Nissa instinctively increases her temperature! A sense of urgency overtakes her! Destroy those things!
She cools down a little… they can’t break the tube. It’s colossal to us. Like that glass that can support elephants if we were fleas.
But even knowing she is safe because she stayed outside the tube as Henri said, one thing is certain…
Nissa grows back and says, “that was scarier than the Amityville Horror!” She goes on to describe what she saw.
To the Builder, Henri shakes his head, "Thank you, but we need to know more before we subject anyone to that effect. It will drastically reduce your blood's ability to," he pauses. "May I take a blood sample? You saw what I did earlier to myself for the test? I would like to do the same to you, if you wish. This is up to you, not up to the Director."
He looks at the Director, "With all due respect, of course."
“The sequel is never as scary ’cause you’re ready for it. I’m ready if there are more tests!”
Nissa will observe the Builder’s sample, and/or any other(s) that Henri wants to test as well.
The most relevant difference Henri finds between the Builder's blood and his own is that the Builder has more hemoglobin, not because he has more hemoglobin per blood volume, but because he has more blood overall. With the extra size the Builder has on Henri (and everyone else there), the Builder might not suffer the same anemic affects by downing the full flask as Henri likely would.
Henri could reasonably predict from what he's observed that, were he to down the flask and the nanites used his blood the way they did the sample, he'd be out of commission for racing until he'd had a significant rest.
Nissa sees the same thing again. The nanites build part of something but their process ends with these whiplike tendrils thrashing about trying to connect the thing they've built to something else that is not present in the blood.
"Thank you for your contribution. I think I've learned as much as I can without a more in-depth test."
Henri injects the substance.
Nothing happens for about three seconds.
Henri winces in pain. His eyes roll back in his head.
Henri's mouth flaps like he's going to talk but no words come out. Henri looks like he's going to faint.
Theo surges forward to catch the unresponsive speedster. "Henri! Henri!"
“Henri—”
Nissa zips into the injection area!
She knows that once the nanobots have built their structure, it is stable. So for safety, Nissa simply needs to not get between a nanobot and its target. If she stays behind where the nanobots do their stuff—or rather, stays where the work is done—she can safely survey the changes.
She trusts Henri is knowledgeable enough, scientifically, that he hasn’t sealed his own fate.
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Henri is uncertain of the appropriate way to inject a foreign substance like this without an IV bag, but he has lost friends to addiction and supposes that their method will serve here. He creates an impromptu tourniquet on his left arm before taking a deep breath. His focus is all-consuming as he injects the substance into his left arm. Feeling nothing yet, he pulls the tourniquet loose and immediately feels like he's been struck by lightning. Wave after wave of pain roll from the injection point through his body.
He attempts to relate what he's feeling, ever the scientist, to his friends, but whenever he opens his mouth, only a gasp issues forth as another wave rolls over him.
This is what happens when you are too focused. Do you remember?
The boy pays no attention to the sand and the sun, intently watching as he uses a stick to lift a rock in the sand and watching the creatures underneath scatter and dive into their burrows. He reaches to touch the ground, marveling at how it can feel cool and even damp from a rainstorm days past. He doesn't hear it, a rasping like rocks thrown across the floor of an arroyo, a rattling...
His eyes widen as he realizes the danger, the sound of the snake's warning finally breaking through his focus, too late. The rattling stops. Pain explodes in his thigh as the fangs sink in. He's going to die - the snake is large, he's seen smaller snakes deliver lethal quantities of venom. They are a fact of life here. He's going to die here in his front yard.
He thinks how Father found a job this week and took Mother to her job cleaning houses - they could afford to drive today, so they didn't have to walk to town, leaving before the boy even woke up. He got to eat breakfast with both of them and tell them excitedly about all the things he's learned from the books they brought from the town library. They smiled and shook their heads at the crazy ideas their boy had about being a pilot one day, a doctor the next, an engineer the third. He thinks how that will all end because he didn't hear a rattle.
