of his will to give her some peace. They had been here now for 13 months now and things were indeed peaceful. If things went sour in the next 2 weeks, this planet would be a nice place for her to call home.

Earth-31/45, 2010 AD. January 18th.

Asche had dressed in his typical brown leather jacket, black button up shirt and boot cut dark-blue jeans. He carried no bags and the only sign of equipment was a slim PDA-like device in place of his watch on his left wrist. Typically covered over by a sleeve, it was often looked at for various readings as he travelled. Anything else he needed could be called from within his neck orb; a light gray glass orb with a swirl of crimson, half the size of a golf ball that hung from his neck on a platinum choker.

He waited a couple hours after the meeting and then went to Gwen in her room. Their encounter tonight was short and sweet. Nothing more than I love you and a small discussion of plans ahead with questions that Asche answered vaguely enough to avoid the facts yet convincing enough that Gwen felt she had gotten what she wanted. Gwen fell asleep in his arms but still Asche calmed her further telepathically rendering her cognitive lobe temporarily inert before moving. He carefully moved his arms away and rolled over and off the bed. Then after taking a brief moment to get dressed, he took in the sight of Gwens still beauty. He then teleported away.


The man dressed in a light brown leather jacket suddenly appeared in dark Seattle alley. After a very short telepathic scan to make sure his arrival was not witnessed, Asche began walking out of the alley. As expected, he was walking out of the delivery drive for the Seattle branch of Microdynamics. This 4 story building was a front operation for both a Pax Con safe house and emergency equipment stash, and a lab fit with a quantum spectrum array. It was this which was his goal at the moment.
He found it disturbingly comforting that even though this place was built and designed in his native earth, it was still here in an adjacent earth. At first thinking it was possible that he existed here, he had dismissed that possibility and attributed it to temporal paradox. The fact that all the security codes were changed and none of the collected data from the last several decades was gone reinforced this in his mind.

Entering the building and activating the array was the first step in discovering if the energies he detected was the Rend or simply some as of yet unseen energies in this ‘dimension.’ He only had to wait a few hours to determine conclusively. As the scanner did its thing, Asche entered a state of reflection and near meditation.

He was brought to the here and now by short burst of beeps. The sensor was done and evidence was conclusive that this time and space was free of the danger of the Rend, but there was something else. Asche ran his fingers over the computer console in rapid motions, depressing and clicking various programs into being. A rift had opened in deep space, farther out than any human technology could detect. The sensors he now activated were remote relays and probes launched months ago. As he suspected, there were several life-forms near the now closing rift.

Realizing his quarry had sensed their detection, Asche had to act swiftly. He began to contact Gwen and his team telepathically at the same moment he concluded it was already too late. His enemy had somehow followed him here and unbelievably had detected his telepathic signature upon his reaching out to his team. He shut down the mental links and hoped for the best even though there was already a presence in the room with him. Cursing his own failures he began telekinetically depressing a sequence of keys on the console he was sitting at as he turned around to face his visitor.

The draconian humanoid would have stood another hard and shoulders taller than Asche but the 8’ ceilings made the reptile stoop a little. Armed with their typical crystalline spear, it said nothing and instead leapt with all its force toward Asche. It was already too close to divert away from impacting the console so Asche quickly decided to return force for force.
Launching himself with all the strength his legs could summon and increasing his momentum psychokinetically the two bodies hit each other with tremendous force. The dragonman still had the weight and strength advantage but Asche’s impact stopped him from crushing the computer console.
Before the giant reptile could gain position to attack, Asche was on his feet. He stepped back and, noticing the computer was done doing its last job, launched himself through the wall. The fall was short and the resulting impact with the ground was avoided with PK. He stopped and looked behind him to make sure the Pultyte was following him and only started running down the alley when he saw the winged creature erupt through the hole in the wall. Asche was running for the sea with all his might but he knew he was not going to make it before another confrontation was done.
Turning a corner swiftly to avoid an energy blast from the Pultytes spear, Asche paused to call his sword Eon from his orb. And that’s the last thing Asche remembered of that world.

Time/Date: January 18th, 2010, 5:30 am
Location: Seattle


For all he knew, it was implanted somehow in the energies of his orb. As soon as he tried to activate it, his old enemy had gotten the upper hand. Asche was probably supposed to be transported to some holding cell or some such, but his own temporal/spatial anchor to earth sent him somewhere else.

*Gwen..*
*Lance.*
*Victor.*
*Eve.*

He sent telepathically after reaching out passively to see if the Pultytes were near. No answer.

Asche pulled up his sleeve and tapped a few times on a sequence of buttons on his Cistron (wrist-comp). There was no sign of MoonDark or Juntha II.

With a deep sigh, Asche hoped the Pultytes left that innocent planet and that his last message was received by his team. If it did, they would rendezvous later on another world.

Now Asche just had to acquire the raw materials and facilities to build the technologies needed for world hopping. Using his powers were not an option right now until he was sure this earth was far enough away from his enemies searching eyes.

Looking around, Asche found himself still in Seattle at sunrise. He was in the same spot he was transported from minus the chase. He now started to look around for a news paper or Op terminal to find out exactly where/when he might be.

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Continuing his walk toward the shore, this time at a more leisurely pace, Asche found himself on Union street. He could finally see the coast ahead of him some four or five blocks away. At 5:30 in the morning though, not much was going to be open so he ventured for the strongest coffee smell he could track. Caffe Ladro answered the call and when he entered the shop he was made aware that this planet indeed had nova’s on it. A news paper dated this morning had a second headline talking about “new discoveries” in the death of Jennifer Landers. Asche wasn’t bothered so much by the fact that her death had been averted in his world but by the simple fact that people couldn’t simply let the dead die.

“I’ll have a Hammerhead please.” Asche spoke to the barista with a slight Russian accent. The choice of drink seemed appropriate for this early morning; who at this hour could not use a quad shot of espresso mixed with a bit of caramel, chocolate and steamed milk?

The young man behind the counter stepped back silently and without confirmation of the request and began preparing Asche’s drink. Asche had a moment to glance over a pass a gentle smile to the only other person in the small shop. The man was apparently a dock worker, judging by his uniform, and was staring at Asche as if he had never seen someone that tall.

A few moments passed and the barista finally delivered the coffee and stood with a vacant stare in front of the cash register without a word. Asche reached out and tasted the work of the young man and then returned the stare silently.

“Sir, how will you be paying for that?”
“Credit, I hope. Try this one.”
Asche passed him his only card. This was a test to see if the accounts from his parallel world lined up here. After a second third swipe with no smart remarks, Asche pulled a ten dollar bill out and placed it on the counter.
“Cut that card for me; that account is closed, and keep the change.”

Asche then sat down in a corner of the shop at a small table and began to peruse the local papers. Deciding where his next destination might be to make some money would be easier than he had hoped in this world full of novas.