They've even put out some glow flies, though it's still dingy as heck here. I suppose that explains the full face helms the Sheeda who were part of the Harrowing fleet wore: our bright light must be blinding to them. Caeryg hasn't been quite daring enough to grow back his severed limb, but this is effectively him 'coming out' as a Queen-doubter. I imagine that Sheeda politics are about to get very interesting.
Hopefully not too noisy, though. The last thing Grayven needs right now is getting dragged into a war of succession. I mean, he might well have to take a hand and end up conquering the lot.
I take a moment to check the etchings on the booster beetle. Since it's a reasonable assumption that the 'vampiric' effect will get stronger as we get closer, this beetle will effectively be integrated into my armour's soul circuitry. Not fully; the Sheeda don't have the ability to make the materials I need for that. But a close enough resemblance mixed with a little magic make something which sort of works.
All looks fine to me…
Let's hope it holds up. Last thing you want is it going kablooey when you're hitting the edge of the atmosphere. Otherwise it'll be a short,
hot trip back down.
I pat the carapace, though I know full well that it's far too insensitive to feel it, and far too simple-minded to understand the concept of familiarity. And since it's almost certainly going to die in the next few hours that's just as well, really.
Flawless Posture.
On the launch pad, Artemis stretches, eye stalk arrows ready to be plucked from their unfortunate donor. Telepathy is unknown to the Sheeda, but psychometry clearly isn't.
...Ew. I'm guessing her Rainbow Bridge technique will be involved in this launch, then.
I nod to the flesh crafters, and they ignite their sigils and lead the booster beetle towards the launch platform.
"Ladies and gentlemen, Highborn of the Sheeda, scholars and warriors, today I and my faithful steed take the first glimpse at the universe beyond the mist shrouding the Earth."
A noble goal. I wonder how many of them actually
buy that. No doubt many have their suspicions.
I make a circuit of the viewing area, making sure to make eye contact with at least the leaders of the delegations.
"I wish to take in the state of the rest of the universe! And I wish to share that knowledge with all of you, so that you will have less reason to doubt my intentions. Each of you has had the opportunity to check the equipment; each of you knows that what you see will be what I see. What is actually there. And perhaps it will go some way to solving the mystery of your situation."
Oh, this is going to be
fun.
Or if I'm really lucky, get me to somewhere from which I can boom tube away, recharge my rings and build up a decent production centre. If I'm less lucky, then whatever's keeping the red giant away only extends as far as the edge of the mist and I'm about to get horribly burned. Or the beetle could blow up and I'll get horribly burned from that.
My tested level of resilience are why Artemis is staying on the ground rather than taking her chances on the beetle.
Yeah, I don't think she'd take a fall from near-orbit quite as well as you can, even with her 'Just Cause'-style grappling shenanigans. Never mind all the
other risks.
Fortify.
I head towards the beetle, smiling to myself as a couple of magic-focused Highborn get their fingers burned by the sigils they were using to covertly monitor the magics in my body. Could be they think I'm a novel Highborn created in Caernouid at Caeryg's instruction. If he's bringing people in at this stage I assume that he's got his story and approach sorted out for bringing them around to his point of view.
Fortify.
Heh. Yeah, New Gods are quite a bit higher-octane on the magical scale than they are. With any luck that eases their nerves just a little. Instead of making them
more paranoid.
I walk down the short series of steps that lead underneath the booster beetle and pull my armour's goggles and seldom-used face covering into place. Then I take a firm hold on the carapace's handholds.
Fortify.
"Artemis, ready?"
Fortify.
"Whenever you are."
Flinging himself into orbit using a giant beetle (some modification of a bombardier beetle?) a rookie New God's arrow transportation techniques, and more than a little luck. Bet he didn't see himself doing this when he went to interview Harley Rathaway back when this all started.
Fortify.
The idea of using the beetle to get off the surface was a non-starter. A beetle acting as a rocket would have to be the size and composition of a rocket, and survive having me hanging off it as it powered up to escape velocity. And if something went wrong or if the Vampire Sun doesn't act in the way we tentatively think it does, we'd be rogered.
Fortify.
Ping.
Translation: "Frankly, being sodomised by
whatever it is would probably be much less painful than whatever we're headed into."
Fortify.
I activate my aero-discs and rise, slowly lifting the beetle off the launch pad. Learning to keep the aero-discs functioning under ground-level disruption took… A while, as measured by Artemis's beetle clock. But I took it up to the upper levels of the miasma and with a map memorised I'm confident that I can avoid falling on anything too important.
Fortify.
Once I reach eye level with Artemis I nod. She draws, and looses the first shot.
Operation 'Grayven-pult' is a go, repeat, go!
Fortify.
She can only bridge to places she knows, but her can fire an arrow pretty much any distance. If she fires an arrow with an eye on the end? We're back in bridge-business.
