Nick pushed greenery aside as he led us along a small stream that cut directly through the island. It wasn’t far removed from something we saw during one of my father’s many nature outings—major difference being, this stream didn’t feel historic. There was no algae, no accumulation of dirt or evidence of erosion. Just a smooth stone rut that cut through the center of the island.

Up ahead, Halima was kneeling near a section of the stream that dropped off into a stagnant creek. I stared at the ripple. I understood that something was wrong with it, but it took a moment for my mind to stop “fixing” the fallacy. The surface of the water was anomalous. There were no frothing bubbles or ripples from where the stream emptied into the creek.

“It’s falling the wrong way,” I said. Which made even less sense when you considered the stream was clearly heading this direction.

Halima squinted at the anomaly. “It’s hurting my brain to look at.”

“Then why are you staring at it?” Keith asked.

“We don’t know what the conditions are. If I look away, it might close,” Halima answered.

Jesus Christ. I already need a vacation.

I spotted a pebble washed up from the creek and picked it up, tossing it toward the small inverted waterfall. The pebble sunk through the transparent curtain and disappeared.

“Pretty sure it’s not going anywhere, Halima,” Nick commented.

As they poked and prodded the ripple, a notification popped in my vision.

<Kinsley: I know this probably won’t go through, but someone told me the tower was different, so I figured I’d try.>

It shouldn’t be possible for Kinsley to message me here. But now that I thought about it, there was nothing in the many handouts for the tower that warned about restricted communications. Either it was common knowledge or the sort of thing you didn’t put in a brochure. Another sign that the Tower wasn’t a typical Realm of Flauros.

<Matt: It actually did. Shoot.>

<Kinsley: Okay, perfect. I’ll just go in order of least to most important. We have a location for a lab outside the region. There’s a few regions leasing entire buildings that no one’s using anymore for extra Selve, and I landed us three floors.>

Renting multiple floors was smart. Assuming Kinsley intended to keep our business on a single floor, it bought us time to organize if there was a raid.

<Matt: Great.>

<Kinsley: Cameron’s demanding someone in charge. Loudly. Pretty sure he’s entering the ‘anger’ stage of grief.>

<Matt: Not great.>

<Kinsley: And surprise, I saved the worst for last. Did you ask some girl who works in our building on a date, then ghost her?>

Shit.

<Matt: … No.>

<Kinsley: You fucking did. She flagged me down at breakfast, Matt. All sad and abandoned, like a puppy in a cardboard box. The hell’s the matter with you?>

<Matt: Kins, I don’t have time for this. The Tanya thing was just a cover from Miles, anyway. Can always find someone else.>

<Kinsley: It’s Tara, you asshole. And what the fuck—I like her, you can’t just replace her because you’re bad at time management. What kind of message does that send to me, coming from the only role model I have at the moment? What am I supposed to take away from this? Find a nice undependable boy who flakes and uses you as cover from the fuzz?>

<Matt: It wasn’t even—whatever. Fine. Jesus. I’ll message her when I’m out. Also, if I’m your role model, you need to reevaluate some life decisions.>

<Kinsley: K thanks bye.>

I rubbed at my forehead. Things were piling up again.

Nick stood in front of us, tying a coil of rope around his waist. Once he finished, he clapped his hands twice. “Okay. Was under strict orders not to pass these out until we found a ripple. Don’t think I really need to say this, but do not, in any circumstances, sell what I’m about to give you to anyone. Especially the open market. It will come back on you. I guarantee it.” Nick pulled three plastic cylinders from his inventory and passed them out.

Everyone besides Nick inspected the cylinders. They were glass, with a small flip cap at one end, not unlike what you’d see at the top of a thermos, and the inside was filled with a black, oily substance.

Keith held his straight up and down and popped the cap, giving it a cautious sniff. The dark fluid lurched, strands of dark oil clinging to the lid like tiny hands and evacuating the container, wrapping itself on the bare skin beneath Keith’s sleeve in seconds.

Keith yelped and attempted to dislodge the thing, struggling to dig his fingers beneath the rapidly flattening liquid.

Instead of coming free, it absorbed into his skin, and a moment later a visible glowing UI appeared on Keith’s wrist.

Nick clucked his tongue. “Great example of what not to do in the ripple. Dangers may not be as obvious as they are out here. As a rule—if you don’t know what it is, don’t touch it.”

