Heretical Edge

Once Mom and Dad were up to speed on the entire situation, or at least as much as I understood myself, it was time to move on to the part where we figured out where the rift in this area was. Or rather, it would be time for that as soon as we solved a different problem. Namely, getting our parents out of here and back into the regular world. Which proved to be a little more complicated than it sounded, considering I wasn't even sure how we'd brought them into the Archive to begin with.

Part of the problem, I was sure, was that the entire Flique had wanted to see them in person. Basically, we had all wished so hard for them to be in here with us that we managed to make it happen. But now it was the opposite. Logically, most of us knew that they needed to go back out there. Yet after everything we had been through, sending our parents into danger wasn't exactly an easy sell. And it was even harder to be enthusiastic about that.

Hell, I wasn't all that eager to go back out there myself, aside from the occasional quick glimpse to make sure our body wasn't being eaten or anything. We were all splitting duties on that, keeping an eye on what was going on outside. Which, for the most part, was nothing at all. My body was simply lying there in the desert with no one and nothing around. Fortunately, the various bits of regeneration we’d picked up protected from sunburn or anything like that. Anytime one of the local wildlife investigated to see if we were food, whoever was watching dissuaded them from it.

So, we were okay on that front. But we still needed to accept that Mom and Dad had to leave this place. There was definitely a part of me, a part of all of us, that didn't want to let that happen. After all, they were safe in here, away from all that. Safer than they were outside, anyway. Quiet as it may have been, and as much as I might have tried to dismiss it right out of the gate, there was a small voice in the back of my mind whispering if our parents stayed here, there would be no chance of them getting hurt by whatever was by the rift.

In the end, it didn't matter what I said to myself. Nor did it matter what any of the rest of my sibling-selves said to one another. It wasn't until our parents sat down with us and promised that they would come back, while pointing out that if our body ended up being killed it would probably destroy this place and everyone in it, that I felt the mental lock that had been keeping them here disengage. There wasn't quite a literal click, but close enough. I instinctively knew what to do.

And just like that, with a renewed and firm promise from our parents to come back and visit everyone here as much as possible once we weren't in such a time crunch, we were back in the outside world.

Scrambling to my feet immediately, I looked around once more. I could feel my parents staring at me for a moment, but I needed to make sure we had our bearings. Nothing had changed. We were still in that mostly empty desert with that pyramid visible off in the distance. There were no other signs of life, or anything to tell us when or where we were.

Of course, something else immediately struck me right then. It was hot here. Seriously, seriously hot. I was already drenched in sweat, even though my clothes had minor temperature protection on them. It wasn't quite enough for this.

Fortunately, Dad had the answer. No sooner had I wiped an arm over my face, then he produced an actual field-engraver. He had been practicing useful magic, apparently. And one of those spells was about regulating temperature in extreme environments. He used it on all of us, and I immediately felt like I was in an air-conditioned room. Boy was I going to make sure his magic teacher gave him an A-Plus.

Of course, as soon as I didn't have the heat to worry about, it left me thinking about everything else. Turning to face my parents, I exhaled. “I know all that was kind of a lot to take, and I'd love to give you all a week or a month to digest it properly.”

Mom’s voice was gentle as she reached out to cut my face. “But we only have six days. Oh Felicity, believe me, this isn't the first time I've had to set my surprise aside to focus on the mission at hand.”

Dad cleared his throat. “I may be a bit newer to the literal saving the world through life and death combat thing, but I've had my share of emotional revelation that needed to be processed later.”

The two of them exchanged looks briefly before Mom continued. “Besides, we've processed much worse news than this. All of this?” Her hand moved to gesture at me, indicating everything I was, everything we were. “This is surprising, exciting, overwhelming, even staggering. But it's not bad.”

With a nod, Dad agreed, “That's right. I mean, we love you. How could having more of you be a bad thing? All those other versions of you, the other people in there are like your siblings, like having dozens of twins all together. And for us, it's like having a couple hundred extra kids.” He offered me a slight smile. “Only without all the extra work of feeding everyone.” As soon as he said that, my father adopted an exaggeratedly terrified expression while grabbing my shoulders. “Wait, you don't have to eat enough for the entire group, do you? We might have a whole space station full of farms and resources, but I’ve already seen the way just one of you can put away those pancakes.”

