Leftover Apocalypse

I'd been a little surprised to find out that the Observatory of Jenkutierra was, in fact, an actual observatory. I'd thought that was just an imperfect translation since English didn't have a word for "place to communicate with gods" or something, but as I'd approached I could see what was clearly a gigantic telescope extending out from a glassy black dome.

The main building was on a mountain peak, with a truly ridiculous number of stairs winding way down until it reached a small but dense city. Rather than the more traditional walls, since it was perched on the edge of the mountain, it had a strange sort of railing circling the whole place; poles extended twenty feet or so over the edge into open air, and then had a thin vertical band about ten feet wide that ran along them. I assumed it served as a place to put wards, but it was interesting that wind didn't immediately catch the whole structure like a sail and tear it away.

Despite airships being uncommon ever since high quality mana batteries stopped flowing out of Brinkmar, I saw passed one heading the other way and could see another at a dock. The one I passed slowed as its whole crew ran to the edge of the deck and stared at me in wonder - their ship was barebones and utilitarian, and they clearly appreciated my beautiful baby for the work of art it was.

The one at the dock was a little nicer, but still not close to comparing. It was also very small, clearly for shuttling a handful of people around rather than transporting cargo. I was guided to a landing spot, and while the dockmaster was obviously impressed he didn't comment. He asked what my business was, warned me that the wait for a visit to the observatory itself could be as long as two weeks, and then took my payment. I gave him enough for three days to start, hopeful that I'd be able to get right in there.

The city was all gray stone and square buildings, but it still managed to be charming through what I began to suspect was deliberately wonky construction - the bricks were jutting out in strange ways, the upper levels didn't line up with the lower ones, some appeared to be tilting or crooked. It gave the impression that the whole city was one stiff breeze away from falling over like a little kid's block tower and crashing down the cliffs, but everything seemed to be solid.

Children chased each other, laughing, all over the strangely-stacked buildings like they were mountain goats, climbing up the uneven bricks and squeezing through gaps and even balancing on narrow walls right on the edge of the seemingly bottomless drop down into the clouds. Nobody appeared to be concerned that they would bash their heads open or plummet to their doom, so I figured it was none of my business.

It was fucking freezing, and I decided that I didn't really care about people thinking I was dressed funny so I took some time to open my planar storage and pulled out some warm clothes from Earth; the quality of materials was overall worse, but I'd found that the high end camping gear was really good and that included things like very warm jackets. While I was at it, I also got out the laptop and the power bank that we'd bought - it was about the size of a car battery and came with some large folding solar panels.

Also, despite promising myself I'd save them for later, I pulled out some hot chips. In theory, I could at some point get more fabricated. I had a little fabric bag, like a tiny burlap sack, and I upended the chips into it so I could carry it with me - the jacket I'd grabbed was clearly a strange material, but the bag for Flamin' Hot Queso Doritos Dinamita was on a whole other level.

I wandered the town, heading vaguely towards the observatory while taking note of interesting shops and restaurants for later. The prices were high, but interestingly they weren't coy about those being for the tourists; some places had "local" and "visitor" prices side by side and the difference was huge. It made sense; other than some little gardens I didn't see anywhere for crops, which meant they had to import everything. No livestock or anything either, that I could see. The restaurants had the generic red, white, or gray meat which made me think they probably had some of the engineered meat-things somewhere, but otherwise way up on this mountain I assumed it was a pain in the ass to get things they needed.

I got to the base of the stairway that led up to the observatory, and there was a small building blocking the way. Inside, a man was sitting behind a desk reading a book. He didn't immediately react to me, but a moment later he carefully inserted a bookmark, placed the book down, and only then smiled warmly. "Greetings, are you here to visit the observatory?"

"Yeah, I was hoping to... this feels strange to say, but I need to talk to a god."

The man nodded, and pulled out a form. "Please answer my questions honestly. All staff of the observatory have taken oaths to maintain absolute secrecy, with anonymized information regarding any actual communication from the gods allowed only after two hundred years, unless you volunteer to waive those restrictions." I nodded, and he continued. "How would you summarize your goals for this interaction? Personal revelation, business advice, scholarly information..."