“Fine. Now what is this, and why is it in me—Oh. Wait.” Keith fiddled with the display, breaking into a smile. “This is sick.”

Halima leaned over his shoulder, jockeying for a look. “An advanced interface?”

Nick nodded. “As you’ve all probably noticed, the system doesn’t give us a lot of information in terms of health and status effects, which can lead to some situations where people miss warning signs before everything snowballs. This is your diagnostic, portable doctor, and codex in one.”

“Codex?” Halima was still looking at the cylinder with revulsion, but the word had piqued her interest. I was still hung up on the portable doctor comment. Did the Order have these the whole time? When they were back in the tunnel even?

“Not really the star of the show here, but yeah,” Nick confirmed. “If you scan your kills, it’ll fill in more information about them. Weaknesses, possible drops, and so on.”

“Are we centralizing these findings in a database?” Halima asked.

“No.” Nick hesitated. “That was supposedly the plan, but some of the higher-level Users and leadership had security concerns. For now, everything is client-side. You can share info with other members of the Order, but both parties have to opt-in. What’s more important, this thing can and will save your ass. Hopefully we won’t need it, as it only kicks in when things are grim—but if you take a critical hit, or get dosed or overloaded with status effects, it’ll synthesize whatever’s needed to keep you alive.”

“What are the limitations?” I asked.

“It can only do so much.” Nick shrugged. “Take a big hit or get poisoned, you’re okay. Take a big hit and get poisoned—you might be S-O-L. Yellow light at the top left indicates it still has charge. When it’s off, you’re on your own.”

“Does it record anything beyond the User’s health?”

“Nah. It can’t access your class or title. Which also means it can’t factor any passive buffs you have, so keep that in mind.”

With a disgusted sigh, Halima popped the cap on her cylinder. The oily entity crawled from the cylinder and absorbed into her skin.

I wasn’t sure I believed it. Nick seemed like he was telling the truth, but that didn’t mean they’d told him everything. But Hastur already knew too much about me as it was—including my class and abilities. Not to mention, I was pretty sure that regardless of how the device was made, it was eldritch. Which meant I had some power over it. It was a tough call, but so far, the pros outweighed the cons.

Still. I wanted to hear Nick admit it.

“Have they had these for long? Tested them?” I asked.

Nick nodded. “One founder is a bio-enchanter. Been making them pretty much since the beginning.”

“Say Keith and I are on our own and he catches a stray arrow, activating his oh-shit button. It heals him enough to get him going, but he panics and tries to run, inadvertently drawing fire. He’s slower from the previous injury, so the shooter dials in, catching him in the neck. I’m close by and I haven’t used my charge. There anything I can do?”

Nick’s blue eyes went cold. “Doesn’t take long for someone to bleed out from a wound like that. But yes. Didn’t cover it, yet, but these things are modular. You can transfer a charge. Assuming you were fast enough.”

“Pretty sure I’d be fast enough,” I needled him.

“Getting uncomfortable with how realistic this example sounds,” Keith muttered.

“Like I said, hopefully we won’t need them.” Nick crossed his arms.

I held up a finger. “One more hypothetical.”

There was something dark in Nick’s expression, almost enough to dissuade me entirely. “Go ahead.”

“Great.” I smiled. “Let’s say Keith didn’t have the register. He was a VIP, or a contact. Someone we actually gave a shit about keeping alive who got seriously hurt. Could the register make that happen, or is he just fucked?”

Nick stepped in close, looming over me.

“Stop pussyfooting around and say what you want to say,” Nick growled.

Halima raised a hand. “I’m… not sure what’s happening? But I’d also like to know the answer to Myrddin’s question.”

Neither of us looked at her.

“You could,” Nick finally answered, never taking his eyes from me. “The register would transfer to the wounded party temporarily and return to you after it spent its charge.”

“Just making sure we’re on the same page,” I said.

Nick turned away, casting a weary glance over his shoulder. “Look. I’m an open book. If you—hell, any of you—hear something about me and have questions, just come find me when we’re not on a mission. Are we done?”

“We’re done.” I popped the cylinder’s cap and watched the creeping tendrils wrap around my gauntlet. Unlike Keith and Halima, who were both wearing robes, the semi-transparent UI appeared on my gauntlet rather than the skin beneath.

