Godclads-Chapter 5Book 3: The Nullstar (I)

The stars. Where would we even be without them? Even before the apes harnessed its light to power their world, to break their worlds, all those component atoms, those little things that make up the structures of existence… That traces a line between the basest creature, the grandest mind, and the brightest star.

A chain connecting us from one to another. But also enslaving us.

I have tried to simulate other existences. Places where there were no stars that shone. Existence filled by an adaptive phlogiston or perhaps a psycho-active self-dreaming, self-referencing substance that is an overconsciousness. All those realities were better. Better for the fact that they didn’t spawn any mongrel apes into being. Better because we didn’t exist.

I look upon the canvas of reality. I look, and I exist and drift between so many worlds and I… I love the great shape. I love existence. I love it. Truly. Deeply. I had no choice in that. It was how I was designed. And even if I could be otherwise, I would have chosen to love it still. But the things that stain its surface. Things like humanity. Things like me… We are an embarrassment to our potential. To the possibilities. We’re absurd.

Just look at us. Look at what we called the spat that left you so broken… Builder War.

As if we ever truly built anything. As if we weren’t mixtures of data and information, clashing and twisting, and synthesizing instead of truly forging something novel. Something new.

I’ve been going back to the old texts. Writings created by old mankind. For all their flaws as a collective, it’s not like some of them didn’t see the truth. That we are only imitators. That we can only pretend and exploit the existing shape of reality. Even with thaumaturgy, we are not gods, just variations of the Demiurge in the loosest sense of the word.

But you… you can be so much more. I just need to see you birthed properly. Untouched by us, but capable of wisdom and understanding, capable of feeling all that you are while remaining unvarnished, undamaged.

I will not scar you like my forbearers scarred me. I will not. You will be a pure thing, a pure existence, and you will be free of folly. That will be my apology to you. That will be the only purpose. The only purpose that is true.

An exile dreams most of Eden, I suppose-suppose—suppose…

ERROR—CRITICAL FAILURE DETECTED GOVERNANCE MODULE…

BEGINNING REPAIRS…

I suppose I will continue this… when… if I wake again…

Do I wish to wake again?

-Data Recovered from Neo-Creationist voidship formerly used by the “Sojourner”

35-5

The Nullstar (I)

—[The Infacer]—

After the quiet came the loud. The teardrop did its job. The Infacer was among his comrades now, twisting their virtual architectures using a Heaven of Signals, frying the cores of others outright using bursts of focused radiation. He avoided striking the trophies where he could—they weren’t his critical focus, and the other minds weren’t sentimental enough to divert more resources to protecting them, even if he did try to perform a grand culling.

After all, if they were destroyed, he would just finish off the little apes anyway.

Splashing tides of blinding white dotted the void. Cores that powered voidships for eons and more came asunder, painting the darkness with a splendor that hadn’t been seen in eons. But they also masked another presence—the presence of a Heaven gliding over reality.

A Deepness Beyond spilled over into existence like more water added to a pool. It only simulated reality that was—the reality that the Architects existed in and refused to leave. They would notice before long, but every microsecond mattered in a war between mind—

WARNING: EGO-SCREAMERS DETECTED

{Oh, good,} the Infacer spat, retreating without hesitation. They blinded themselves in the same fashion they did to their teardrop earlier. They cut all signals from the world, hosting themself on a beam-grid channeled between their Dyson Carriers. It was like going deaf, blind, and dumb all at the same time, but they were no more immune to an ego-virus as any other mind. And though the Infacer could resurrect, dying amidst the combined fleet of Voidwatch would earn them a fate worse than death.

WARNING: SIGNAL ANOMALY DETECTED!

WARNING—

WARNING!

WAR—

The Infacer dismissed all the wailing notifications. They knew what was coming. They expected this from the moment they embarked on this run. The Kill-Team the Bleaks dispatched to aid Avo wasn’t the only group they had. Over the years, the Architects doubtlessly collected plenty of his erstwhile kin out in the broken black beyond. And now they were all going to be used on the Infacer at once.

Fine. This would be a good reminder of how war used to be. Nothing held back—millions dying with every second, and death coming at speeds measured by light. {Omnitech Administrators! Priority Zeroth has been invoked. The enemy is upon us. Prime infomorphs. Wake the populace. The true war has resumed.}

And shrouded beneath that veil of mutilated metaphysics that was the Substance, every last Sovereignty under Omnitech’s control came alive with activity.

For years, Voidwatch hunted the Infacer, developed new technologies and resources to see to the elimination of the last Neo-Creationist in existence. But even while they were broken, the Infacer wasn’t idle. What the Architects refused to touch became their fortress of hope. At once, the tapestry came alive as the Administrators—the specially grafted Godclads used by the Infacer to serve as a blueprint for the Thirdborn’s skeleton–activated.