I was officially done with worrying about beating around the bush, ever since Tindelus. "Yeah, I have reason to believe that the world is going to end on the Grand Alignment unless I do something, and I probably briefly talked to a god already but they said they weren't at a place where they could communicate well."

The man nodded, made some notes, and then picked up a ledger. "If you don't mind, can you elaborate on the way in which you believe the world will end?"

"Sure thing. Okay so... basically, the Grand Alignment already happened and all the planes were collapsed into Azaraze and destroyed. Then, thanks to there not being anything anymore, it was possible to restore an earlier version of reality from within the same Grand Cycle; the asshole who set all that up wanted to go way back to the previous Grand Alignment, but instead I made it go just seven hundred and twenty days back, to this past first of the fifth. But now, apparently, when the Grand Alignment comes again those extra seven hundred and twenty days are going to make things not... lock in... right, and the whole thing will fall apart. Supposedly."

The man flipped to a specific part of the ledger, as if he knew exactly what he was looking for. "Ah, it's good to meet you, we were hoping you might stop by. We were aware of the reversal of time, but were lacking in details. It's completely optional, of course, but if you'd be willing to write up a summary for us and grant permission for it to be incorporated into our upcoming report on possible world-ending events we would greatly appreciate it."

"And if I say no, you just... won't include that?"

He smiled. "Not any parts that rely solely on information from you, no. If we are not absolute with our secrecy, we will not be trusted. If we are not trusted, we will not be given any information in the first place. So in the end, this is for the best."

I frowned. "Generally, sure. But like... for world-ending stuff?"

"There are more world-ending concerns than you might think, especially so close to the Grand Alignment, and so far things have worked out. I have faith that the gods will give us the tools we need to keep their great experiment running, either by talking to you or some other means. Back to the questions... ah, you said you believe you spoke to a god before?"

"Maybe," I said, "I was using Yesrin's Loom at the time, and I saw this impossibly huge thing that was all eyes and mouths and stuff... but it talked to me in a normal human voice, and maybe helped me use the Loom, and said we didn't have a good connection at the moment. So my friend said I should come here in case there's more it wants to say."

The mention of Yesrin's Loom got a slight eyebrow raise, but only as much as I might expect from someone overhearing some juicy gossip. He made some more notes, then moved back to normal questions. He got my name, age, where I was staying, and asked if I'd been to Twelve Towers or the Necropolis. Then there was one last question I had to think about. "To the best of your knowledge, have you interacted with any demigods?"

"Uh. Yeah, I made a deal with Sentortzi that's still ongoing, and got some training from Betokat which went kinda sour. And then I have... uh... something going on with the Queen of Candles. I think that's it."

Once again he didn't seem surprised or bothered by this, which was really making me wonder what kind of people went to try and talk to the gods. "I think it's safe to say you are a good candidate," he said, "and so I can speed up the process somewhat. Let's see, today is the fourth of the twelfth... I can get you in on the ninth, and I can waive the fee if you promise to write up the details of the anticipated apocalypse."

That sounded fair enough, so I agreed and then headed off to find some dinner. I stumbled into a wedding party by accident, however, and they sort of swept me along into the celebration even after I tried to apologize and excuse myself. That meant that the next thing I knew I was watching the sun rise over the mountains while hallucinating some very pretty colors, surrounded by people in a similar state. I'd let my third eye open by mistake at some point, but either nobody had noticed or they'd decided it was the drugs.

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I took it easy that day, resting and relaxing. I read some, and played on my phone, and generally accomplished very little. The next day I got to work, not only writing up a summary of why the world was maybe going to end soon but also starting on the project of documenting all the other threats that I'd learned about from the Grand Alignment Task Force in the prior timeline.

I had some stuff in my old journal, the one I thought of as "Connie's" journal, though most of that still felt totally unfamiliar, and I also found the second to last memory of Helma from that timeline - I wasn't watching that last one again - and copied her matching journal. Then there were other meetings and reports from the task force, which took way longer to find and document; I started at the end, and worked backwards so that if any were easily resolved or new information was obtained I could ignore the older stuff when I got to it.