I circled through the readouts. The amount of information on display was impressive, and the interface simple enough to navigate without getting bogged down in endless text—it implemented visuals to create a map of the user’s body in three layers. The overall body, underlying musculature, and organs. Most of my display was white, with some light yellow. When I zoomed it to the second layer, there were a handful of yellow splotches showing healing wounds, with information listed displaying the origin and age and a percentile chance of infections.

Out of curiosity, I zoomed one layer further.

There was a flash of orange leading from my lungs toward my heart. It disappeared so quickly I almost missed it. I swapped layers several times, trying to recreate the effect, to no success.

Nick pushed a coil of rope into my chest. He was all business now, the flare of irritation more or less gone. “Hold this. In case we can’t hear each other once I’m settled, two yanks means all-clear, come in. Three yanks means hurry the fuck up, because things are hot. Four means I’m stuck or can’t move, come and get me. Five plus means I’m panicking and we’re boned.”

“And… what are we supposed to do in that case?” Keith asked.

Nick shrugged. “Try to tie the rope to something sturdy, so I can climb out if I get clear. Otherwise, cut your losses and report back to the order.”

I studied him, looking for any sign of despair, anything out of the ordinary. Nothing in the way he’d presented himself gave the feel of recklessness, or a death wish. But such things were rarely obvious.

Too often people presented themselves with tranquility and confidence, right before they were gone.

“Sure you don’t want me to go first?” I asked. “It’s in my skill set.”

Nick shook his head and gave me a playful shove. “Stay in your lane, new guy.” When that didn’t mollify me, he dropped his voice to a whisper and leaned in. “Look, all we know about the ripples is that they’re unbalanced and unpredictable. And I feel like we both know how brutal the system can be under normal circumstances, let alone when we’re venturing into areas it doesn’t want us to go.”

When he put it that way, this felt far riskier than I’d considered.

“I could drop into a treasure trove,” Nick continued. “Or a meat grinder. There’s no way to know for sure. If it goes sideways, just get the kids out.” He raised his voice. “If I go MIA, do as Myrddin says.”

Halima and Keith were both standing far enough away that they probably hadn’t heard us, but they seemed to pick up on the finality in Nick’s voice. Neither argued, though Halima looked like she wanted to.

“Good luck,” Keith said.

“Just a second.” I walked the cord of rope back, looping it around a nearby tree and forming a fulcrum. Now we at least stood a chance of catching him if he ended up falling into a chasm. I wrapped a layer of rope around my forearm and nodded at Nick.

Nick made finger-guns, firing a “shot” at each of us before he blew away imaginary smoke and holstered them. He grinned. “See you fuckers on the other side.” He stuck his face in the ripple first, then jumped inside.

No matter what happens. I’m not losing you again.

I dug my heels in and braced, waiting for the rope to go taut. Keith—inexperienced, but quick on the draw—grabbed the rope with his bare hands and did the same.

Halima stood some distance away with her arms crossed, staring at the ripple where Nick had disappeared. “We have nothing to worry about.”

“Doesn’t hurt to be careful,” Keith said.

“Have you ever sparred with the Ceaseless Knight?” Halima countered. “Really sparred, when he’s not holding back?”

“No… but…”

“Then you can’t possibly understand. There’s nothing in this Tower that could put him down, permanently—”

“Shut the fuck up,” I hissed. Halima and Keith fell silent. The slack rope was moving, meaning Nick was reaching the end of his lead.

But he hadn’t signaled yet. Something was wrong.

Come on, man.

The rope tugged once. Then again, a few seconds later.

“See, he’s fine—” Halima trailed off as the rope tugged a third time.

He’s sending the signal slowly. Trying not to draw attention to himself.

In a flurry of movement, the rope snapped a half-dozen more times and started flailing erratically. There was immediate slack, which I took to mean that Nick was retreating.

I looped the rope around my waist and continued reeling it in, passing the slack to Keith. Halima was standing stock-still, her mouth open. I shouted at her. “Get in here!”

She started, rushing to take place behind Keith. “What—what do we do?”

“When he went through, he dropped down. He may need help clearing the drop. Get ready to pull your ass off as soon as we hit resistance—” the rope slipped from my hands. I whipped around, back toward the ripple, trying to get a handle on what just happened.

Keith held the end of the rope in shaking hands, black strands fraying from where it was severed.

“Oh… fuck,” Keith said.