Skyline Extended Universe Part Two

I seriously considered pulling some 1984 level shit and going back to Wednesdays post and changing the promised date to today (Saturday) but this one is over twice the size of most of my posts so I don't feel all that bad about being a little late. Here it is.

Lifening crackled through the recelerators, the stink of ozone and sulfur filled the air, and the threads of reality were taught and humming. The brains of three Wise Ones sat on a table, they had obviously been modified but Rhea was unsure as to exactly what purpose they served, copper rods jutted from multiple points on each brain and one had large crystal accumulators grafted to it. She had never felt so conflicted in her life, horror and disgust at what they were about to do, honoured that they had asked her to help keep the massive quantities of energy in check and to help stave off and mend the inevitable rifts in existence that energy created, and amazed at seeing the symptoms of a rift form before the rift itself did. If she was being honest it was mostly disgust, but the Wise Ones had made up their minds and as powerful as she was there was no way she could stop them all, at least not without doing so much more damage to the universe that the point would have been moot. All she could do was be on hand to try and keep things as safe as possible and, when things inevitably fell apart, stitch them together as best she could.

One With Unorthodox Ideas floated into the lab “Are we prepared?” He asked no one in particular. His three underlings all hummed affirmative with the lead assistant replying.

“Yes Great One, we are prepared. As is your... security...”

“Ah, yes, Rhea, so glad you could join us on this momentous occasion.”  He replied as if he hadn't noticed her till that moment.

Rhea was puzzled for a second before she realized that the five of them totaled the entirety of the party that would be present for this ‘momentous occasion’. Cowards, you all know that even if things go as planned the whan rifts could easily kill us all. No wonder they offered me the ‘honour’ of securing the laboratory. No matter, it just means none of those fumbling brain sacks will get in my way as I try to secure any rifts.

“As am I” she replied. Glad might not be the exact word but it is close enough. “I am ready whenever you are.”

“Excellent, as you know what we are about to do here has never before been attempted on a scale such as this, the earlier trials were all performed on the brains of primitives, and lobotomized ones at that. This will be far grander.”

She wasn't sure what upset her more, the eagerness in his voice to perform this abomination, or the fact that the ‘primitives’ he spoke of were members of her race unfortunate enough to not be strong enough to whan. But she said nothing; she had come to terms with the arrogance of the Wise Ones long ago.

Unorthodox Ideas continued “It should take less than a minute to recelerate the constructs, once the lifening has charged them it will be a simple matter of giving them their orders, orders which they will follow without doubt, hesitation, or fear. However during that minute more whan energy will flow through this room than the last hundred years combined, my assistants will channel and shape it, you must deal with the side effects.”

“I understand my role in this,” Rhea replied coolly. “Concern yourself with your own.”

“Very well, then let us begin.” 

And with no further ado the recelerators flared and crackled. The effect was immediate, reality began to bubble, Rhea knew from past experience that most of the bubbles were nothing to be concerned about, they would swell and deflate without any lasting damage, but not all would. Ten seconds in and already there were two swellings ready to pop like particularly nasty zits, instead of oil and pus these would spew forth filth and corruption, anger and pain made solid and given form by raw energy and the shadow of what was being done here. There was no easy way to describe what she did, the closest she had ever come to putting words to it was that she flexed the part of her mind that knew what was real and true, backed it will her will, and pushed. There were far too many, forty seconds in and she had prevented eighteen bubbles from rupturing but one had and would be a full blown rift in moments. As she pinched it closed with a thought she felt three grimlins slip through from whatever hell the tear opened up on and grinned, you don’t spend three hundred years studying rifts and their effects without picking up a few tricks. Being beings of pure energy made the grimlins powerful and dangerous to the untrained, but to her they were barely the mental equivalent of a wasp, actually better, because you couldn't psychically eat a wasp for a boost in whan energy, grimlins you could. The boost they gave her carried her through the next thirty seconds, or fifteen bubbles and two tears, but there were limits to her power and she had already spent three times as much energy as she had on Hosswell, meanwhile the recelerators were still pumping out lifening, causing even more, progressively larger, bubbles to appear.  The three biggest disturbances she had felt so far all started concurrently and even as she reinforced one she felt the other two split open, tentacles and claws immediately springing forth and she knew she would die if she attempted closing them, if the creature that those claws belonged to takes control of the power surging through this lab we are all dead. She braced herself and began grappling with the larger of the two when suddenly she felt a new presence in the whan, it felt like frozen steel covered in slime in her mind and she fought the urge to scream, cry, and vomit simultaneously but that frozen steel will also reached out and snapped both rifts shut effortlessly, even though lifening still crackled throughout the room not a single bubble did more than flex slightly, ten seconds later the recelerators shut down. Rhea, having barely even twitched let alone moved since it all started dropped to one knee, breathing heavily as waves of heat radiated from her now red-hot scales. She looked to her left at the three newly recelerated brains, hovering as they assessed the situation. 

The brain with the accumulators grafted to it turned to her and said in a slow methodical voice made of stone and rusted iron. “We are the Weaver. Thank you for your assistance in our assigned task, Mender.”

It took Rhea a moment to realize that they were talking to her. “Umm, you’re welcome?” she was thoroughly rattled and fighting to not show it. “My name is Rhea.”

The Weaver replied “we care not what you are called, Mender is what you are.” One of the other brains copper rods flared and crackled. “We are needed elsewhere, Mender Rhea.” With that the three of them flickered once and vanished.

She stood up and looked around the fairly intact lab. One With Unorthodox Ideas and his head assistant were both missing; the other two assistants were huddling, as well as a sack of brains can huddle, in a corner of the lab. Well that went about as well as could be hoped. Now as long as the zombie monster brains from hell, programmed by a race of arrogant, self important, cowards, hold up their end we'll all be fine...