The Wyrms of &alon

"You really think that will work?" Ichigo asked.

We'd gathered back in the sitting area. V had been kind enough to seal the specious portal.

EUe patted his hands on the tabletop. "If it works, it works; if it doesn't, it doesn't." He looked over the four of us. "Right now, we need to plan what happens if we're successful. What's the plan?"

"The Lodestars need to be stopped," I said. "They can't be fired. That's the most important thing. Next, there's the d'zd."

Dzrtk nodded, though the motion was somewhat exaggerated. It was clear ze was still getting used to it.

"Our Archive is freezing, Great Ones," ze said. "The Fossil Wind will destroy us all if it's left unchecked." Ze pressed zyr hands together. "Forgive me for imposing, but… it must be stopped." Ze looked EUe in the eyes. "The Winged Savior must save the D'zd for a third time. You are our only hope."

"The Archive's climate is out of balance, correct?" V asked. The module rested comfortably on the middle of the table.

"Yes," I said.

"Then addressing the issue is a simple matter of alternating the Archive's parameters from the Tower's terminal," V said.

EUe nodded. He briefly fluttered his wings. "All of the Network's functionalities route through the terminal at the top of the Control Tower. Once we're out of this Prison, we need to get there as quickly as possible. Everything that needs to be done can be done using the terminal."

"What are you going to do?" Yuta asked.

"I'm going to finish what I originally set out to do, and then some," EUe replied, clenching a single fist. He pounded it on the tabletop. "hUen-dE has gone too far. She's built an empire of lies using my 'death' as the cornerstone. I'm going to rip out that cornerstone and pull up the whole damn foundation."

"How, O Mighty EUe?" Dzrtk asked.

"As I told Genneth," EUe explained, "when I helped V take flight as a generation ship, I died, and was saved only because V Archived me. From my aerie up atop the Tower, I used the terminal to help oversee the Network." He looked us over. "Though these bodies may look and feel real, they're really just bits of data, floating in the stream. Genneth, you and your spirits have your body to return to. I don't, and that gives me a huge advantage, because it means I'm free to roam across the entire Network. Wherever there's a module, I can make myself known, and I know V's family is going to be very, very interested to hear from me, considering I was supposedly murdered eons ago." EUe's tail feathers twitched. "I'm going to do a deep dive. I'll be the damn ghost in the machine; a virus for spreading truth."

"What will that accomplish, my lord?" Dzrtk asked.

"With luck, it might just change the world."

By and by, a thought occurred to me. "EUe, when I was snooping through the Network, I saw a twEfE structure—a large cylinder—surrounding a portal and the Vyxit's copy of the Sword. Do you know what that place is?"

He nodded. "That's the temple at the heart of the old GTS. The portal is the way to the Great Dream. It's been with us since we began our journey. It's the last remaining piece of UlU. hUen-dE has made it her home; it's where she directs our war efforts, including firing the Lodestars."

"What about the Great Dream, O Great One?" Dzrtk asked.

"It's where we harvest what dreamshards we can still find," EUe explained, "only we use aegises, now, rather than Gatherers. We use the dreamshards they gather to power the fleet, and above all, run our 'engines'."

"Engines?" Yuta asked.

"Yes," V said. "We use the Sacred Blade to travel. By feeding it power, we can create portals that allow the fleet to travel great distances in an instant."

Whoa.

"Not just great distances," I said, "but between different worlds—different u-universes; I believe that's the word. The Sword can create portals between different realities, not just between different points in space."

"If we free you," Yuta asked, "can you use that engine to take the fleet somewhere else?" He gave me a sidelong gaze. "With the Vyx fleet gone, there will be nothing to stop &alon from fleeing Genneth's world with the wyrms in tow."

V booped forlornly. "If only it were that simple. The Sacred Blade isn't accessible through the Network. The remains of the Great Temple Skyholder are one of the only parts of the mothership that aren't built of modules."

"If you wanted to use the portal engine," EUe said, "you'd have to go to the GTS yourself, and that means having to face off against Wendy and her finest warriors."

I grinned like a madman, or, at least, as madly as I could grin with a beak on my face.

"Holy fudge, that's it!" I said, hopping to my feet and spreading my wings. "That's how we fix this!"

"Like all the other times you've 'fixed' things?" Ichigo said.

I shook my head. "No, this time, it'll work." I turned to EUe. "We can use my copy of the Sword!"

The twEfE's eyes widened. "Yes, yes! You have it, don't you?"

Stolen novel; please report.

"Yes, I do!" I could feel the threads of the plan as they came together. It was practically crystallizing before my eyes. "EUe, you're going to get your long-awaited revolution. You can use your original plan: split up the mothership, so that the Vyxit who want to leave can leave." I tapped the tabletop. "Once we get you out of here, you'll expose hUen-dE's lies for what they are. That's how you'll restart your revolution. In the middle of all that chaos, I'll bring my copy of the Sword to your allies, so that they can use it as an 'engine'."

"And then we'll be able to get away…" EUe whispered.

"What about hUen-dE?" Yuta asked.

"I'll tell &alon that she was the one who hurt her," I said, "which she was."

EUe nodded. "Yes. It was her idea to use the Lodestars against the Blight. She's been leading the campaign for millennia, whittling away at the Blight time after time."

"And with her out of the way," I said, "&alon can take the rest of us out of here before the darkness destroys us all!"

I would have wept if I could.

"How?" Yuta asked.

"She's already demonstrated the ability to travel between realities," I said. "She was able to travel from UlU—EUe's homeworld—to my world, as well as Angel-knows-what other universes."

Ichigo flattened his brow at me. "This plan is insane, you know."

