August 29th, 3522.

“I know other worlds have… less active Spirit Worlds than Terre, but you really don’t have as many Great Spirits as we do then?” Tess asked both Mogu and Xinji, not expecting that at all.

Mogu blinked slowly, shifting her fingers. “We have Senu-Jura, the great Ocean Goddess and the mushroom mother of our species, and Protogenoi, the patron Father of Void, warding our world from the beyond.”

That sounded lonely.

“And what about your world?” Tess redirected the question to Xinji, curious on what she would say. The alien bird woman was sitting down, tail feathers ruffling as she sat comfortably.

“There are many spirits on Dikar, but the greatest rarely create avatars like yours do.” Xinji explained, and it… sounded so alien from her own perspective.

The panadim were even worse, they had never encountered spirits before, and their understanding of Void Rails was purely as transitioning into an alternate universe for travel. I can say it’s not wrong but it feels so wrong.

“It just feels strange, you know? All of humanity can be considered under the aegis of the Elements. Those of air belong to the Autumn Lord, Kukulkan. Those of Water belong to the Moon and Ocean with all their many names, Guanyin for those of Earth, and Khepri for those of Fire.” Khepri had been a name that had spread to the four corners of the world, the great goddess of flames, and the mother of the dragons.

All the Great Spirits had many names, worshiped and respected in different capacities by different peoples. And each of them had their firstborn children, Khepri had her dragons, Guanyin had the earth krakons, Kukulkan had the sky golings, while the Moon and Ocean had the sea wolves, the walking whales.

“Your world is a rare breed,” Xinji pointed out with a chuff. “All things in existence have spirits, but some are simply dreaming, simply part of the landscape of the Abstract Spirit.”

Tess pursed her lips, crossing her arms over her chest. I should really stop wearing ribbed sweaters, they make my boobs look even bigger.

But that wasn’t a thought she lingered on for long, as the alien spoke about the truth of the shape of the universe. The Abstract Spirit were the very highest known layers of the Spirit World, an utterly alien environment with no laws that exist for more than moments at a time. A place of extreme danger, and the home of the very greatest and most powerful of spirits. Many theories indicated the fabric of the Abstract was the reflection of the very greatest objects and concepts of the universe, from the smallest world to the largest galaxies.

“I suppose it is strange, though I don’t think our world is special so much as just lucky.” Khepri had many siblings, born from the same nursery over five points eight billion years ago. “There’s certainly been other civilizations with our number of Great Spirits, and I’m pretty sure the kanaloaa come close with their spirits.”

“But you are likely one of the few species who colonized other planets before they developed fire salts.” Mogu pointed out with an ethereal giggle, and Tess puffed her cheeks in a frown.

Tess rolled her eyes. “Anyone could have done that when you have the Spirit Road and a desperate enough group of shamans.”

Though we’ve done it an awful lot.

“Also, the Great Migration was after we invented gunpowder… and then lost it again for almost four thousand years.”

What point was I making again?

Xinji flicked her bangs with her hand, cocking her beaked head with a gentle swish of her four ears. “You’re very featherbrained, just stop it.”

Tess narrowed her eyes. “The fuck? That’s how people work!”

Xinji blinked. “They do?” She said innocently.

Tess brought her hands up to her lips, and took a deep, deep breath. And focused on the open space they were in, it was a modest campus park, with native trees and animals.

In the grass she could see a ratta, a fat quadrupedal bird that liked to shit wherever they pleased. It looked at her with a smug grin, and she was very tempted to cook some dinner.

Bumbling bitches, I hate you.

“Perhaps we should switch to another topic, why do you humans put so much emphasis on your head fur?” Xinji did the smart thing and changed topics.

Tess reciprocated eagerly. “I guess it’s just for display, we… like showing it off for social reasons like your facial markings, and your sails.” Diderik facial markings were usually for special occasions, but they often furnished their sails with objects and materials. “And how Mogu’s race uses their caps for the same reason.”

“Fascinating!” Mogu exclaimed, eyes glowing softly under the shade of her cap.

Tess was happy to talk about this.

“Well, there’s also how we share a lot of commonalities in how we use jewelry and…”

Tess frowned at the whites and golds of the medical facility she had been called in to by Scholarly Cadences. The smell of disinfectant and the sterile atmosphere were too much like many of the clinics she had gone to as a child after her channeling had weakened when she was just over five years old.

It was after a spirit plague, one that had ravaged the town until a shaman and a team of doctors had scoured out the plague-spirit responsible for the unnatural illness. There were very few illnesses capable of ravaging the nodes of the soul like they had with Tess, and she had been among the best cases.

Others had been… emptied out, left barren of their most personal and fundamental traits by the deadly illness. After a year they had thought Tess had recovered.

Until she didn’t…

Whatever spirit had attacked the town had been an alien one, perhaps poached and smuggled onto the planet, or an artificial one concocted in a lab using dark sorceries and the harsh and crude manipulation of spiritual energy and force.

It had been destroyed, and the town had been saved… with a celebration all around even as the survivors were left hurt and crippled. She had changed outfits, her sweater had been a little mistake and Tess very much would not allow that when she was meeting with Scholarly Cadences.

