Manifold [An Interstellar Sci-Fi Progression Story with LitRPG Elements]

0004h. TAF-Wednesday.

Click-clack.

The sound of cocking weapons echoed within the cramped confines of the APC.

They had only brought carbines with them. Betelgeuse and Tenzhian agreed that all railgun batteries and armature-rounds were to be conserved.

After all, the Nook had plenty of internal-combustion firearms—and more 7.62mm hollow-points than could be fired in an entire lifetime—but armature-rounds and batteries (or charging-ports, for that matter) were rare.

Betelgeuse glanced into the APC's troop compartment to observe the faces of the others. The purple light affixed to the ceiling made scowling gargoyles of everyone. Some expressions were half-filled with anxiety, some were absolutely indifferent.

Douglas, Voke, Misha, Entuban.

There hadn't been space for any more. Space was a serious constraint.

Of course, Betelgeuse opted to bring Entuban because, large body or not, his great physical strength was likely to be useful for the fuel-run.

"Are we under the vehicle park yet?" Betelgeuse asked, turning and leaning his head over the aperture shutters to address Thete.

Former PDF Sergeant Von Fenak was driving, while Thete was riding shotgun and poring silently over a screen-map of the Saltillan Underground. The particular overlay she was studying related to the subsystem-maintenance access-tunnels.

A small red blip traveled slowly over the digital map, the blip signifying their location.

Thete turned to him, her prosthetic eye jittering out of anxiety and irritation. Half of her face was lit by the glow of the screen-light.

"I'll tell you when we reach, okay?" she snapped.

"It's been more than two hours," Betelgeuse returned, turning to the windshield and squinting into the interminable darkness they had been slowly traversing.

The APC had left behind a wide and brightly-lit tunnel about 30 minutes ago to fork into this long, narrow and featureless corridor of stone. Since then, their progress had slowed to a crawl.

"Look, there are a million kakking tunnels. Unless you want me to navigate us straight into a cave-in?" Thete exasperated.

"I'm asking for confirmation if we're going the right way. That's all," Betelgeuse pursed his lips, meeting Thete's eyes and trying to effect as sincere an expression as he could.

Whatever face he managed to make, it ended up achieving the opposite of what he intended.

"Kak! Ahman—your questions are stressing me out, okay! You're stressing me out! Can you just sit back down and let me—"

"Calm down," Von said, cutting through Thete's outburst with a stern voice. Casting a sidelong glance at her and Betelgeuse, he indicated the walls that were flanking them. "Thete, we're on the right track. You see those small yellow strips on the walls? It means we're still in Maintenance. As for you, Betelgeuse, we'll get there. Just prepare yourself and leave the navigation to us."

Betelgeuse nodded and patted Von on his shoulder. Even though Von Fenak rarely spoke, his composure and stoicism were crucial supports in tense situations.

"Thank you, Von. And Thete…" Betelgeuse said, placing his left hand on Thete's shoulder and squeezing lightly. "Sorry about that."

Thete bit her lip and sighed, mumbling her own apology and turning her attention back to the screen. She didn't shrug away Betelgeuse' hand, so he supposed that they were good.

Turning back into the troop compartment, Betelgeuse addressed the others.

"Let's go through the plan again," he said. "Douglas?"

"What!? Again? It's the fourth time!" Douglas moaned.

"It is being a discipline," Entuban nodded sagely. "Sakar is prudent, and we will be benefiting from it to be prepared."

Betelgeuse looked gratefully at Entuban, although he was sure the ugly purple light shaded over the meaning of his expression.

Since Tenzhian had begun sharing command with Betelgeuse—since he began pretty much going along with whatever Betelgeuse instructed—the relationship between Betelgeuse and Entuban hadn't been the same.

A difficult-to-explain rift had opened up between them, although Betelgeuse felt that it was starting to scab over.

Douglas was still grumbling when gray-eyed Misha—her pupils transformed into a beady black by the evil purple glow—took the lead in explaining her own understanding of the plan, which was naturally confined to the role she had to play.

"First phase: we'll find our way up to the Vehicle Park's basement level via a maintenance access, near Saltilla Barracks Block 48. Once we're there, we break into the fuel-hold on the same level and stuff the APC full of as many jerry-cans as we can. I'll stay with the APC and keep it warm. Second phase: we route to the maintenance access under the Detention Barracks, where the party of Thete, Douglas, Voke and yourself will seek the extraction of target personnel, while Von, Entuban and myself will defend the APC."

Misha said all this in one breath, then puffed out her chest, paused and looked askance at Betelgeuse. Her full lips pressed together, as if anticipating his response.

Is she… expecting me to praise her?

"... That's the gist of it. I suppose we've gone through the finer details without having to repeat it. Thanks, Misha," Betelgeuse nodded, observing Misha's features start to relax. "Stealth is the priority for the first part of the plan, capische?"