I kept notes on the laptop so I could easily re-organize as I went, and then once everything was on there in a nice spreadsheet I finally started on the grueling task of writing it all down. My handwriting had never been amazing, and I hadn't practiced that much with Imperial, so I had to go slowly to make sure it was all legible. By the time I was done it was late on the seventh, so first thing on the eighth I took it to that office and asked if he had people that could make copies.

For a small donation they actually agreed to make multiple copies, which was convenient, so I left the bundle of paper with him and went out to dinner. Red meat, noodles, tangy sauce, and roasted kinat. It smelled good, but when I actually sat down and started eating I barely tasted it - I was too busy thinking about the next day. I was, maybe, going to talk to a god.

I'd never believed in god on Earth, though to be fair these gods seemed like a different sort of thing than what the Christians I was surrounded with believed in. They could just be super-powerful aliens, or something. But still, they were beings that could create an entire world and control magic. That was plenty godlike for me.

My concern must have been clear on my face, because someone nearby spoke up. "Worried about communing with the gods?"

I looked up, and saw that the speaker was a bland-looking man who was seated right near me, eating his own dinner. He was balding, and middle-aged, and just sort of... forgettable. I was naturally paranoid about people I didn't know being friendly to me, but people were just more sociable here, and it wasn't like I had anything to fear from some random guy. "Yeah, a little."

He nodded. "You don't have anything to fear. The gods that are interested in communicating with us have a certain fondness for us - in the way you might appreciate an interesting animal you see while traveling, or a persistent plant that thrives in an unlikely spot. Maybe not the most flattering comparison, depending on how you feel about those things, but it's comforting to me."

"Yeah, I'm fine with that. I wouldn't expect them to treat me as an equal or anything. So... you've talked to them before?"

The man smiled. "Twice, actually, and it was a different god each time. One conversation was very brief, just a... moment of recognition, and a feeling that they were looking backwards from the future. The other was a longer interaction, with many strange images and feelings. That one was... private."

I flicked on threadsight, and the unassuming man was surrounded by a strange swirl of fate threads; they weren't pulled tight, but looped around him in a strange pattern such that I wasn't sure if it was one or twenty. There was also another thread, not on the fate layer but still with some sort of off texture or sheen to it... a twisted cord of black and white, with just a hint of blue. Which colors were those? Blue was probability, white was binding... but black? I wasn't certain, but I thought that was Perception.

Most importantly, the thread was connecting the two of us.

"Well," I said, "thanks for the reassurance. I think I'm going to head out."

The man smiled again. "You don't need to be afraid of me either, Calliope."

And he knew my name. Great. "I'm not afraid, I'm just trying to decide if this is worth me making a big scene and kicking your ass. You're targeting me with magic, without my consent, and calling me by name when we don't know each other. I was going to just leave and see how things played out, but if you want to talk openly about this... fine. You're going to cut off whatever magic you're using on me, and if you put it back I'm going to stab you through the eye. Okay?"

He chuckled. "I like you. I hope you survive whatever is coming, and I hope I never have the need to kill you."

He was very casual, like this was a totally normal thing to say to someone. I pulled out my scissors and cut the thread connecting us - his eyes widened, as did his smile. Ah, the little freak liked that. "Listen, asshole, I wouldn't be the one dying."

"Unfortunately, miss Runelighter, I have never failed to kill my target even when I would have rather it not be my duty. But currently, I have no reason to harm you. I am merely... scouting. As I said, you don't need to be afraid of me. Not today."

I pulled out the little sack of hot chips I'd been slowly snacking on over the last few days - trying to make them last as long as possible - and at a few while I examined him. He really looked like I could beat the shit out of him with one hand tied behind my back. Magic was the big equalizer, of course. He could be capable of nearly anything, in theory. "So... you're scouting. For what?"

"I anticipate being quite busy right after the Grand Alignment, so it makes sense to get some idea of the players ahead of time. I recently found your name on my ledger, though I don't believe anyone has made an appointment yet."

