Chapter 1 - The Spiral

Entering was the easy part, making it to the other side was the hard part, and the deeper he drifted into the unknown, the more certain Ikaris became that Arishem had chosen to withhold just how dangerous the situation was.

Perhaps, it was even the celestial could not fully explain the danger since his species rarely faced unsurmountable danger themselves. Ikaris imagined, as a God, it was either or… either you could crush them like a bug, or they would crush you like a bug.

The Universe could not survive an equal battle between monsters any other way. Ikaris drifted for what felt like Eternity. The first part of his Eternity was spent searching for Sersi and the others, but since entering, he never saw them again.

The second half of Eternity was spent trying to preserve his consciousness. There was twisting and spiraling, and everything in between those two motions. It was like a never-ending spiral of death.

Ikaris had more than once experienced falling to his doom, but in this infinite spiral, there was always a new sensation of doom buried under the other versions of doom. Perhaps, that was the true nature of the Omniverse.

The Multiverse was countless iterations of established things, deviating slightly from each other to effect large changes, but Omniverse was completely different. The Omniverse felt like a new perspective on just about everything.

You had no choice in the matter.

Ikaris tried to fly during his eternity, but the concept of flight ceased to exist at times and returned completely different at other times. What was flight without gravity… well, such a thing suddenly became possible for a couple of seconds.

Confusion stacked on the common sense of more confutations things?

Even Ikaris' thoughts weren't making sense anymore; though, he could more or less tell what was happening outside his body. The matter was being displaced, replaced, recycled, returned, and regressed.

As he fell through the infinite spiral, Ikaris could feel his body shrinking in certain places, a clear sign of biological regression. This would directly counteract the boost in power he received from Arishem before his awakening.

Then again, that may have been Arishem's plan.

Had the regression acted on Synthetic parts instead of a biological being, there was a very real chance Ikaris would regain memories of his time on other planets, shattering his mind before he even made it out of the spiral.

'Could Arishem's calculations really have extended this far?'

The obvious answer was YES! Ikaris expected to die, coming was a risk from the start, but he couldn't have predicted the mere incomprehensibility bombarding him at every single moment.

Flashes of understanding would cross his mind every so often. For an instant, he would witness a continent made entirely of Vibranium, then another instant he would witness the Egyptian Overvoid… but the more he drifted, the less Ikaris understood.

Enormous mechas battling for Galactic Superiority.

Movement of peculiar energy called The Force as men fought with glowing sticks.

Super Soldiers made of metal battling against much large alien threats.

A man unconsciously drifting between time, tethering himself to a single woman throughout his life.

Then, there was another version of himself, trekking through the snow beyond a wall of massive proportions.

The more Ikaris saw, and the more he wondered, the more he realized what he was losing to make such discoveries. The realization came a bit too late.

Arishem warned him that things would get weird… and that was just the beginning because, in a few minutes of constant spin, Ikaris could literally witness the moment his memories started to depart from his mind.

Golden mist blocked his vision, and then came a whirlwind of a spin that sent Ikaris into unconsciousness for a couple of seconds. By the time he regained his bearings, Ikaris had forgotten several things.

He could no longer remember her face.

He could no longer remember his family.

What was his mission?

Why was he spiraling through a never-ending twister?

The questions came one after the next. Ikaris knew he was doing something important but who or what was that important thing? He had no idea about that!

Between the disorienting spirals, Ikaris caught sight of three people similarly dressed like himself, but as soon as he saw them, with another twist from the endless spiral, they were gone.

That was the moment he noticed the branches.

Somehow, there were twisters between spiraling corridors spinning at a completely different rate. Ikaris could feel his mind beginning to shatter under the impression of something he couldn't possibly hope to understand.

As an Eternal, he could manipulate the pinnacle of Celestial Technology, but in the end, he could bear to keep his eyes open, less his brain seeps out of his ears. The memories drifted free of his mind, and a sense of despair forced Ikaris to cradle his head, trying to preserve whatever was left.

Honestly, Sprite was mostly what was left.

Her stories and dances…

Now that he thought about it, Ikaris realized that Sprite's energetic attitude was mostly what kept him and Sersi entertained over their thousands of years-long relationship. Ikaris didn't want to lose this as well.

The spinning seemed to stretch endlessly. His physical existence was fine, but Ikaris could feel his mind beginning to shatter under the weight of not just his memories, but memories of lives he had never lived.

That's how he knew – there was no way to survive but let go.

"Pick one and hold onto it!"

Ikaris made the memory of his and Sersi's marriage the core of his being, engraining the love they shared into his very existence… then, he let everything else drift away in a fog of golden memories.

Perhaps, it was best to start from scratch, but Ikaris couldn't find the will to do so.

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INTERNATIONAL SPACE STATION

"Echo-3, Echo-3. We are starting to see an energy spike at your location. Can you confirm anything?"