"Kapish," Entuban and Misha nodded, and Douglas sniggered at their response.

Even Betelgeuse found it difficult to keep himself from chuckling.

Whispered words drew his attention to the seat beside him, and he saw Voke with his hands clasped together, mumbling in fervent prayer and thoroughly absorbed in such byways of imagination that Betelgeuse had long ago abandoned.

0045h.

The way up the maintenance access was steeper than Betelgeuse thought. As the APC climbed the ascent, the entire vehicle slanted nearly forty-degrees, and Betelgeuse had to support himself by holding onto the handlebars that had been welded into the blacksteel chassis, just adjacent to the front-facing aperture shutters.

Betelgeuse checked his wrist-transceiver to make sure he still had signal. If anything went wrong, he'd have to notify Tenzhian immediately,

By now, the TAF had disabled their official transceiver accounts and access and verification-signatures. The only reason they could still communicate by transceiver was because of Kanogg's illegal mods.

The APC reached level ground before five minutes was up, and Thete called into the troop compartment to inform them that they'd reached.

"Keep sharp," Betelgeuse said, indicating the back-facing hull doors and feeling the ground reverberate with Entuban's thumping footsteps.

"Sakar, I'll be taking point once we're out," Entuban rumbled. "I'm knowing the way to the fuel-hold. It is just on the opposing end."

"Roger," Betelgeuse nodded.

The door cranked open on squealing hinges, causing Betelgeuse to wince. It felt like an eternity before it slammed onto the rough concrete ground, blasting out as it did so a wall of sound that bounced off faraway walls and echoed further into the dimness.

Unauthorized tale usage: if you spot this story on Amazon, report the violation.

"Couldn't be louder," Voke said sarcastically.

"Can it. Keep close to Entuban," Betelgeuse said.

The basement level of the Vehicle Park had a length that was many hundreds of meters across. Due to power-conservation regulations, only several light-bulbs were on, giving that capacious space a gloomy and haunted aspect.

There were rows upon rows of vehicles and bipedal machines stored in the basement level of the Vehicle Park, although Betelgeuse wouldn't go so far as to say that the basement was filled to capacity. Only about 20% of the space was utilized.

Misha stayed with the APC, shifting into the driver's seat, while Douglas, Voke, Thete, Entuban, Von and Betelgeuse made their way quickly across the space from the corner of the basement, shimmying past rows of vehicles and clinging to the shadows.

Completely deserted, Betelgeuse thought, as he glanced from side to side.

There was nobody about, but still…

"Up ahead," Entuban said, about a minute into that frantic sprint.

The fuel-hold was naturally kept right next to the refueling station, in an immense and geometric space that looked like it had been carved straight out of Desert's rust-red crust.

To access it, they had traveled across to the opposite corner of the squarish basement, where a thin opening in the beige-painted concrete wall brought them into the entrance portion of the fuel-hold.

A large metal grate with a door that was obviously locked impeded them from accessing the fuel. Betelgeuse stepped up to the grate, looking through to see mountainous stacks of jerry cans just out of his reach.

By Betelgeuse estimation there must have been tens of thousands of jerry cans stored here. An immense amount, enough to fuel the war effort against the Chimerae.

"Aisya would've made this way easier," Betelgeuse muttered, remembering the woman's combustion-based blessing as he came to the metal portal and eyed it closely. It required verification from their transceiver—a big issue, seeing as their verification signatures had been revoked.

"You have the cutters we prepped?" he said, turning to Entuban.

"Yes, yes," Entuban rumbled, taking out the makeshift plasma cutter Kanogg had furnished them with.

"Okay. Hold. Von, as we discussed, you know where the main power lines feeding this place are," Betelgeuse said, turning to Von, who was crouching beside him. "You said it's close by."

Von nodded.

"Whack it ASAP. Use Tenzhian's Nitro-canisters. We'll start cutting once the lights go out," Betelgeuse said.

The plan was to cause a temporary power failure so that the alarms wouldn't trigger when they started cutting. They wanted to be far away by the time the missing fuel was noticed.

Von was gone even before Betelgeuse finished his sentence, sprinting away with Hollow-enhanced speed and melting away into the shadows.

The rest of them waited there patiently, silently, taking up positions beside the wall-opening and keeping their carbines cocked and ready.

Truth be told, Betelgeuse had been expecting to deal with several lookouts, but he supposed that the fallout from the General Strike was straining the Allied Forces' manpower to the limit. They hadn't even met a single guard. The situation had to be dire.

The seconds dragged on. Betelgeuse' penal brand itched beneath his helmet.

It's upstairs. Barracks Block 50 is just two blocks down. Quite close, isn't it?

Betelgeuse blinked. Sometimes his thoughts possessed a sentience that irked him.