The pain of the venom is so intense. Wave after wave of fire from the fangs all through his little body.
__________
I remember. I survived. I will survive again.
Seconds pass, feeling like hours. Just when he feels like the transition has completed and he can relax, a final explosion of sharp pain strikes him, becoming an unremitting agony that makes it impossible for him to think. His eyes roll back in his head and while he makes a visible effort to maintain his balance, his struggle is obvious and Theo leaps to his aid.
He looks down at the snake, fangs still embedded in his leg. The thoughts, the fury, have come so fast that his hand flashes down to grab the reptile behind the head. Two will die here, then. It is a useless gesture, but the snake will die, too. He grabs the snake with all of the strength he can muster, thinking of the way the people in town dismiss him as a poor child from the desert, focusing that anger, too, into killing the snake.
He hears footsteps, crunching in the gravel of the road, slowly approaching. He should run, should hide, should not speak to the stranger. He cannot move.
The stranger steps up, blocking the sun, shading the boy. A young man, dressed strangely. Loosely draped cloth, sandals tied to his feet with long laces that wrap around the man's calves and reach nearly to his knees. Metal on his arm, metal around his head.
The man reaches down to the viper in the boy's hands. "Not today. You have many races to run." He takes the snake and it becomes a rod. The boy blinks, certain this hallucination is because of the venom. The man is not real after all. The young man touches the rod to where the fangs had torn the flesh of the boy's leg. The sudden relief overwhelms the boy where the pain had steeled him. He faints.
__________
You did. You changed. How will you change this time?
Feeling the godling's strength, the speedster leans into the support. He recalls the breathing techniques of his racing days, begins pushing the agony out of his mind by focusing on the breaths, bringing in extra oxygen to make up for the hemoglobin that he knows the nanites are using for their work. Theo feels the full weight of the smaller man as he gives the breathing all his concentration.
They did not believe him. They shook their heads again when he started running. Every day, running. Longer and longer distances, faster and faster.
__________
As he falls into the rhythm of the breathing, his mind detaches from the pain, rises above the agony as his entire body is rewired from inside, and the scientist returns. He notes the sensations for future study. He endures.
Yes, that's always the question, isn't it? How will I change this time?
“Henri—”
Nissa zips into the injection area!
She knows that once the nanobots have built their structure, it is stable. So for safety, Nissa simply needs to not get between a nanobot and its target. If she stays behind where the nanobots do their stuff—or rather, stays where the work is done—she can safely survey the changes.
She trusts Henri is knowledgeable enough, scientifically, that he hasn’t sealed his own fate.
Henri only needs to think an assent and the recording starts. During the recording, the visual stimulation of the snake held in a gloved hand disappears. The voices play in the darkness.
Aviary: Why have you done this Hamel?
Hamel: It's just a sedative. You heard him, Aviary. He wanted to try for Utopia on foot. We'd never have made it. The wave is coming.
Aviary: You aren't any safer in here.
Hamel: We would be if we were in stasis. I need you to let us in one of the nests.
Aviary: My primary mission is to repopulate bird populations. Emptying a nest of eggs contradicts that mission.
Hamel: Tell you what, I'll find you a million birds when I get out of here, for each egg you have to sacrifice to keep us alive. Just empty out one of the nests.
Aviary: Hamel, you are a human; you will not fit in a nest.
Hamel: Let me take worry about that.
The recording ends.
"You are rescue? All power has been redirected to preserve Nest 000007 as per mission parameters. Time on mission 687 years. Please proceed to effect rescue. Mission completion pending."
Charles rouse themself from musing on what could have happened to this world and the bioscrubbers when they realize how much they've missed. They look at Henri anxiously, hoping he's not being hurt further. They do their best from the outside to figure out what's happening.
Henri doesn't appear to be comfortable, but he isn't actively showing the levels of pain that he was when the nanites first hit his bloodstream.
At this point, he appears to be in a trance, seeing something that the others do not. Perhaps a virtual reality display? His lips are moving slightly as though he is speaking, but he is not making any sound.