I nodded. "Yes, but so are the times, so it all averages out⁠ in the end."

"There's still a problem," EUe said.

"Yes, my Savior?" Dzrtk asked.

"While hUen-dE's betrayal should be more than enough to plunge the fleet into civil war, I don't know if it will be enough to get the Vyxit to set aside their hatred of the wyrms."

My wings drooped as I realized the issue went both ways. "Just like there's no guarantee the wyrms will let bygones be bygones, either, even if &alon returns control over their bodies to them."

"Yes," EUe said. "They've been fighting for so long, I'm worried they won't remember what it's like to be free."

"You need to show them that the wyrms are not their enemies," Yuta said. He turned to me. "Just as you need to show the wyrms some of the Vyxit will be willing to make peace, Genneth."

"I'll try," I said.

"But what about EUe?" Ichigo asked.

EUe nodded resolutely. "I can do it." He turned to me. "I just need you to trust me, Genneth."

"I do trust you, EUe," I said. "I do. Yet… even if I didn't, that wouldn't change where we stand. Right now, you're our only viable option for resolving this without everyone ending up dead, or worse. Speaking of which…" I crossed my arms, "if and when we reach the top of the Tower, is there a way you can use the Vyx's systems to broadcast a message?"

"Yes," V said. "Easily."

I nodded. "Then that's what we'll do. Once we climb the Tower, you and V will help me send a message to my world's wyrms. I need to tell them about what's going on. I'll use my mind-world powers to give you all the information I know about wyrmsong and how it works. Maybe you can use it to enable the Vyx translate wyrmsong into intelligible speech. Breaking down the communication barrier would go a long way to helping us end this conflict, once and for all."

EUe nodded. "If all the wyrms work together, you just might be able to take down Wendy and her goons."

"This is gonna be one heck of a finale," I muttered.

"We have our plan," Yuta said. "All that remains is to execute it."

"Savior be praised!" Dzrtk said.

"Then let's get going," EUe said. "Today's the day we change the world."

— — —

Dzrtk suggested that we put my plan into action right then and there, in the middle of the gladiators' village, but V chirped back at us that creating a traversable portal would unleash all of the combatants we'd have to fight later in the loop all at once. Not wanting risk biting off a bigger fight than we could chew, I figured—and my companions soon agreed—that the best way forward would be to play by the loop's rules, at least up until the final, unwinnable match, at which point we'd take a sledgehammer to those rules and smashed them to pieces.

So, we strapped in and prepared for the worst. Even with four extra sets of hands helping him, climbing through the arena's ranks was still an arduous slog, though it would have been so much worse had it been just EUe and me, let alone EUe all on his own.

Yuta, Ichigo, and Dzrtk were floored that EUe had done so, and not just once, but many times over.

EUe, meanwhile, was self-effacing, as usual. "It was just trial and error. Even the impossible is doable when you have eternity to practice."

Make no mistake, I had my place managing forcefields and blast waves and other psychokinetic delights, but that would only get us so far when our opponents could do the same, be they monster or bird. The instinct, experience, and talent that Ichigo, Yuta, and Dzrtk brought to our party of warriors, however, made all the difference.

Ichigo and EUe very much enjoyed glutting themselves on the fermented nectar we got as our rewards for victory in battle. Dzrtk and Yuta, meanwhile, were both enthralled with the prospect of aerial combat.

Eventually, the final match was upon us. We asked EUe and V what to expect, but they just said, "We'll be fighting the Blight."

"We'll be able to overcome it," I said, "I know it."

"I hope you're right," EUe replied.

We donned our armor the morning of the final match and drank one last round of nectar before setting off for the Cage. The village's emptiness was as disconcerting as ever, but our sense of camaraderie helped keep despair at bay.

All that remained was to grab freedom by the throat.

The moment we stepped into the colosseum's substructure, I knew things were going to be different. Every other time, the Archive had been hard at work recreating twEfE bloodsport to the finest details: sparring warriors training, convicts wailing as they were bludgeoned and beaten by the circuit's trainers, and the screams of blooded fighters being keybranded.

You couldn't walk through the training halls without smelling burnt feathers.

But this time, the place was empty—silent as the grave. There was no one to escort us to the arena antechambers. We picked up our weapons. EUe and Dzrtk grabbed their dual-wielding short swords, Yuta and Ichigo picked up two-handed blades, while I had my trusty stabbing spear. twEfE swords were sufficiently katana-like that the two Munine warriors adapted to them pretty quickly. The major difference was the undulating line of scalloped metal along the blades' business ends. Yuta impressed EUe by intuiting their purpose: to snag enemy weapons—beaks including—so as to give the swordsman an upper hand against his opponent.

Dzrtk, meanwhile, was frustrated with how narrow⁠ twEfE weapons were, though he'd come to appreciate the sharpness of their bite.

Finally, we were ready to go, as was the arena itself.

The entry portcullis had been raised the entire time

We stepped into the arena to find ourselves beneath a turbulent sky, as dark as wolves. A fell wind blew through the colosseum, carrying an acrid, bitter, sweetness. Thunder rolled from high above.

In moments, we couldn't see the sun.

All around us, the colosseum began to decay. Veins of fungal darkness scribbled up the stone, spreading their thickening branches. Bioluminescent inflorescences budded from the grasping mycelium, while spore currents began to drift through the entry holes up along the walls.

EUe kept his eyes on the arena's roof as he raised his twin blades. "Get ready."

My companions and I assumed our battle stances. A moment later, wyrmsong split through the air, startling my wings into a flutter.

Ichigo readied his toothed sword. "Here they come…"