Who's to say that the Incunabulum had not already split him into several personalities, and that he, Betelgeuse Sakar, was now only one amongst many?

Divide and conquer. That was a concept that Chrysilla had had some difficulty with in grade school, when they were still in the habit of discussing pre-Old Empire history. Divide and conquer was what the colonizers of Ancient Tellus did to conquer the planet.

Crazy talk, he thought, shifting around to regard the others to see that they were alert. My will is mine and nobody else's.

He'd fight tooth and nail to make sure it stayed that way.

But it is upstairs. Your lockbox with Frederica's Incunabulum, with Chrysilla's letter. It's close. I can almost feel it. You have a special compatibility with her Incunabula, given how close you two were.

They'll have ransacked the damn place by now, no way it's still there.

You need the Incunabulum for another graft, don't you? You gotta get it. One more for the road.

No. Grafting an Ash grade is counter-productive especially one as self-destructive as Frederica's. But ... I do want to bring her with me…

No graft then. But you should take it anyway. And Chrysilla's letter, you do want to keep it. You need it. So you have to go.

I need nothing like that.

Even if you don't need it, our minds need a tether. Chrysilla keeps us focused. Prevents us from… going in different directions. Frederica keeps us together.

… Perhaps.

The lights flickered. A deep sound echoed through the basement, evidence of some great mechanism shifting in the bowels of the place. The lights went out all at once, plunging the surroundings into absolute dark.

"Now!" Betelgeuse hissed, turning on his torchlight and focusing it on the grate.

Entuban was already moving, taking the plasma cutter to the grate and carving through it with sparks that spangled blue to orange.

"Keep a lookout," Thete said, the muzzle of her carbine never wavering. "There might be guys who'll come down to check."

"I'll blast 'em!" Douglas responded, flexing his prosthetic arm proudly.

"No talk," Entuban sounded. "It is done. We need to move them, now."

Now's your chance. Let Entuban deal with it. We—

I. I have to go.

"Thete," Betelgeuse said, regaining his feet with a determined expression. "Run back down to the APC and tell Misha to bring it around just outside the fuel-hold here."

"What?" she said, turning to Betelgeuse and squinting at the glare of the torchlight. "The plan said they were supposed to wait there in case some goons decide to spike strip the place! Why change it now?"

"Look, there isn't anyone here to guard the fuel-hold. Bring it here and the loading will be done much more efficiently. I'm heading upstairs to secure the frontage, so just do as I say," Betelgeuse intoned.

The others stared at him, absolutely nonplussed.

"Keep the APC ready to move when I'm back," Betelgeuse said, and then he was gone, bolting with supernatural swiftness.

"Betelgeuse, wait—kak!"

"Fuck! Douglas, go with him! Man's not thinking right!"

"Ballsman, what the fuck! Wait up!"

***

It was an exhilarating feeling, running without restrictions. There was a special thrill to possessing physical strength. And the build-up of lactic acid in his thighs—it only added to the feeling of intoxication.

Betelgeuse sprinted up the steps four at a time, his legs driving up and down without slowing. He could hear Douglas huffing behind him, trying to keep up with his punishing pace.

'To be able to keep up with me even after the graft—Douglas' stamina is something else,' he thought. 'Though I'm not really pushing.'

"Balls…. where in the hells are ye going?" Douglas managed.

"I'm going back to our bunk. Block 50 is just next door," Betelgeuse replied.

"Shit..."

They continued up through the stairwell. All was dark and stuffy. Noises materialized from out of the silence.

Calm down, Betelgeuse forced himself to think. Keep a clear head. Something's not right here.

Why are there no soldiers around?

As a key resource, the Vehicle Park should be far more heavily defended than this.

He increased his speed, scaled the staircase faster, flying up with superhuman strength—

Then he halted, having reached the first floor after ten or more flights of stairs.

Low concrete walls that only reached up to his waist lined the perimeter of the floor.

Though the space was dim, Betelgeuse had no difficulty seeing because of the half-light streaming into the space from outside. It was the same wan and dirty light that the TAF had instructed the Bureaucracy to maintain 24/7.

The atmosphere was charged with a strange electricity. It was the feeling of war.

Distant explosions and sounds of gunfire drifted over from somewhere far away. He stepped forward to the concrete walls and breathed in the acrid odors of gunfire and death. Before his eyes, plumes of smoke rose from a multitude of destroyed buildings.

The Barracks was in disarray, but that wasn't what he was concerned about.

Betelgeuse' eyes searched the Saltillan ceiling. Something strange was there, right in the middle of the great lattice-suns. It was a large and discolored patch that glowed a distinct crimson hue. The enclosure that was Saltilla had been breached, and the red sun Corydon was streaming its light into the ailing city.

As Douglas stumbled out beside him, huffing and puffing and trying to regain his breath, Betelgeuse pointed up and said:

"That's the sky. The real sky."