Heretical Edge

No one said anything at first. It was almost entirely dead silent for a few long seconds aside from a slight noise of disbelief that came from the two Seosten. Finally, Charmeine turned her sharp, disbelieving gaze toward me with a quick, "This is you, isn't it? This is something you set up just to trick us. You think we're all actually stupid enough to believe something this absurd, just so no one interferes with whatever it is you're planning to do with the ship." Her voice had grown even more angry as she started to walk my way, lifting the spear. "Well, let me give you a piece of--"

Abruptly, the woman was stopped by a reddish forcefield cube that appeared around her, which she bounced right off of. And no, that really didn't seem to help her mood at all, to say the least. Nor did the fact that banging her spear off the walls did nothing to make them go away. Soon, more of those large holographic words came into view, vibrating and bouncing as though frantic.

NOT TRICK. NOT THEIR TRICK.

NO TRICK. NEED HELP NOW.

VORTEX DOOR HURTING ME.

PLEASE NOW NEED HELP NOW.

NO FIGHTING YOU. GET ME OUT.

NEED OUT. NEED AWAY FROM DOOR.

"The rift," Vanessa put in quickly. "The ship-- I mean the energy in it, the rift is interacting with it. If we don't get the ship away from here, something really bad is going to happen." She stared at her mother, still disguised but with a look that told me she was debating whether or not it would be worth it to tell the woman who she really was, just for the off chance that it might be enough to get Sariel to actually listen to us. And honestly, at that point I had no idea if I should stop her.

Fortunately, I didn't have to find out, because we were interrupted by the arrival of Marian. She came bolting through a different hatchway than the one we had come through from the outside, like she had been deeper in the ship somehow. The girl didn't even pause to take in the rest of the room or what we were doing as she blurted a wild, "Wait! The ship is alive, I mean it's conscious! It's trying to help, it's been trying to help the whole time, even before it got here!"

Her hand waved toward the still trapped Charmeine. "I was chasing her, trying to stop her from getting back here but I got turned around. I think the ship turned me around, it made me go the wrong way, led me to some archive room, where they keep the logs. I saw what happened! The captain and crew were trying to harvest the energy from that place to feed into the engines because they thought it would give them the power they needed to jump out of there and back to this universe. But it actually made the ship into an intelligent, thinking being, a living thing. It tried to warn the crew that taking this much of that energy out to this universe would be really bad!"

By that point, she was finally noticing that Charmeine was trapped, and those spinning, colorful holographic letters. But none of that stopped her from pressing on, speaking so quickly it was kind of difficult to understand. "The ship tried to warn them but they wouldn't listen. They thought it was all some sort of trick or something. Anyway, they were getting critically close to having so much of that energy, it would've instantly caused some sort of big bang sort of situation as soon as they jumped back here. So the ship did the only thing it could. It took over and locked all of them in stasis. It thought it would just stay in that place, drifting through Tartarus forever. Better than coming back here and dooming the whole universe. It chose to be alone to save all of us.

"But then that rift appeared, or it found the rift, or Tartarus guided it there. It was like some sort of whirlpool, yanking the ship through so it appeared here, by the rift. Which was the whole plan. I mean Tartarus's plan. With the ball of that energy in there combined with the rift, they're like, interacting and pulling more energy through. And if we don't stop it soon, it'll be like yanking the drain on a bathtub. Assuming we're the sewer, which fits more than you might think. All that energy in Tartarus is gonna pour through the rift and flood into this universe. If that happens…"

"We won't let it," Sariel announced, looking around briefly before speaking in a voice that was closer to the one I knew, though still somewhat shaky as she addressed the ship. "I know it's difficult to trust anyone right now, with something this important. Especially after what happened with your crew." I saw her eyes flick toward me briefly. "It's hard to trust after you try to talk to someone and they won't listen. But please let my friend go. We won't let this happen, I promise. We'll fix it, but I need her help. We have to figure out how to get you away from the rift."

Charmeine, for her part, looked like she was about to say something but stopped herself. And a second later, the ship acquiesced, making the forcefield cage vanish. Once she was free, the Seosten woman took a quick step away before snapping, "Are we actually going along with this? You know it's probably just that bastard playing games again, like he always does." Her eyes were hard as she glared at me, hand tightening on that spear. But she didn't attack, at least. That was an improvement over where we'd been a minute earlier. "You can't really believe this."