Blushing at the teasing, I gave him a little push while shaking my head. But a wave of gratitude watched over me. I knew what he was doing. Our father was showing that he would still tease and joke with me-- with us. That hadn't changed. He wasn't going to act weirded out by our situation. They both accepted us. They loved us. Obviously, it was going to take time to process it, and I knew the rest of the Flique wanted to bring them back in for longer interactions as soon as possible. But right now, they knew about us, and they accepted us.

Yeah, Story agreed from her place in the back of my mind, to tell you the truth, the rest of us are still processing this whole situation, and we've had a lot longer than them. They're actually dealing with this better than any of us expected. It's kind of a lot.

She wasn't wrong, and I really did wish that we could turn everything else off and just focus on this. Unfortunately, that rift wouldn't wait. So, I took a deep breath before offering my parents a smile. “First of all, we've only got the one body, so we're still only eating for one person. Though we do tend to use up a fair amount of energy with everything we do, which means I could totally devour even more pancakes than you think. Mmm pancakes.”

“My suggestion,” Mom idly noted for Dad, “buy a lot more mix.”

Once that was settled, I focused on my distance power. Or started to. But before I could even decide what location to compare our current position to, Mom spoke up. “Looks like we're definitely in Egypt. Which, I know, should be self-evident, but there are deserts and pyramids in more places than you might think. Some of them are just more hidden than others.” As she said that, Mom's hand slid it down Dad's arm. “Remind me to show you.”

Well, okay, we knew we were in Egypt, but not much else. And that didn't exactly narrow down when we were. This wasn't even necessarily ancient times, and even if it was, ancient Egypt encompassed an awful lot of years.

So, we only had one thing to do, really. And that was start walking toward the pyramid. Mom, always prepared, produced several bottles of water and dried fruit and meat, which we passed around while heading that way. It was far enough that we were going to have to walk for quite awhile. Or we would have, if Story hadn't mentally slapped the back of my mind with an incredulous, Dude, you can teleport, remember? What the hell are we doing?

Blushing deeply, I retorted, Hey, I’m a little distracted right now. And maybe part of me was thinking the slower walk would give them time to process things a little better before we jump right into things. Which was a bad idea, I knew. We might have six days to get to that rift, but who knew how long it would take to manage that. We couldn't afford to waste time, not with something like this.

So, after taking a swig of cold water, I turned to my parents. “Hey, I know I just dumped a lot of stuff on you in a really short time, but remember that minor little bit about me being able to transport anywhere on the planet after what happened with Maestro? I guess we don't really need to do this the long way after all. I mean, if you're ready.” And boy did that question have a double meaning in my head.

Mom held up her hand. “If we are going to find this rift without attracting attention to ourselves, we need disguises before we go anywhere.” With that, she produced a field engraver and took a moment to try a spell I hadn't seen before. According to her, it would make the locals who looked at us see us as completely average, ordinary people. It didn't actually change our appearance at all, it simply made it so they would think there was nothing out of the ordinary about our appearance. We wouldn’t stand out at all in their minds. They would think they were seeing the sort of people they expected to see, essentially.

Obviously, that served a double purpose. Not only did it mean we wouldn’t immediately jump out as strangers to be wary of, but it also meant we could look around and be ignored even more than the average person for the most part. At least, that was the idea. We were still going to need to try our best not to draw any extra attention to ourselves.

Once it was activated, the spell simply felt like a soft, warm, fuzzy sensation against my skin. It kind of tickled a bit. We didn't look any different to one another, but Mom assured us it was working properly. Then they both looked expectantly to me.

“I did always say we should take a vacation somewhere far away,” Dad mused thoughtfully. “I wasn't really thinking about Egypt, but still.”

Mom shook her head at him, moving a finger to poke him in the chest. “No you don't. This doesn't get you out of that globetrotting trip you promised we were going to go on back when I got elected sheriff. You said we'd set foot on every continent and as many different countries as possible once we retired. I am absolutely holding you to that.”

With a small smile, Dad caught her finger and used it to pull her hand up so he could kiss it gently. “You're right, I did say that. And as soon as you retire from all this, I'll make good on my word.”

I knew what they were doing, of course. They were treating all this like it was completely normal so I wouldn't freak out so much. I had been worried about how they would react to everything, and here they were playing it down for me. This entire situation, everything I had told them and everything we needed to do, had to have hit both of them like a truck. Hell, we were doing this whole thing just to send me through a rift that might end up going badly again for all I knew. Between that and everything else I’d dumped on them, I was asking them to accept a hell of a lot on very short notice.