Nissa eventually emerges from Henri’s head. “The nanobots built a Thing. It goes all the way to Henri’s brain!”
She sees his lips move, but not even little fairy ears can hear the words… if there even are words.
Kate, can you pick up any of Henri’s thoughts?
"He is talking to himself," says Kate in Utopia, her own ability translating words into their meanings. "Both sides of a conversation. Talking about rescuing people. He might be losing his mind."
You have learned, during the trip over, that the majority of work Communicator's do is the equivalent of marriage counselling. They sit with people who can't communicate and help them feel the other's true intentions. Most of the Communicator's have felt they were meant for something more. Something like this.
Charles rouse themself from musing on what could have happened to this world and the bioscrubbers when they realize how much they've missed. They look at Henri anxiously, hoping he's not being hurt further. They do their best from the outside to figure out what's happening.
[dice=Medicine]1d20+9
Henri seems to be in some kind of trance. His eyes are open, but he can't see.
"He is talking to himself," says Kate in Utopia, her own ability translating words into their meanings. "Both sides of a conversation. Talking about rescuing people. He might be losing his mind."
You have learned, during the trip over, that the majority of work Communicator's do is the equivalent of marriage counselling. They sit with people who can't communicate and help them feel the other's true intentions. Most of the Communicator's have felt they were meant for something more. Something like this.
“To what? The nanobots are in Henri’s brain, so maybe he’s talking to them.” Nissa says in an encouraging tone, “Kate, I think you have a very unique ability here… we can only guess at the generalities. But you know the specifics.
“I believe Henri would be okay with you sharing the internal conversation. I mean… as long as it’s not juicy gossip, or something personal like his first kiss or something.”
Nissa thinks about her first kiss.
Kate concentrates and then shrugs, "It's too fast and all one voice. It doesn't make sense. Like two people talking at once and both of them are Henri. They are talking about rescue."
“A rescue?” Nissa wonders if Henri stumbled onto the answer! “Kate—no matter how weird, can you give us some details? Don’t worry if it sounds strange, or even nonsensical. We’re used to weird and we’ve got Mindy and other Minders of your world.”
She turns to other Communicators, and Builders and Directors too. “Any of you might pick up info in your area of expertise, so don’t be shy if you’ve got something to share. If those nanobots are telling Henri how to rescue your people—or your world maybe?—this isn’t the moment to be a stickler to the hierarchy. Utopians thrive by working together. This is just gonna be a different togetherness than the routine you’ve kept up your entire lives.”
One of the Builders starts to speak. The host Director and host Minder seem ready to intervene, but Nissa's words stop them.
"You asked about bioscrubbers. I think we have worked at another site that might be one of those. The Minder and the Engineer said it maybe made a big sound pointed at the sky. Could that be a bioscrubber?" the Builder asks.
The host Director and host Minder seem to think that's a reasonable question and look at you for the answer.
Nissa is not at all surprised that a builder had something brilliant to say. She is a little surprised the others reacted so well. Pleasantly so.
“That sounds very likely. So likely, I think we need to stay here a little longer so we can visit the site—when it’s safe to travel there, I mean.
“Are we going to hunker down here for shelter from the cold winds, or do we need to leave this site?”
Theo give Nissa an affirming nod, acknowledging her good work.
Nissa is not at all surprised that a builder had something brilliant to say. She is a little surprised the others reacted so well. Pleasantly so.
“That sounds very likely. So likely, I think we need to stay here a little longer so we can visit the site—when it’s safe to travel there, I mean.
“Are we going to hunker down here for shelter from the cold winds, or do we need to leave this site?”
The Director responds with Kate's help, "We have time to finish your visit, but we should hurry. We haven't been able to get past the second doors in the last building. It would not be safe to travel to the other site the Builder mentioned."
"Maybem if he's talkin to the stuff he injected. Maybem they're tellin him how to finish the plan they started in the illusions we saw?"