The examination room wasn’t very cozy, but it also looked very new, it didn’t have a spirit like the other rooms in the medical facility. She could see medical scanners and implements, a lot of it unfamiliar but not all of it. There was a medical chair surrounded by the arms and machinery of an AutoDoc X. Medical kits were pretty common, and she knew she had packed three of her own at home.

It came with bags of medical elixir, a supercharged artificial stem cell gel and all-in-one pharmaceutical nanocapsule solution capable of healing and regenerating injuries. The solution was infused with rūh, and could functionally repair injuries within minutes for minor abrasions to hours for major organs and tissues.

So medical elixir, smart-mold polymer masks and gauges, and little receptacle blocks used to auto-inject medication and medical nanomachines. Her own holo-caster came with a medical suite, using transoptic modules to send out various forms of energy scanning pulses. From ultrasound to T-rays to advanced magnetic field resonance scanning down to an atomic-level.

There was a mirror over a nearby sink, so Tess walked over out of curiosity and boredom while waiting for the expert on metaphysics in the modern age. Walking over she could inspect her outfit, and opted for something that actually looked good on her.

I really need to stop buying shit from shops with ‘normal’ body types in mind.

Then again her town has always been kind of backwards, they still used clothing made by hand rather than omni-processor printed clothing. It was actually one of their major sources of income for the town, not that they’d starve if they didn’t.

While the SA didn’t expect to attain true post-scarcity for anywhere between five hundred and five thousand years, most people worked because they wanted to work and not because they had to. A basic universal income has been an accepted right for over a century now.

She was going on a tangent wasn’t she?

Tess had opted for a green sleeveless top with white polka dots and canary yellow pants. It showed off some of her cleavage, but she didn’t mind and it’s not like a kanaloaa would give a shit. Most of them simply weren’t attracted to humans, even if she couldn’t quite say the same for humans.

They were cute at least, like long legged cuttlefish with their little eyes and their odd faces.

Tess turned from the mirror as a door slid open with a smooth mechanical hiss of air. Scholarly Cadences stepped, glided, wiggled(?) into the room with a relaxed posture, four long bendy limbs skidding along the floor. Again they looked like armored cuttlefish, but with four long legs and about the size of a large dog.

She smiled. “Mr. Cadences!” The older man twitched at her greeting, and she casually smirked. Most people tended to just call him Scholy, but calling him mister seemed to confuse him. “So you’re the one that’s doing the check-up then?”

He was wearing something like a onesie lab coat that fit his lenticular frame, his head only lifted slightly from the rest of his body. He had dual holo-casters, medical models from the looks of them connected to his clothing which had a number of compartments for equipment and scanners.

“Theresa Hoshino, daughter of Aitana Hoshino and Yaga Hoshino, née Bomba. So you’re a great name, the Hoshino clan were close to the Dragon Throne once upon a time, and the Bomba are eusean, the distant cousins of the castellans who founded their own kingdoms of Fire.”

Tess nodded with a grimace. “So you can see why I want… no need your help?” She was born of Fire, she was loyal in a way few people could understand. She wanted to make her family proud, wanted them to see her grow and prosper, and she had the same ambition. To learn and grow stronger and wiser…

And I’m a failure of an heir, I can’t do what they do and I hate it.

There was a hum in Mr. Cadences’ synthesized voice. “Yes, my race is most closely tied to Fire and Water, so I do understand.” There was a haggard tone, the man looking decades older for a brief moment, as he shifted his four arms. “Please, sit on the chair.” He pointed to the AutoDoc X, waving a holo-caster to put the machine in scanner mode. “May I begin the scan?” She nodded in reply.

Tess scooted her butt over to the machine, and laid back, almost drawing blood from her lip with her teeth. The machine spooled up, and silver light was projected over her frame, analyzing her biology. Flexible arms bent closer, and she felt her skin depress slightly from the needle-like probing tips.

“I will need to gain my own understanding of your condition,” Mr. Cadences asked, and Tess rolled her eyes.

“Just do it.”

The alien sighed, and swooped his four arms. Water was pulled from the compartments of his clothing, and golden sparks flared from his upper pair. The cool water submerged her skin while the living flames touch burst in the spaces between.

Curious, to see a child so young, with a soul like the sun.

The thought wasn’t her own, but she felt her own inner fire flare in response, and the spirits swooped around them in an excited tizzy.

More like a sickly mess, I’m not impressive. Was her own thoughts pressing up against Cadences’ power with little effort on her part.

Wrong, you are a strong soul but you have been burdened with a great sickness, the man chided her through the connection, as the machine scanned her down to her very soul.

He gently probed the paths the energy of her life took, the chakras, the very nodes of something grander and greater. He measured the energies, and she relaxed to the best of her abilities as the machine clicked at a high pitch.

“I was allowed to pull up some of your medical records, you were a victim to a spirit plague of unknown providence?”

“I was…” Tess replied, not liking the reminder but knowing it was important.