Well, with all that in mind, I couldn't help but embrace both of them again. I didn't actually need to touch them to teleport, but I didn't care right then. I hugged them tightly and shivered a little from the emotions rushing through me (through us, rather, since I was still feeling things from the rest of my sibling-selves) before focusing on my transportation power. At the last second I had a thought of how awkward it would be if it didn't work for whatever reason and we ended up having to walk after all.

But no, the universe didn't feel like being quite that funny this time. As soon as I focused on that area of sand that I had seen far off in the distance closer to the pyramid, we were suddenly there. I didn't want to send us directly onto the pyramid, not before we had a better idea of who, what, and when we were dealing with. I just put us close enough to walk the rest of the way in a few minutes once we took a moment to see what we were walking into. This entire situation was so much of an unknown, I was glad I’d had the opportunity to explain the situation to my parents before we got into anything. Which, of course, made me wonder if the Ankou had actually done that intentionally.

Immediately after arriving on the edge of that next sand dune, I put those thoughts out of my mind and focused. My gaze snapped toward the pyramid, expecting to see it right in front of us. Except it wasn't. I had specifically focused on a part of the desert that should have left the pyramid only a few minutes walk away. But when I looked in that direction, it was no closer than it had been before.

Dad made a noise of confusion, staring that way before looking at me and then turning in a circle to take in our new surroundings. “Okay, I know I haven't been in many deserts, and it's easy to get lost, but I feel like we moved. We did move, right? This area looks a little different. Unless I'm just going crazy and you haven't done anything yet.”

“We moved,” Mom assured him with a visible frown as she stared at the pyramid. “But it seems like that thing moved as well. Or… hmm. Either the structure itself relocated, or there is some sort of spatial distortion effect happening. That would be a very effective defense, if it was possible to pull off. If someone isn't allowed into the pyramid, no matter how far they walk to get to it, they’re never any closer. The space around that location is elongating to prevent us from getting any closer. That’s fascinating.”

My head shook. “Yeah, that's really awesome, and if we can find whoever made it, I'll be sure to ask for the spell recipe. I can already think of a few really good uses for it. But right now, how do we get past it? Because that pyramid is the only thing that stands out aside from more and more sand around here. Between that and this spiffy protection magic or whatever it is, I'd say it has to be where we're supposed to go. But if I can't even teleport us past that, I don't think we stand a chance walking the whole way.” Which, I realized, was another aspect of that protection. People would spend all their effort and energy just trying to walk through this hot desert. Most wouldn't have my teleportation. So, by the time they realized for certain that they weren't getting any closer, they would have been in rough shape.

Fortunately we noticed in time. Stopping there, I stared at the distant pyramid with my parents on either side of me. “That's got to be some very powerful spatial magic if it can twist my teleport. It's got some juice behind it.”

I let Story take over the end so she and Mom could compare notes on trying to diagnose this special distortion that was somehow able to trick my teleportation. Or, more to the point, they were trying to find a way past it. Unfortunately, they couldn't figure it out. They came up with a few possibilities, but nothing worked when they tested them. No matter what we did, the pyramid remained just as far away as when we started.

“Could it be the rift itself?” Dad mused thoughtfully before coughing when we looked at him. “Sorry, I know I'm not exactly Merlin over here. But you said the rift goes through time and space. Seems like we're dealing with something twisting space right now. Makes sense that the two would be related, even if it's just someone siphoning off the rift to make this effect.”

Mom took his hand, tucking him down into a kiss. “You are much better than Merlin. And I think you might have a point. They must be connected. But how do we get past something like that? If our entire goal here is to get to the rift, and the rift is the thing being used to keep us away from it…”

For a minute after that, we stared at the pyramid some more. I considered teleporting somewhere else and then coming back to see what would happen, or if we could find out what else was going on in this general area. At least we could find out what year it was. But I was afraid that with that spatial distortion thing on, I might not be able to find my way back even this close.

Before I could come up with anything else, Dad spoke while looking up. “You know, I would say that's something you don't see every day, but at this point, we kind of do. That's what I think it is, right?”

I had followed his gaze by that point. Not that what we were looking at was hard to miss, as the very distinctive shape came closer, clearly heading right toward us. “Yes,” I murmured, “and I sure hope those disguise spells are really working right now.

“Because that's the Olympus.”