[Negative Echo-2. Our scanners down here show a clean bill of health.]

"Standby," Cosmonaut Alexa checked his instruments again, noting nothing of importance, but the previous readings were recording so it couldn't be his eyes playing tricks on him. "Continue with Mission Space Tourist. I will forward this information back to base and see what they think about it."

[Rodger.]

----------------------

THE MOON

Astronaut Lauren huffed as she killed the connection to the ISS.

"I told you those fucking Russians will try to find any reason to call our mission off. They never like when we are the first at anything,"

"Keep a steady mind and steady hand, cadet," Superior Astronaut Marin criticized his trainee. "We need the complete clearance in five minutes and we will be free to venture into the unknown as we wish. Besides, this is not the first."

"What do you mean?"

"It's not the first time someone will be arriving at the bottom of Vallis Apes. It's just the first time someone is gonna make it back alive."

"I didn't see those reports," Astronaut Lauren complained as she secured the cable to her spacesuit as she was trained to do over the last couple of months. "Is it classified or something?"

Astronaut Marin rolled her eyes from within her bulky suit. "Would you tell the first Moon tourist that wants to explore a canyon that countless Astronauts have tried to reach the bottom and died because of it?" she inquired.

"I kind of feel like turning back now."

"Too late," Astronaut Marin flicked her coms on to receive the incoming signal.

[You're a go for the bottom. I repeat you're a go for the bottom. Make us proud!]

"Affirmative."

Astronaut Marin and Lauren replied in unison, made the final adjustments to their locking mechanisms, and leaped into the valley from the hill where they stood. They began their slow descent into the darkness, but they couldn't have been more excited even if they tried.

The gravity of the moon ensured they would take about an hour to reach the bottom, so all that was left was to relax and wait.

At least, that's how it should have been.

--------------------

INTERNATIONAL SPACE STATION

The instrument blared again, and this time, Cosmonaut Alexa was ready for it. A quick flick of several buttons locked onto the signal, ensuring he could track it even when it switched frequencies.

And when he saw what the data reflected, Alexa's eyes couldn't help but widen at the implication.

"Command, command! We have a problem! I am seeing vast amounts of gamma radiation originating from the bottom of the valley. We need an immediate cease on a mission! I repeat we need an immediately cease order on a mission!"

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RUSSIAN X USA SHARED COMMAND

EARTH

"What's happening?" Russian Cosmonaut Director, Serge, rushed into the room. "We are receiving a request for a cease notice… why?"

"We are not sure," The Head Analyst reported. "We are only getting the information now and from what we can see…" his voice came to an abrupt stop. "Oh shit!"

"Oh, shit, what?"

"Uhmm…" The Head analyst squirmed in his chair as if contemplating an orgasm.

"Report Soldier!"

"Sir!" The Assistant Analyst stood and saluted, seeing his boss was too appalled to say anything. "We are seeing vast amounts of gamma radiation originating from the bottom of the valley. It wasn't there in any of our previous readings."

"Then we retreat, issue the cease notice!" Director Serge ordered. "I don't see why we have to make this so complicated. We see a risk to the mission, we simply choose another crater to explore. This mission was a formality to begin with."

"It's not that simple." The Head Analyst finally revealed.

"Make it simple!"

"Well…" The Assistant Analyst swallowed his spittle. "The type of gamma readings we are picking up is likely a byproduct of some larger process, and if these readings hold for another ten seconds, then we can be certain exactly which process that is."

"Name the process, soldier!"

"A stable Quantum Accretion Bit Wormhole phenomenon." The Head Analyst reported in a single breath, unsure if his words made any sense now that they had left his mouth.

"In English?" The Director inquired.

"A connection of two points in space using a Quantum Highway that exchanges bits of information via wormhole phenomenon." The Head Analyst rushed to type commands on his computer. "What we are witnessing here is something about to make contact."

"Notify the Roscosmos and Nasa. Continue the mission, we do everything above board from here."

"You are a go, Echo-2. I repeat you are a go."

---------------------

THE MOON

Astronaut Lauren adjusted the signal on her coms as she sunk deeper and deeper into the valley. Of course, this was done under instruction from Astronaut Marin who was experienced enough to know the correct frequencies to adjust to.

Then again, they had an entire course on this mission months before even attempting it.

[Tells us what's happening up there, Echo-2…]

Lauren looked to Marin who simply shrugged since there was nothing in particular happening. Everyone was excited about the mystery signal that may or may not be humanity's first encounter with a technologically superior race, but on the moon, everything seemed as dead as usual.

"Well…" Astronaut Lauren's cheeks turned a bit red under her suit. "Well… the lights installed in the suits brighten our surroundings, but down here is still very dark so we can only see a couple of meters below. It's like floating in space all over, but this time, there are no stars above or below us."

