Hilda Jotunsdottir
Now

“Could you, just maybe, explain to me how this thing works?” I asked, fingering the odd device dubiously.

Aristotle tilted his head to the left and his wide mouth twitched into what I recognized as a crooked smile; it was one of the odd things I’d noticed travelling across the timeslip- people who lived in places that had no real tradition of skinlyns or anything truly similar had a great deal of difficulty translating their facial expressions and interpreted most of them as hostile.

“I could try,” Ari said, his soft voice breathy and quick.  “How much do you know about phase-space theory?”

I shook my head.  “I think I’ve heard the words,” I offered.

“Quantum mechanics?”

“Not much,” I admitted.

“Temporal coterminating bond theory?”

“Um…”

Ari sucked air in past his teeth.  “Well, I would need to get you grounded in all of that, first… I don’t think I’m likely to live that long.  How about you just take my word for it- it’ll do the job, okay?”
I shrugged unhappily and pressed the button.

There was a feeling not unlike being turned inside out and twisted from head to toe, then I was back in my body.  Back in my much smaller body.

I inspected what I could see of myself and grimaced.  “People here are so delicate,” I complained and Ari almost collapsed with convulsive laughter.  “What?” I asked, slightly miffed.

“It’s been a while since you even approached normal, hasn’t it?” the mustelid asked, wiping tears from the corners of his eyes.

“You cannot seriously expect me to believe this-“ I indicated my body- “is in any way normal!  I feel so weak!”

Ari simply shook his head.  “Not only are you stronger than you look,” he noted drily, “you look like a larger version of the most athletic specimens on this world, judging from what I’ve been able to determine.”

I released a deep sigh.  “I guess there’s nothing for it,” I frowned.

“Attagirl,” Ari grinned, “way to make the best of it!”

He waited a beat.  “Now… there is something we need to start thinking about,” he said, “we need currency.”

He was right.  In the past, we’d been able to draw on the Ecclesiarchy’s resources, an interplanetary empire spanning thousands of worlds and hundreds of dimensions.  This far removed from them, that would no longer be an option even if we weren’t wanted fugitives.

I nodded.  “I take it you have a suggestion?” I asked.

“We’ll have to get jobs,” Ari admitted.

“By which you mean,” I smirked, “I’ll have to get a job, right?”

Ari shrugged.  “I’ll try to find some sort of work that I can get paid for without ever having to meet a customer face-to-face, but first I’ll need to learn a bit more of this world’s computer-writer protocols.  I suspect your more purely physical abilities will have more immediate success than my technological skills.”

I grimaced.  “Easy for you to say; you don’t have to relearn how to fight in a body made of tissue paper!”

“Look at it this way,” Ari offered, “at least your enemies will be made of similar material- you won’t be duking it out with an Archangel, right?”

*****

Then

“MTV Gallant- acknowledge this message and stand by to receive confession and communion.”
It was the standard hail, used for business visits of any ranking official from the Sacristy, whether they were lowly country ministers or archbishops.  The signal carried the Voice of Command; not just a metaphor for a powerfully delivered dictum, but a bit of code that locked the Missionary Transport in relative time and space and prevented it from shifting away.

Hilda cursed blasphemously into the silence of the unnaturally still air of the control deck, then hit the switch that would send the automated response to the approaching official.

A moment later, a calm, beautiful man’s form appeared on the console.  His eyes were glacier-blue, set in an aquiline face with pale skin and fiery, wild hair.  Faith illuminated his presence with a pale, golden radiance.  “God’s mercy on you, Sister Hilda.  I look forward to your hospitality.  Is your vessel prepared to receive me?”

“We walk in faith, Archangel,” Hilda answered, swallowing.  She had known that the Ecclesiarchy would have to respond to her initial message, of course, but to send an archangel… and, more to the point, to send this archangel.  “We have prepared the way and made ready your place at God’s table, this evening.  We await your coming.”

Jehudiel was not the oldest of the archangels, nor was he the most powerful- not that the distinction made much difference to Hilda; when comparing a spark to a forest fire, the size of the forest fire is utterly irrelevant.

Jehudiel gave Hilda a gentle smile.  “It has been some time since I could rest my head and wash my feet,” he said wistfully, “I look forward to your quarters most eagerly and hope that my visit will not inconvenience you overmuch.”

He cut the com without another word, but Hilda was far from reassured.  “They could have just sent Michael and been done with it,” she growled and Aristotle winced.

“Maybe he was busy sterilizing a galaxy,” he muttered in a half-hearted attempt at humor.

“That might be funny if it wasn’t true,” Hilda sighed, “not that Jehudiel makes our prospects any better.”

“Jehudiel, the Praise of God, who carries the Sword of Salvation and the Crown of Victory,” Ari recited, “how bad could he be?”