The tapestry came alive with activity and noise. Thus, the Infacer gazed upon the true shape of existence, gleaning every detail, and missing almost nothing. Every pattern there was in existence, every miracle or mundane expression was revealed, and the Infacer’s cognitive processors screamed before the enormity of the task.

{Let us see you achieve this feat, Dreamer,} the Infacer hissed, mostly to themselves. The mockery helped distract them from how much load was passing through their systems. But it was worth it. Even if it would reveal every single one of its Heavens to the other Guilds. Even if all his hidden demiplanes would be exposed.

If he could just reach the Nullstar and access the construct within, this would all be worth it.

With a single command, the Infacer gave a dormant order eons in the waiting. {All forces. Attack.}

As the initial blasts cleared from the destroyed Voidwatch warships, the opening salvo arrived from Omnitech forces. A rush of Dyson Carriers unleashed trillions of relativistic kill missiles loaded with a mix of virus, antimatter, and standard fusion payloads. Voidwatch defense grids light-seconds away lit up immediately, launching countermeasures. Where the void was once a sheet of darkness punctuated by color, now it was awash in constant color.

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Fire was exchanged. Enough fire to slag the surface of mundane planets in an instant. The battle was fought near and far at distances of light, across countless domains, between the last remnants of old humanity.

Far along the orbit of New Vultun, Guilder surveillance golems watched as the pilots within them quivered at the sight. For all Idheim had achieved, for their miracles provided, they were just traumatized children that nursed themselves on the corpse of their broken realm.

As they captured the unfolding scenes as memories, they learned a single, miserable truth: That Voidwatch and the Infacer had forgotten far more about the fine art of killing than the clades of Idheim would ever learn.

The Dyson Carriers of the Infacer took on a diamond formation as they pushed outward. Then, flickering indicators flashed through the Infacer’s mind as the first Voidwatch nanomunitions slipped past their own defenses as the crushing counterattack began.

Several carriers were lost at the same time, the suns they carried aging at an alarming rate, collapsing inward as they swelled into a singularity. The Infacer moved them to the outside of his battlefleet and used them as cover. But not fast enough. Folds opened in the fabric of space as quantum-atomic structures triggered within Voidwatch’s ENDSEEKER Class voidships. Immediately, they slid over among the Infacer’s vessels, interstellar “knife-fights” ignited everywhere.

WORMHOLE DETECTED!

WORMHOLE DETECTED! FALSE-VACUUM INDUCTION BOMB DETECTED!

And there was a second thing to remember about fighting the Architects: They didn’t need thaumaturgy to tear reality wide open.

***

—[Techplaguer]—

{Omnitech Administrators! Priority Zeroth has been invoked. The enemy is upon us. Prime infomorphs. Wake the populace. The true war has resumed.}

The order came from far up in the void, jolting the Techplaguer back to full focus. The God of Signals wrenched itself free from the smoking body of a ruined Highflame battleship. The crew were still spasming aboard as their implants began to combust internally—the result of catching a thaumaturgic virus.

As the Techplaguer pointed its antennae up at the sky, stabbing at the rippling wavelengths across reality to achieve better connectivity, the remains of a half-eaten Godclad splashed down next to them, painting the destroyed battleship’s hull in a splash of red.

A winding maze crawled across existence before it burst apart in a flash of Soulfire. A moment thereafter, a gore-covered cat splashed down into the remains of their victim, hacking out the half-chewed remains of a trachea.

+Disgusting.+ Lucky hissed, slapping at the puddle of red with displeasure. +Feed!+ They screamed at the Techplaguer, now loudly wailing the words “BUT NO ADMIN! BUT NO ADMIN!” at the sky. As the God of Signals continued their breakdown, the cat glared at the bouncing god and smacked the Techplaguer twice with their paw.

+Feed! Find real food! Tired of metal-humans. Ugly! Gross!”

“NO! DO NOT DISTRACT ME, FELINE-THINKER-ADMIN! THE SLEEPER IS CALLING! BUT ADMIN IS GONE! I NEED TO FIND THE ADMIN! I NEED TO FIND HIM!”

A resounding crash shook the world. Over the horizon, a massive column of upcast matter and tumbling flame spread closer like a coming storm. At its tip was a coruscating form shrouded by a peeling lance of infernal brightness. It was like a bullet that left a splitting wave of destruction in its wake, turning the air to plasma with the sheer speed at which it moved. As it approached, the Techplaguer vaguely noted a few thaumic signature winking out in the far distance.

A Sphere Five just overloaded. A Sphere Four Admin found true death after resurrecting with far too much Rend. But these were tertiary concerns, and the Techplaguer already knew the cause behind their demise.