I nodded, eating another chip, and offered the bag to him. He took one, looking at it curiously, and then popped it into his mouth and started chewing. Sweat broke out of his forehead, and his eyes went wide as he choked. Slamming the time differential to the maximum, I swung my fork down at his hand. It started to move out of the way in response, and I strained to the point of tearing muscles to correct my course. I just barely got him, pinning his hand to the table as I swung the scissors at his ear.

He caught my wrist with his other hand, which had been nowhere nearby. He wasn't squeezing; he'd closed his hand exactly the right amount to keep me from pulling my hand free, without actually applying pressure. I tried to keep swinging with my ghost, but that also seemed to be contained in his grasp somehow. I considered doing something with my other hand, but given how hard it had been to even get the one hit in I wasn't feeling confident.

Everyone turned and went back to their meals, as if nothing had happened. Just like that. The smug motherfucker smiled as he calmly lifted the hand I'd pinned to the table, looking at the fork stabbed through it like it was an interesting bug.

"Very impressive, Calliope. Few have harmed me in even a temporary way in... many years. Since I was not currently pursuing you, I was not in the correct... mindset... and I also did not expect anything to bypass my immunity to poisons. Very curious. Still, that is no excuse. You have bested me, if only for a moment, and you are due your reward."

He let my hand go and removed the fork, tucking it away into his coat, and then reached into his mouth and pulled a tooth free - but as it came out, I saw that it was far larger than it should have been. This was the canine of a fucking bear or something. He put it back in his mouth and seemed to suck on it, and when he removed it again the clinging bits of gums and nerves were gone. He polished it on his shirt, examined it, and then nodded as if satisfied.

"I think you will survive your trials, Calliope Runelighter. I apologize for being unclear and causing you distress, and I think I will speak in your favor at your hearing. If you would like to set a date, I can convey it to the council."

The council. Wait. This was reminding me a lot of how Betokat spoke, when he talked about the group of demigods. Okay, more of this shit. That was actually good news, because it meant he probably wasn't actually out to stop me.

He placed the tooth on the table between us. "You have earned this, by drawing my blood. Single use. Crush when you need to find or kill someone and can't do it on your own. May I... have another one of those things you fed me? Exquisitely painful."

I held out the bag, and he took two. One he popped into his mouth right away, and the other he slid into a pocket. His face was getting red, and his eyes were watering. "To be clear," I said, "you're... checking on me because you think I might end up as a demigod, and you also think you might need to kill me... what, if I don't make the cut for your little council?"

He nodded. "There is a third option, if you are not suitable to join but also are not a danger. We can discuss it further if it becomes relevant; currently you're still well below the threshold of being called a demigod. The concern seems to be with the speed at which you're approaching that line - typically it is the work of a lifetime, or a single moment of ascension. The middle road of gaining more and more power over the course of a handful of years is less common, and often ends badly."

"At your hands?"

He shook his head. "No, though it's been laid at my feet by many. Some other agent, for some other master. They simply lose their heads, one day. None ever witness the method, it happens in an instant. I will be deeply disappointed if you meet that fate - I hope you live out your life as a mortal, join us, or... or give me the best hunt I've had in five Grand Cycles."

"Well listen," I said, "you mentioned fate... this thing that's going on, the Clockmaker captured some aspect of fate and it's crazy and trying to... take over the world, or end it, or something. It's a fucking mess. And right now there's a situation where the Grand Cycle is like seven hundred and twenty days too long, that's what I'm here to talk to the gods about. But if this council wanted to do something about it, or about Tindelus, that would be great."

He shook his head. "We do not interfere on that scale. We have our own callings, but otherwise the whole point is to allow mortals to develop without tampering from the most powerful of us. If the world ends, it ends. Death finds everyone, even the immortals. Every empire falls. Every story comes to an end; better to get there honestly than to try and keep a story from ending and ruin it. One way or another, Calliope... you have nothing to fear."

The accountant-looking bastard stood, placed some money on the table - enough to pay for both of us - and walked away. I found it hard to follow him with my eyes, and after a moment I'd completely lost him somehow. He just faded away into the crowd, totally forgettable.