Higher Ground

Steam everywhere. It didn’t matter where he went, it seemed to follow him like a cartoon cloud. No one wanted to ask but if they were indeed planning on infiltrating an enemy stronghold, it was a bit of a giveaway. Avoiding the question, both Char and Tay attempted various methods of stealthily wafting or otherwise dispersing of the steam while Varkral wasn’t looking. None were very successful.
“If you don’t mind my asking, why is it there’s always steam trailing from your arm?” Char shot a surprised look at Lore as if the question were taboo. Tay snuck the notebook she had been using as a fan behind her back.
“My last visit to this area left me without an arm and nearly without my life. And despite their less than warm reception, I hear the locals still name themselves after me.” He flexed his arm. “Steam and sorcery, that’s what keeps me moving. Although, I understand your companions wish for secrecy.” He tapped his staff to his arm and the steam flowed no more. “Sorcery alone will have to suffice.”
“When you say ‘Sorcery’, you mean…” Lore shrugged slightly.
“The noble art of magic.” He looked confused. Lore flashed their Breacher across his body. “Can I be of service?”
“You could drop the act?” Lore showed the results to Char. “Scanner says we’re nearly biologically identical. So who are you?”
“I am Varkral, Son of Alrek. Though not born that way, it is my name now.”
“And before you were Varkral, if you don’t mind, who were you?” Lore kept their head on the swivel as they approached a crossroads.
Varkral looked to Lore, then to Char and Tay. He pulled Lore in closer and whispered in their ear. “I was born Lorelei Alreksbarn.”
“Must have been nice to know your parents…” Lore spoke under their breath. The well wasn’t too far away now. They let Varkral lead, falling back to join Char and Tay. “It makes no sense, his scans nearly match mine pre wedding but he doesn’t seem to know who we are.” Lore brought up the scans again.
“Well the scan must be wrong, look.” Char pointed to Varkral’s variance factor. “That number shouldn’t be higher than one point one.” The number read one point three one inspiring both Char and Tay to perform their own scans. Both tapped at their Breachers once the scan completed. “I’m getting the same result.”
“Same here.” Tay scanned Char to confirm her Breacher was still functioning after the years of abuse it had endured with its previous owner.
“What does one point one two mean?” Lore had an image of Tay before them. Tay let out a concerned sigh.
“That’s the reason I can’t see this through to the end. The scans are relative. One point one means the scanned object is from the present and is in the present. My one point one two means I’m from this timeline but I’m directly influencing events that could change my future.”
“Is this an appropriate time to be discussing the relativity of the universe?” Varkral stopped them in their tracks. None of them seemed content with leaving the conversation there. “Fine. There was a belief among the Seers our village that there was more to reality than the planets and stars in our skies. That for every action there was an infinite number of worlds. I made it my life’s work to prove them right and I did. The first digit is the base of our universe. One. The second is the variance of the universe. In this case one. And the last is the variance of the parallel. That is not ‘your’ child more rather an image of what your child could be.”
“Brian! I think I…Hang on, where’ve Brian and Alodrass gotten to?” There was a shared confused look as everyone mumbled while looking back over their shoulders. Lore rescanned the area, the majority of the humans were now in the well. “I know what happened to everyone!” Lore stormed off ahead.
The rest of the group followed but were unable to match Lore’s speed and stealth. Eventually they caught up but only because they had reached the well’s edge. From the maps and the way Varkral had described it, it seemed smaller but within the well was enough room to house the nearly three thousand strong army Varkral had described with enough room to comfortably quintuple that number.
“Not what I was expecting.” Lore grabbed the binoculars Tay was offering to them. After a brief glance they lowered their head and sighed. “I’ve found our friends.” They passed the binoculars over and pointed to the other side of the well where two blue figures were crouched mirroring their exact movements. “I’ll go get them.” And with a flash, they were gone. Two more flashes occurred and finally, everyone who hadn’t been taken captive was together.
“We have the advantage. If we move in quick and quietly, we can all achieve our goals and the enemy will be none the wiser.” Varkral waved his staff.
“I’m sorry, who are you?” Sukal pointed to Varkral.
“It’s a long story… I’ll explain later. He is right though. Right now we have the element of surprise so let’s get going.” Lore opened the nearby hatch and as the air seal hissed open and the dome’s atmosphere rushed out, so did three rifle barrels.
They didn’t speak but they didn’t need to. While their captors were greatly outnumbered, Lore submitted to them. With all but Tay slightly confused the remaining party members followed suit, stowing their weapons and following silently. The dome that covered the well did little to obscure its interior but the closer they came, the more impressive it seemed. What from afar had looked like a ramshackle city was in fact an illusion of paint and rusted plates. Given its main tunnels depth, it would have been a simple conversion but none of them had expected it. At the dome’s centre, decorated to appear as a fracking rig, stood the scaffold for a sizable rocket that assumedly slumbered in the nearby well. One thing that confused them was the guards willingness to accept their surrender, a failure that Varkral readily exploited. With a flick of his staff, the first soldier was thrown into the air before promptly colliding with the dome above. Before the second could react her time was stopped, freezing her as they had once done to Famine. The third guard was taken in a team effort between Char and Tay who simply attacked with their weaponry.
“Ok… Now what?”  Varkral’s victim came falling back to the ground.
Lore sized up the three bodies before retrieving a set of hand cuffs. “You know how you wanted to role play…” Tay gagged. War Won.