"I do," Sariel replied while very pointedly not even glancing in my direction. "I don't know about him, but I believe this ship. It fits with what we've seen so far. Think about how difficult it's been to open that cargobay, or even to get that flight log. You said it yourself, Charmeine, it was like there was someone trying to slow us down every step of the way. It was the ship. It didn't trust anyone enough to try talking before, not after the way its crew dismissed it. But now the situation is bad enough that it doesn't have a choice. We… we have to listen to it. We have to fix this." As the woman said that, I could hear the slight tremor in the words. She was thinking about what had happened with that piece of Elizabeth, and how she might've done that much damage to an innocent girl just to accidentally help create a situation that turned this planet, or even the whole universe depending on how this all went down, into an extension of Tartarus itself. It was a lot.

For Charmeine's part, it looked like she was about to argue, but thought better of it. Instead, she pointed at me. "Fine, but I've got my eyes on you. On all of you. The second you try to pull a fast one, like I know you will, you won't have the lungs left to try one of your meaningless apologies."

There really wasn't any point to arguing with her or defending myself, not considering what was going on. As far as 'what Charmeine thought of my alter-ego' went on my list of priorities, it was probably somewhere down below wondering when the next Lou Devereux movie would come out. I just did not have any time or capacity to worry about it. So, I just nodded once without so much as looking at her. "Why do I think it's not going to be as simple as just turning the ship on and making a jump out of here? If it was, you would have done it already. Or the ship would've."

Sariel replied, but still wouldn't look my way. "Yes, the ship is stuck here. We couldn't work out why, but assumed it was the presence of the Tartarus energy. Now I would say it's clear the rift itself is holding onto it. Which means if we want to move the ship out of here, we need to make the rift let go of it. Which means forcing Tartarus to release its grip somehow. If something like that is even possible." She trailed off, frowning thoughtfully. "If we can pry the rift open enough for the ship to slip free, it would allow more energy through, but only for a microsecond until we make the ship jump. Tartarus might not oppose that too much if it thinks more of itself can escape."

"Okay, wait, go back," Tristan quickly cut in, "you want to open the rift more just for a second or two so the ship can jump. Just how much of that Tartarus energy do you think can get out in that much time? Cuz I'm thinking about when you have a seal on like a dam or whatever and it gets a leak. I'm picturing all that water spraying out like… gallons and gallons of the stuff every single second. Even just two seconds of Tartarus energy spraying into our world could be a hell of a lot, right?"

"Yes," Sariel agreed after looking briefly like she was going to say something else. "It could spill more energy here than we intend, depending on how long it takes to make the ship jump. Every added millisecond would mean even more Tartarus energy would flood this area. But unless any of you have a better idea of how we might force the rift to release the ship without opening it at all, we don't appear to have a choice in the matter. At least the ship itself can make the jump the instant it's released, without waiting for outside input." She paused, then added, "You can, yes?"

Immediately, the ship made more glowing, flashing words appear, confirming that with a simple,

YES, WHEN FREED FROM GRASP.

I CAN MAKE THE JUMP. BUT HURRY.

VORTEX DOOR GETTING WORSE.

Right, so we needed to get this show on the road. But I was with Tristan, I didn't like the idea of making the rift larger, even if it was only for a very brief time. There was too much that could go wrong with that. Especially with Tartarus itself setting this whole thing up. How did we know that doing this wasn't exactly what that damn place was angling for to begin with? It might be trying to get us to pry open the rift 'just a bit' to let the ship escape, just so it could slip enough of itself into our universe to do some real damage. Maybe it wouldn't be as easy to close the thing after we pried it open as these guys thought. So much of this could go so catastrophically wrong.

Before I could bring up any of that, it was Marian who pointed out, "Wait, why are we talking about making the rift bigger at all? We should be getting rid of it, and we already know how to do that." Her hand waved. "Jacob just goes into the rift to close it. He goes through, the rift closes, and the ship slips right out. Why don't we just do that? That's the whole reason he's here."

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Charmeine gave a disbelieving snort, eyes rolling. "Oh yeah, and let's just go and believe everything Jacob and his little minions say, because we were born yesterday and also suffered severe head trauma in the process. Look, this is all important enough that we can call this little truce until we get it sorted out, but don't think for a second that we actually believe or trust any of you at all. Make one wrong move, give me a reason to think you're about to pull something, and I won't hesitate. Just do what we tell you."

"I don't think it would work anyway," Vanessa murmured before Marian could retort. "I mean, maybe it would take down the rift, but it would also probably kill the ship. If Tartarus doesn't let go, closing the rift could slice the ship in half. Or, best case scenario, yank it right back in so it would just be stuck over there forever. We can't let that happen, not if the ship is conscious."