Fortify.
The rainbow explosion goes off just above me and I rise. It's not fast, not compared to ring-based flight and even compared to what I managed with aero-discs back in the past. But as Artemis sends an arrow through the bridge ahead of us the booster beetle and I are accelerating at a slow but steady rate.
As one of the nobles comments, "You know, I thought this would go faster..."
Fortify.
And then space gets peculiar for a moment and we're… Not all that high up, actually. With a quick glance I can still just about make out the lights of the city below. But we're about as far up as fly-mounts can take their riders.
Fortify.
Then the bridge behind me closes and a new one opens in front of me. Keep going.
Like taking a flying leap in Seven league Boots.
Fortify.
This one opens further up. The ground is fully shrouded and the sky above me similarly obscured. I can see my hand where it's gripping the beetle, but not much further than that. I don't see the arrow that creates the next rainbow bridge, but fortunately the bridge itself is bright enough that I can still aim at it.
Fortify.
I feel a momentary kinship with the early hot air balloon aviators getting caught in a cloud. At least the beetle's carapace is surviving having its entire weight pressing on my hands.
Would have killed the plan if he picked it up, and it promptly cracked open and slid down over him... Bet it would have earned a few laughs, though.
Fortify.
Up again, and this time while I can't see anything at least the clouds above me are bright enough to let me know that I'm going in the right direction. They don't shine white, of course; it's red light all the way and really does put me in mind of the fire pits, when the fug from the forges gets really bad and the overseers have to move their lowlies into shelters or lose the whole lot of them.
Fortify.
Up again, and this time there's a shape to the redness. I can see the outline of the sun, the baleful glare strong enough to trigger my goggles.
Let's hope it isn't too close. As amusing as it would be for him to come flying into orbit and smack head-first into Starbreaker's nose or something...
Fortify.
And up again. The clouds are wisps, the sun disturbingly large in the sky, and… Ugh. I can't see stars, but I can see that there's enough dust in the system that they could well be blotted out. The sun itself… I'm no expert in solar dynamics, but it looks like an early stage red giant in the growing phase. What I'd expected from the illumination but not from the chronology. Red giants don't grow particularly fast, but they grow faster than this. Once things get hot enough to evaporate all surface water… But again, the surface of the Earth isn't all that hot.
Fortify.
And now I'm standing in what passes for its for its full glare I'm not that hot, either. Oh, at this distance a red giant wouldn't do me measurable harm, but I would feel the distance. Light without heat? I'm not feeling as if I'm being drained at an accelerated rate, and my armour feels just as functional as it did at ground level.
Things are just getting weirder and weirder. More and more physical improbabilities...
Fortify.
I can't see the moon…
Fortify.
Wait. Don't I remember that in the comics the Dominators blew it up? But Earth was the centre of human civilisation in that comics, whereas I've had it confirmed that it isn't here. Won't be, here. Then again, there is a lot of dust. Maybe they do?
To be honest, even if they did, Humanity would probably have managed to reconstruct it later on, given the quite variable level of technology assorted future eras showed off. Plus, five or so
billion years... Anything could have happened to ol' Mundus Luna.
Fortify.
Mother Box?
Fortify.
Ping.
Hmm... Was that 'Moon's still there... I think.' or 'We're high enough, you can stop now.' I wonder...
Fortify.
Good show. I turn away from the sun and trigger the booster beetle. And after a brief delay, its internal gas bladders undulate and release the thrust plume that propels us forward.
Ah, I see, the beetle is his extra-atmospheric manoeuvring gear.
Fortify.
Ahead is… The dull glow of light from the sun reflecting off a billion billion particles of dust. I can't see any object of any size, which makes sense. This beetle is an organic booster rocket. It doesn't have a faster than light drive, if only because there are very few organic non-arcane faster than light drives and they all require substances we don't have. But the thrust is constant, my armour is replenishing my air and I'm not being harmed. I could pretty much just go to sleep here and wake up when we've gone far-
And miss this view? Well, probably, yeah. It does not sound particularly picturesque...
Fortify.
Ping.
Fortify.
-enough… Really? Already? And you're sure that it's New God?
...What. Oh, this should be
good.
Fortify.
Ping.
Fortify.
That's lucky. I switch the setting of my goggles to pick up anything that touches the Source.
Just watch for overload. Whatever's out there, it could be very, very
big.
Fortify.
Let me know when we're close…
Fortify.
Enough…
And it's enough to render Grayven speechless. This must be
amazing.
Fortify.
Oh.
Fortify.
Dimly through the dusty miasma I look left and right, up and down, at the outlines of the titans whose imprisoned forms make up the Source Wall.
...
What.
Wait, has the universe contracted or something?
What's going on?
There are so many questions!