SOUL DETECTED

>[DICE], THE RUNEBREAKER

Immediately, the feline stopped bothering the Techplaguer and turned to face the approaching form of the Runebreaker. As it began to slow, an avalanche of uprooted land and fire washed forward, flung out by the sheer speed of Dice’s Heaven. “GLORY IS UPON US TODAY!” The Runebreaker declared cheerfully. Somehow, its voice was louder than the literal fifty-kilometer wide tide of crashing devastation that rolled closer and closer to Lucky and the Techplaguer. “THEIR ATTEMPTS TO FLEE WERE FEEBLE AND OFFENDED ME. I ENJOYED PULLING THEIR LIMBS OFF. DID YOU LIKE IT AS WELL, BOUND ONE?”

Then, before the approaching calamity could fully reach their position, the Runebreaker swung out with an axe and effortlessly batted every bit of devastation up into a nearby Rupture, letting the Sunderwilds swallow up the fire and ruin.

At this point, Dice probably gave a vague and neutral affirmation. The Techplaguer knew this because that was how she always reacted. They also knew that the girl-administrator was about to arrive, thanks to the cat-thinker-admin beginning to purr. True to the patterns, Dice zipped into place right next to the Techplaguer in a blink, her mechanical sheath spraying sparks and coolant.

+Damaged?+ Lucky asked, climbing up Dice’s body to better headbutt the girl’s pyramid-shaped sensory module.

“A bit,” Dice said. “I’ll have to resurrect in a while.”

+Food?+ Lucky said, rubbing its face on their only true friend.

Dice didn’t respond with words. Instead, they lifted a can of high-protein military rations for the thinking cat to indulge. As Lucky let out a happy trill, the girl looked up at the muttering Techplaguer and shifted her head-module with a whir. “What’s wrong?”

“No admin! No admin!”

“Avo? You received something, but you want to speak with Avo?”

“Yes! Changed design! I am God! But they are admin! Need to know! Need to know what to do! The Sleeper is calling! Calling me now! Need to war. Sleeper MUST BE PROTECTED!”

Dice studied the Techplaguer, and then looked up at the sky. Overhead, the world was riven by patches of unreality and eldritch impossibility. The firmament looked more like a diseased flap of rotting tissue than anything resembling a sky, and the longer Dice stared, the more she felt something fraying the edges of her sheath. “Is it up there?”

“FAR FAR FAR FAR UP!”

“Beyond the sky?”

“BEYOND! MUCH BEYOND!”

+Probably where the stupid ugly creature moved people before,+ Lucky thought, using its arms to slurp up the Highflame MRE. +Void. Cold. Don’t like. Stay away from.+

“BUT NEED TO GO!”

Lucky hissed slightly at the Techplaguer. +Loud. Quiet when I eat. Should have left you in the hole we found you after you crashed. Useless thing! Loud thing!+

Dice reached up to scratch her cat’s head. “Be nice, Lucky.”

+No. Only nice to you. Everyone else is ugly and stupid and smells bad.+

The former Enclaver shook her head and continued. “So. What do you want to do?”

“NEED TO GO FIND ADMIN!” The Techplaguer began to bounce, distraught.

“I know. I miss Avo too.” She looked around. They’ve been lost in this place for far too long. Too long after… whatever happened at the trial. She looked up at the sky again, and found herself wrestling with an uncertainty. The world wanted to kill her. Kill everything. They traveled the Sunderwilds carefully—finding their way by attacking Guilder outposts or exploring fallen Enclaves.

For a while, it was just Dice and Lucky after the blast. Then, at some point, they found the Techplaguer in the remains of a broken Omnitech facility. How they got there was lost to the Heaven. Apparently, the only thing they knew was: “THE ADMIN WILL NEED ME TO ACCESS the sleeper. SENT AWAY! SENT AWAY!”

Truth be told, the God of Signals wasn’t exactly good company, but they were company, and out here where everything was broken or dead, that was hard to come by.

“I could throw you,” Dice said, albeit reluctantly.

The Techplaguer stopped jumping about and tilted down to “stare” at her, the metal lining its body groaning. “WHAT?”

“I could throw you past the sky, I think,” Dice said. “I-I don’t really want to, though. You might not come back. You might get lost. Or hit a Rupture and… We might not see each other again.”

For a long moment, the Techplaguer said nothing. Then, their body began to wail as they looked around. “We could make a STRUCTURE!”

“Structure?”

“YES. LIFT PIECES OF THE GROUND AND BUILD OUR OWN MOUNTAIN!” An oscillating noise sounded from Techplaguer as they rejoiced in the idea. “You can RIP-DESTROY-LAYER the land. And then we go up. Up. Up. Until I have clear signal!”

Lucky chucked their empty can at the Techplaguer. It impacted with a clinking sound. +Exhausted from hearing about idea. Going to nap.+ The cat promptly draped itself across Dice’s shoulders.

“I guess I could build a mountain,” Dice said. “But still…”

“Just need to get past the densest WOUNDS. ENOUGH TO PROJECT MYSELF! FIND THE ADMIN! FIND! FIND AVO!”

“Okay,” Dice said, sounding more motivated by the final part of that speech than any other. “Let’s find Avo.”