No sooner had she finished saying that, than the ship itself responded by making more words appear. They were almost twice the size the others had been, as though the ship was shouting.

DO IT. CLOSE VORTEX DOOR.

CAN'T RISK LETTING BAD OUT.

BAD TRYING DO BAD THINGS.

WILL DIE OR STAY THERE

IF THAT WILL STOP THE BAD.

Okay, if I hadn't already been convinced that we had to find some way of releasing the ship and closing the rift that didn't involve killing or abandoning it, that would've done the trick. Really, the ship was willing to sacrifice itself, either dying or being lost in Tartarus forever, to avoid letting more of that energy out. This ship was a hell of a lot more selfless than many I could name.

From the look on Sariel's face, her own reaction wasn't far from mine. She noticed me looking at her and immediately met my gaze. I had no idea what she was thinking right then, other than the fact that it was probably complicated and she probably still wasn't exactly full of warm fuzzies about me. But not actively trying to kill me was something. I just wished-- well, I wished a lot, to be honest, and there wasn't time for any of it.

"Okay, come on," Tristan put in, "There's gotta be something we can do to get Skuttlebutt out of here."

Charmeine gave him a look. "Get what out of here?"

Wincing, Tristan glanced toward his sister and me before answering. "It's the name of a sapient ship from a comic--from a story. It's just a fictional sapient ship. But whatever, the point is, we have to get it out of here and close the rift."

"I know how to do that." It was Sariel, her voice sounding odd in that moment. A second later, I found out why. "But I need Necromancy to do it. It's a Necromantic spell to hold back that Tartarus energy. To convert enough of my own magic to Necromancy would take… longer than we have. And it would take much longer for me to teach it."

"What--" Marian gave a little start. "Jacob? You want to possess Jacob and work through him? You can't be serious right now. Why the hell would we--"

"Marian, stop," I cut her off. My eyes were on Sariel. It could be a trick. It could be wrong. This spell she wanted to use, who knew what it might actually do? Who knew what else she might… she might…

No. I wasn't to second-guess her. I wasn't going to try reading her mind or pretend I knew better than she did. Not right now. Taking a breath and letting it out, I spoke just as Sariel's mouth started to open, her face already twisting. "Do it." My hand extended that way. "Whatever you need to do, just use my power."

Silently, the other woman crossed the room, approaching me. Our eyes were locked on each other and I could feel the tension there. It was practically electric. The others were completely silent, just watching while Sariel moved right up to me. I had a loud voice in the back of my mind actively screaming for me to be careful, reminding me that she had been one of the Olympus's most dangerous assassins for a reason. What if saying she needed to use my Necromancy for this was some sort of trick? Or she wasn't actually certain what this spell of hers would do? What if she had decided that she and Charmeine could handle this alone? Maybe with the help of that other Olympian guy, wherever he'd gotten himself off to. What if--what if--

I pushed the what ifs aside, ignoring the voice as well as I could while making myself stand perfectly still. I wasn't going to move.

Standing in front of me, the woman took a deep breath, "Are you certain about this?"

"No," I answered honestly, something telling me it would be a bad idea to lie. "I have no idea what's about to happen. But you say you can do something about this. That's gotta be good enough."

With that, my gaze turned to Tristan, Vanessa, and Marian. "You guys should get up to the bridge. Make sure the ship's ready to jump as soon as it's loose."

Sariel interrupted just as Charmeine was starting to say something. "Go to the engine room, double check everything there. The ship should let you in now. Just check for any more issues." When Charmeine started to argue, the woman quickly added, "Please. Not for him, for the ship."

In the end, that was enough for everyone. The others all went up to the bridge to check on things there that the ship itself might not be able to notice or deal with easily, while Charmeine (vocally reluctantly) went to the engine room. Which left Sariel and me alone. She took my offered hand, her voice even as she quietly asked, "Elizabeth, that piece of her, is she still…"

"I don't know if she's going to be okay or not," I replied as honestly as possible. "But I promise, my… people and I will do everything we can to help her. We just have to get through this first."

With that, I allowed the woman to possess me. She disappeared, and I felt her presence. It was tempting to block her off from everything, but I stopped myself. The Flique kept her out of our memories, out of anything that could give her too much information. But we allowed her to see through our eyes, to control our limbs. We allowed her to use our power. We trusted her to do this.

That didn't mean I wasn't worried. That didn't mean I didn't have concerns. It didn't mean I wasn't afraid that something might go wrong. It meant I accepted all of those worries and then trusted, believed that Sariel would do the right thing anyway.