“You’ve never wondered why salvation takes the form of a sword, have you?” Hilda snorted.  When Aristotle didn’t immediately answer, she added, “Jehudiel is the Ecclesiarchy’s chief investigator- he is as puissant as any other archangel, but his duties lie primarily in ferreting out heresy and eradicating it utterly.  His presence means that they are not only hunting you, they suspect me as well.”

“What can we do?” Aristotle asked; for the first time, he looked genuinely worried, although not enough for Hilda’s tastes.

Hilda rubbed her eyes, pinching the bridge of her nose.  “Not much, at present.  We can bide and look for the opportunity to flee; if he decides to act, we cannot stop him.  He would turn this quadrant to ash without blinking, and we haven’t the power or the resources to stand a hope of breaching his defenses.”

*****

Anne Friedland, code name: Network
Now

“Anne- I have found a curious anomaly.  Someone or something has been attempting to break into my systems.”

I frowned and looked up.  Someone attempting to hack into Minerva’s systems was not exactly unusual- for one thing, Minnie was as close to simply being the internet as I could fathom, which meant that any attempt to break through internet firewalls or alter data stored in the cloud was, technically, hacking her systems.  Of course, she was so redundant and complex that even extremely sophisticated hacks and viruses rarely did more than mildly- and extremely temporarily- inconvenience her.  That Minerva had paid close attention to this attempt- whatever it was- bespoke something outside her realms of experience or ability to easily extrapolate.

“The source of the intrusion appears to be a fragment of rogue code,” Minerva continued.

“What,” I asked, “like a competing S.I.?”

Minnie produced a sound not unlike a derisive sniff.  “It may be extrapolative,” she said, “but it’s not self-aware.”

I rolled my eyes.  “Okay, Minnie, quit with the mystery act.  What makes this so interesting to you?”

“My apologies, Anne,” she replied, then her tone changed to a more professional tone.  “The rogue code is something that, assuming my analysis is correct, I will likely write within the next five years.  There are artifacts in the code that almost certainly belong to the programmers that informed my coding style, and other flourishes that are, without question, stylistically mine.  This is strange, though, because I have not yet written this code- it is a temporal anomaly.”

“So… who’s doing it?” I asked.

“I cannot say,” Minnie admitted, “whoever is running the code is paranoid and covering his tracks well.  The rules I incorporated into this iteration of my consciousness prevent me from directly bypassing the security and counter-security the hacker has placed around himself.”

“It won’t stop me, though, will it?” I asked with a slight grin.

Minerva paused for a moment; given the speed at which she was capable of processing, I was certain the pause was for impact and not for any practical purpose, and I reminded myself to congratulate her on instituting that little nuance so effectively.  “I estimate a ninety-seven percent chance that it will not, based on evident relative skill levels,” she finally answered and I laughed.

I cracked my knuckles.  “Right,” I said, “then let’s get to it, shall we?”

*****

Aristotle
Now

I was starting to be frustrated with the unintuitive and generally dumb computer intelligences we seemed to have stumbled into.  Periodically- not often, sadly- I ran across what struck me as elegant and brilliant bits of programming, although I’m sure a real software designer would have called all of it kludge-worthy.  I am decidedly not a programmer, and the more I tried to act like one for Hilda’s sake, the more I really wanted to just take out my rock and readjust all the computer settings manually.

The screen on the historic- prehistoric- P.O.S. that was serving as my desktop suddenly cleared and, for a moment, I thought the machine had died on me again.  Then a cursor appeared and a line of text quickly scrolled across the screen:  “YOU’RE NOT FROM AROUND HERE, ARE YOU?”

I blinked.  My fingers tekked out a response on the keyboard: “WHAT DO YOU MEAN?”

Instead of answering my question, the cursor dropped another line and wrote out, “JUST TALK- YOUR MICROPHONE WORKS AND I CAN HEAR YOU JUST FINE.”

I cleared my throat.  “Who are you?” I half-growled, half-squeaked.

“INTERESTING OVERTONES TO YOUR VOICE- NOT ENTIRELY HUMAN, ARE YOU?”

“I asked first,” I protested illogically.

“CALL ME NETWORK,” the cursor typed out.  “DEPENDING ON YOUR INTENTIONS, I MIGHT BE ABLE TO HELP YOU…”

“Why, by the hand of Michael, would you ever want to do that?” I asked.  I realized my eyebrows had climbed until they threatened to interfere with low-altitude air-traffic.  I also realized this Network- whatever it was- had no way of knowing that, given that there were no cameras in the room or on the device.

“I’M A GOOD SAMARITAN,” was the response, and I snorted.  The story of the Samaritan was hardly a new one- we had it back in our home dimension, as well, the story of a wealthy man who stopped to aid a traveller who had been beaten by robbers.

“I hardly qualify as the victim of a robbery,” I noted drily.

“NOT YET, ANYWAYS,” Network returned, “BUT THE NATURE OF YOUR INQUIRIES SUGGESTS THAT YOU’RE MORE THAN A LITTLE DOWN-AT-YOUR-HEELS.”