Lead Astronaut Marin's cheeks also turned red when she heard the oohs and ahhs over the coms. Truly, the same old things were nothing to get excited about, but everyone was too excited to really pay attention to what was being said.

CCCHHHHHKKKKK

[We're detecting a spike in the gamma radiation. Do you see anything?]

"Hold up, there is something happening here."

"Fuck, there really is something happening."

Marin and Lauren were startled since they truly didn't expect the idiots at control to get anything right, much less something of this magnitude. One had to note, that Control had some of the smartest people on Earth, but they did tend to be a bit … eccentric.

Half the workers in control still believed the government was covering up aliens on the moon when most of the classified documents have to go through control to get to Earth. Hence, Lauren and Marin didn't trust the guys at control beyond their calculation capacity.

[Describe what you're seeing.]

"WWWOOOOOOOOOOOAAAAAHHHHHHHH!"

Lauren's and Marin's voices rose as the gravity shifted, dragging them down faster than expected. Within a couple of seconds, the trip that should have taken them an hour, took them exactly three seconds to arrive at the bottom.

All common sense said they should have gone splat, but just before they touched the ground, the gravity reversed and the duo landed safely. It was only then that they realized they could hear each other through more than just the coms.

Their voice was traveling through the air – air on the moon? Gravity shifting on the moon, normalizing to just below Earth's gravitational field?

[Tell – us… us … wha- what – what's happening, cadets?]

The transmissions from Control became a broken, muddled bit of data, but Marin could occasionally make out what was being said… so, she decided to continue talking after activating the recording feature as protocol demanded in such situations.

"There is light down here. It's a bit further away from us. Uhm, the gravity shifted suddenly and we fell down into the valley as if we were on Earth, but the gravity reshifted for us to land safely. Now, we are making our way towards the light."

The Astronaut duo took careful steps forward, ready to bolt at the earliest show that something shady was happening in the valley. They were excited by the prospect of a new discovery, but it was not worth their lives.

"Okay, I am seeing an arch of some kind. It has scribbling, like ancient writing on the surface. It is somewhat small, about 2 feet by 2 feet. Definitely made of a kind of metal and it's letting out incredible amounts of energy."

The Astronauts examined the miniature arch that had come into view, and for some reason, they couldn't rip away their attention even when it started to glow multi-colored. Something was coming through – that much was easy to see, but they could no longer find the will to escape.

[Echo-2, Echo-2. Immediately retreat. I repeat, put some distance between yourself and that energy source!]

The warning broke through the fog of interference a bit too late.

BBBBBOOOOOOOOOMMMMMM

BOOOOOOOOOOOOOOMMMM

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THE END OF THE SPIRAL

THE MOON

There was no more sense of self remaining when Ikaris exited the spiraling hell that had trapped him for what felt like an eternity. Of course, Arishem did not bother to tell him where he would exit, so as soon as he felt the pressuring cold of empty space, Ikaris panicked.

Stored Cosmic Energy escaped into the surrounding atmosphere, expanding in an instant and causing a massive concussive force with Ikaris as the epicenter.

BBBBBOOOOOOOOOMMMMMM

BOOOOOOOOOOOOOOMMMM

Two loud booms followed the appearance of an Eternal, but as confused as he was, Ikaris did not have the presence of mind to do anything other than be carried away by the blast.

The Cosmic Energy that usually protected an Eternal had dispersed, leaving Ikaris shooting out of the valley with no way to arrest his momentum. It was only by some miracle that the last vestiges of his consciousness thought to correct his trajectory upon exiting the valley.

Now, he was heading towards the planet of blue and green in the distance – the Earth. Ikaris drifted into unconsciousness – only a single memory able to comfort him on the journey to come.

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"We need aid!" Astronaut Lauren clutched Marin close to her chest, yellow lightning of Cosmic Energy dancing over their bodies. "I repeat, we are in desperate need of assistance."

[Cadet, repeat. What happened? The energy signature has disappeared. What happened?]

"Uhm… Uhm…" Lauren listened to the hissing of their space suits and could tell she and Marin would not make it, so she decided to give all the information she could about the incident that had just taken place.

At the very least, that would be her last duty in this world.

"There was an explosion, we were exposed to something, and… argh!" Lauren coughed a mouthful of blood as Cosmic Energy ravaged her body. "It's a strange energy eating our bodies from the inside."

[Did anything else happen? Your next words may very well determine the survival of humanity, so think very carefully.]

"A kid… a kid came out of it," Marin was also choking on her blood, somehow forming the words between breaths. "The kid looked about fourteen or fifteen. He stumbled a bit after he came out but… he is gone now. I don't think he survived."

[Listen Echo-2, someone will be at your position in a few minutes, we need you to-]

"Too late."

Lauren and Marin replied in unison since they felt it at the same time. The Cosmic Lightning crackled one more time before dissipating and with it, Lauren's and Marin's bodies also disintegrated into particulates.