There was only a moment of hesitation there as the Seosten woman tested her ability to move my arms and fingers. It was like she expected me to snatch back control and boot her out. When I didn't, she got right to work, disabling that Anti-Necromancy field before setting up both spells. She made the original one, that was supposed to pry the rift open to let the ship escape, and the one that would block any Tartarus energy from escaping. As promised, that one required a lot of Necromantic energy. So it was a good thing I had plenty to spare.

Eventually, both spells were ready to go. By that point, it sounded like things outside were getting much worse. Apparently that was where the other Seosten was, keeping an eye on things there. He'd sent a telepathic message to Sariel, letting her know the whole village was starting to come apart at the seams. The merged rift and Tartarus energy was leaking out, the ground was shaking, the sky was… it was bad. Very bad. We had to hurry. No time left to debate, or explain, or ask forgiveness for what had come before. We had to do this now.

"Okay, Ship," I announced as Sariel stepped out of me, "are you ready?"

I WISH TO BE SKUTTLEBUTT

IF ALL FAILS AND I AM

NO MORE WHEN IT IS

DONE. USE THE NAME

THE BOY GAVE ME

I WILL BE SKUTTLEBUTT.

I could see a flicker of emotion run through Sariel's face before she spoke. "Okay… Skuttlebutt. But you aren't going to die. You'll be okay. One the count of three, we're going to set off these spells. The instant we do, jump out of here. Go straight up. It's dangerous, but it'll be worse if we let this go on any longer. Do whatever you have to to get away from the rift."

The ship, Skuttlebutt, sent a message to the others to strap themselves in. Then it was time. First, Sariel set off her spells in rapid succession. Even with the power we'd put into them, none of us thought they would last longer than five seconds at the most. We just had to hope it was enough.

I was counting those seconds in my head, already practically able to feel the unimaginable power on the other side of that rift slamming up against the shield we had just put up.

But just like that, Skuttlebutt hit the gas. Or rather, initiated an emergency jump. That sort of thing really was dangerous this close to the planet (literally inside the planet), but it wasn't like we had much of a choice. Instantly, the ship leapt from that spot underground to… well, who knew where. We certainly didn't, because we weren't on it.

"Uh." Tristan started as we all looked around at each other from different parts of what had turned into a large, empty underground cave. Skuttlebutt the ship was gone. Had it left all of us here intentionally because it knew I really needed to go through the rift, or… or what? Either way, we were in this underground wide open cave, which was illuminated only by light coming in from the stairway attached to the courthouse building, and by--

"Jacob!" That was Marian, pointing to the far end of the cavern where the other source of the light was. A glowing portal, a rip in space and time tingling with energy. The rift. It was there. And it really did not look happy. The shape, the energy, it was all twisting, glowing, crackling.

By the time I took all that in, Charmeine had already moved between me and the rift, spear raised threateningly.

"No." That was Sariel, but she was addressing Charmeine. "Just… just let him go." It sounded like one of the most painful things she'd ever had to say. Which was enough to make the other Seosten open her mouth to argue before thinking better of it. Still, she glared at me intently.

My gaze turned to Sariel as I asked, "The ship, Skuttlebutt, do you think--"

"We'll see it again, I'm sure," she replied. "At some point. Now go, before it's too late. And… before I think better of it. Keep… keep Elizabeth safe. Help her. Just-- just help her."

Giving a short nod, I trotted to the rift, where the others were waiting. Just to be on the safe side, I gave Charmeine a decently wide berth while she continued to glare.

"Guys, I-- thanks for the help." What else could I say besides that, as I found myself standing in front of Vanessa, Tristan, and Marian?

"Save the gratitude for when the whole universe isn't about to blow up," the latter insisted. "Just go. We'll be fine. They'll disappear and I'll… eh, I'll disappear too, my own way. I'll meet up with all of you down the line, promise. Like the lady said, go before she changes her mind."

The twins both nodded, giving me a pair of thumbs up. Vanessa added, "We'll see you on the other side. And get some actual answers."

"Yeah, answers would be great," I agreed, giving a short glance toward Marian. It felt like I could see Skywalker in there. But obviously, she couldn't manifest. Not with the Seosten staring at us.

Instead, I realized I'd said all I could. For now, there was only one thing left to do, step through the rift before things got so much worse. So, after taking in and letting out a deep breath, I did just that, walking right up to the twisting, angry rift. "Sorry, Tartarus," I murmured, "better luck next time."

With that, I took another step forward, and passed through the rift.