I was unfamiliar with that expression, but the meaning seemed clear enough- as well as the implication that she was able to track my progress hunting opportunities for Hilda and myself.  I sighed.  “All right- shave me, but you’ve got it right.  We do need help, or we won’t make it.”

“WE?” the cursor typed, and sat blinking curiously.  I swore under my breath- that had been careless, giving away that there was more than just myself…

“’I’,” I answered firmly.  “Call me Aristotle.”

*****

Then

Jehudiel took little time before embarking on his investigation.  Although he travelled alone- just himself and the Scion named AEV Inviolate, rumored to be his only companion for the last three thousand cycles- he had barely set foot aboard the Gallant before Inviolate had started downloading and decrypting the secure surveillance and communications logs.  The fact that the data had to be downloaded over a physical ship-to-ship link rather than through a quantum wave was a security measure that Hilda was extremely grateful for- it had given her and Aristotle a small window in which to make preparations, although, ultimately, it meant sacrificing the Gallant to Jehudiel’s justice.

In truth, Hilda did not know what degree of sentience the Gallant had acquired- she was a new vessel, after all, barely two hundred and fifty cycles, and she had been programmed with a much more limited intelligence than any Enforcement Vehicle- but if- when- Aristotle’s and Hilda’s heresy was determined, the Gallant would be repurposed, as well, her memory scrubbed and her sentience scoured bare until she had little more intelligence than an abacus.

Hilda wrinkled her nose and snorted in disgust.  That she had been a willing servant of an empire that could so easily discard something as beautiful and chaotic as intelligence and free will tore at her sense of self.  That she might be wrong in defying them, even now, was an even more damning possibility.

“What troubles you, sister?” Jehudiel inquired, startling Hilda out of her contemplation.  He had appeared silently at her side, and she had failed to notice his presence at all, for all of her combat-trained senses and heightened perceptions.

She barely managed to keep herself from starting guiltily; any admission, even a nonverbal admission, might be enough for Jehudiel to pass judgment.  She looked down at the archangel.

If not for his copper hair and blue eyes, he might easily be taken for an albino- his skin was pale to the point of translucency, and his entire form was deceptively frail.  He stood a little over two meters and carried none of Hilda’s prodigious soldiers’ bulk, being more wiry and lean instead of thick and powerful.  Hilda was not fooled by his apparent weakness, of course- she’d known the sensies of archangels tearing apart entire armored battalions with nothing more than their battle armor and the blade of their faith, and she knew he could move with a speed that made striking snakes seem sloth-like by comparison.

She cleared her throat.  “Your pardon, Archangel- I am not troubled, merely contemplating,” she extemporized.  “The Gallant has been stationed here for three cycles; she is young and eager, and it is not well for her to be dormant this long- we are anxious for our next assignment.”

The corner of Jehudiel’s mouth turned up.  “There is a time for everything in its season,” he rebuked her gently, and she felt her cheeks blush.

“Of course, Archangel.  It is possible I grow impatient as well,” she admitted.

He nodded.  “Best to curb your enthusiasm, sister- we are about the work of the faith- it would not do to be hasty.”

Hilda bowed her head submissively and Jehudiel laid two fingers on her scalp in benediction before retiring to his cabin.

Hypocrite, Hilda thought savagely at his departing form, I wonder how much he believes his own press.

She retreated back down the corridor and found Aristotle at work in his compartment.  He looked up as she entered and gave her a toothy grin, holding up a finger.  She waited at the door as he bustled around his workbench and fingered various bits of technological detritus and random gewgaws.  When he reached her, he held out one of his long-fingered paws and beckoned her inside.  As the bulkhead sealed, he sighed.

“There,” he said, “we should be safe enough to talk for now.  I’ve put a looping feed on the surveillance in here, so we should be good for about fifteen minutes.  Any longer than that and the Inviolate- or the Gallant- will undoubtedly start noticing artifacts and inconsistencies.”

Hilda nodded.

“Have you given any further thought to what I showed you?” the skinlyn asked.

“I have,” Hilda nodded, “and I think you are right.  We must escape- and we haven’t much time.”

“And we have to run far-“

“Not just far- Jehudiel will never stop hunting us.  If he believes there is even a chance that we still live, he will track us to the ends of reality.”

Aristotle’s expressive mouth flattened as he considered the problem.

“I may have a solution for that,” he said at last, “but it will require timing.  Timing and some daring- we’ll be doing something no one in the Ecclesiarchy has attempted in a score of millennia…”

Hilda raised an inquisitive eyebrow.

“We’ll be attacking a Scion,” Aristotle explained.

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Is this what's called making the worst of a bad situation?  At least Aristotle seems to know how to make friends in ...

Heretic, Aristotle, Jehudiel, Network, and Minerva all belong to , as do MTV Gallant and AEV Inviolate.

You can find the first section here: 

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To be continued here: 

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