Nissa gushes a little at Daddy’s approval. Unless the brains of her party (which she thinks is everyone else) think otherwise, Nissa would gladly wrap up here for the safety of everyone not made of fire. And herself too, since her own ability to resist cold is limited.
Still staring into space, Henri's face takes on a bit of a smirk and he clearly says, "OK, good," before his voice returns to very low levels or actual silence.
He nods, almost imperceptibly, and quietly says, "...original mission. Please advise."
Henri starts to come out of it.
Henri blinks, obviously coming to the present. He grips Theo’s shoulder, ”Thank you, friend.”
”This project is, was, Nest 000007. As we have learned, this was intended to restore birds to the world. I have made contact with the artificial intelligence controlling the site, know as Aviary. We need to rescue the workers from this site - Aviary has them in stasis in the last structure and after 680 years, there is a real possibility of catastrophic power loss here.”
Henri starts moving toward the last structure. He’s listening for other connections or thoughts from Aviary as he goes.
Nissa is surprised by Henri’s news… and the fact that there are still things that can surprise her.
“Okay, so… they’re here? Okay, ummm… okay! I can fly through walls. Kate can keep in touch with my mind. So if you need me to do any subatomic B & E, I’m your girl!”
She mumbles, “Technically just E, since the point of my power is to enter without breaking anything.”
She then considers the nest with all the magical grubs. She checks to see if that nest has a number on it.
"It should not be necessary. I think Aviary is going to open the door for us. They are concerned about the success of the mission, which requires them to keep the staff members safe until Rescue arrives. We are Rescue."
He continues to whatever portal is evident in the structure, looking back to see if the others are following when he gets there.
Nissa does find, in numbers she recognizes from their similarity to Atlantean, a string of six digits. This small container is 084303.
The large domed Aviary structure has an outer door that the hosts say they opened long ago.
Once you get inside though, another door in the floor, the hosts say, has resisted all their efforts to open.
Henri walks up to the door, looking for a control that would allow him to unlock the door. Finding nothing, he says, "Aviary, assist me."
Theo watches at a distance with the other Utopians.
The floor slides open when Henri asks for help. The smell that comes up from below is putrid.
The opening in the floor reveals a spiraling staircase into a deep dark pit.
The wall are lined with little stasis chambers, like the nests you found being repaired in Pod 3. The stasis chambers line the wall surrounding the spiraling staircase and continue into the darkness below, as far as the eye can see ... there are tens of thousands of them.
Nissa is no longer an air breather, so the sulfur smell doesn’t bother her.
Fortunately the air about her doesn’t light from her fiery presence.
Aviary does not wait for Henri's answer.
One light comes on in one Nest. The seventh one. 99,999 other stasis chambers remain dark.
The smell of hundreds of thousands of rotting eggs wafts past you.
Henri’s breath catches, but he’s not in danger of getting sick - he’s concerned that Aviary’s mission may not have worked out, after all.
He starts down the stairs slowly. ”Aviary, where are the staff members?”
Nissa flits over to the only lit nest. “The lights are on at quintuple-oh-seven. Does that mean somebody’s home?”
Nissa finds the men in the nest are taller than her, but as men normally were when she was human-ish.
“Henri! They aren’t birds! They’re the people from the journal—and they’re half a foot tall!” Seeing that the men aren’t moving, Nissa would probably have guessed they were a paused illusion. But knowing Hamel is magical and made a promise to the Atlantean, she says, “I think it’s really them, in cryogenic whatever!”
She eagerly awaits Henri to do a thing that will probably wake up the little guys.
"Aviary, advise. We have not revived anyone from 687 years of stasis previously. What medical attention should we be prepared to provide? And how did the staff members manage to fit into such a small chamber?"
“I’ll bet Hamel used his magic,” Nissa says of the second question. But for the first question, Nissa asks Henri, “Can you ask that Aviary guy if warmth will help?”
Her hands momentarily are engulfed in flames.. but she puts the fire out and quickly moves her not-flaming hands behind her back, just in case ending Cryogenic Whatever releases a combustible gas.