The alien mollusk flicked a face tentacle with a dark glimt in narrowed eyes. “I have seen such ravages of the chakra meridians before, but they are rare and difficult to repair, but I have seen worse.”

“Worse?” Her curiosity got the better of her.

Mr. Cadences didn’t waver in his duty as he answered. “All channelers can, with great effort, learn the other elements even if the strangest and highest paracausal techniques are beyond them.” He explained dutifully, and with a warm tone to his song. “But in their heart, they will always hold one or perhaps two elements dear to their heart. You are Fire, but you can reach out to Earth almost as easily. So what would happen if your deepest connection was warped, and replaced with another rather than complementing one another?”

A wave of revulsion struck her, Tess was horrified by what he had said. To change someone so drastically… you would have to cut away at the very core of their being, to manipulate the very nodes of their soul. The seven chakras and one hundred eight sub-chakra meridians, the energy within, determines everything about a person.

Tess swallowed her bile. “So something like that happened to me?”

I hope it wasn’t true.

Mr. Cadences nervously folded his arms back from checking her meridians. “No, the illness left deep and complicated blocks within your chakras, and interfered with the expression rather than permanently altering it.” The AutoDoc X dinged, and projected a rough scan of her biology, underpinned by the metaphysical biology of her soul.

She could see the labeled channels and rivers of power, with seven points serving as the largest and deepest pools of rūh or chi to others.

A wry look emerged on Mr. Cadences’ face. “Your inner fire is less than it should be because it is fighting the blocks, melting them, tearing them down. Your mothers have used both fire and earth healing, am I correct?” Yaga had used fire healing while Aitana had called in friends for earth healing.

She remembered the warmth and power of the dragon’s flame, and the solidity and reliable healing earth.

“Yes they did.”

“Then they did their part in helping you recover, and I am certain we have the tools to break the remaining blocks.”

She didn’t dare to hope, but she wanted to so much.

“How?” She asked, and why hadn’t her parents gone here when she was small and young and didn’t have to suffer a decade of shame and uselessness?

“The technology was only developed in the last twelve years, and only became approved for medical use in the last five, and only in low private numbers.” He explained gently, and she crossed her arms over her chest with a pout. “Your Basic Income should cover the costs, and I can easily offer it to students here.”

“That’s not telling me what professor.” She scowled and he chuckled nervously

“My apologies, the technology is known as moxibustion interface devices or MID. MID technology is a method of interfacing with the life energy channels of the body, which the humans derived from lost thirty fourth century experiments.” His voice was soothing, and she could feel his telepathic connections projecting his emotions. “It has many therapeutic and medical applications using shor field effector coupling, using dark energy to provide a conduit to interact with metaphysical forces.”

“So it can help me with my blocks?”

Mr. Cadences nodded to the best of his ability. “Yes, it can provide easier paths of resistance to remove the blockage of your meridians, and monitor any changes as needed.”

Tess jumped up from her seat, bouncing on her toes. Can I really be helped?

“What do I need?”

“You already have an appropriate interface on your right arm.” He pointed out with a kanaloaa grin, tentacles pulling back in a smile. “You’ll simply need an additional bracer on your left, and an upgrade.”

Tess smiled.

Yaga sighed as she rolled her wrists, her inner fire burning hot and bright. Without Tess, they had a lot more time to return to old habits without her getting too suspicious.

Cosmogony wasn’t large in comparison to the entire population of humanity, but at their peak two decades ago they had fifty six thousand fighters and eighty four thousand supporters on Terre alone. Across every colony of humanity, four and a half million combatants that were entirely channelers was a devastating threat if they got access to the right weapons.

Many had gone to ground, and if they had been rebuilding all those years their numbers could have drawn from sympathizers and other fanatical groups.

Yaga had dressed for the occasion, a lightweight and flexible soft black armor, with chameleon skin and a number of stealth and electronic warfare features. She was here with a certain chitta who was wearing a heavy suit, which for his species was the equivalent of a small vehicle in toughness and armament.

But they weren’t here to fight just yet, there was a lot they needed to get in order for that to be possible. And that was restating the Golden Spiders with the permission of a certain man.

A man slid in from just out of her line of sight, practically melding into the shadows.

“I still have no idea how you do that, old man.” She commented with a toothy grin, inspecting her old mentor. He looked to be in his forties, though his black greying hair and wizened face spoke to a much greater age.

He was wearing a ridiculous kanaloaa shirt with flowers on it, and black slacks, his large head pulled into a grin as his eyes snapped open to stare at her.

“You’ve been slacking in your retirement Wildchild, you would have spotted me twice as fast in your best years.”

Yaga scoffed. “Just cuz I put a baby in Aitana doesn’t I still can’t kick your ass,” she growled, lips pulling back in a fierce scowl as her temper got the better of her.

She said this to a man who was over six feet tall and two hundred forty pounds, his dark eyes glimmering with old man amusement. “You’re not wrong, but that’s not a nice thing to say to the man in charge of ONI.”

The Office of Naval Intelligence was ruled by one man, Keilani Momoa, and a good friend of her grandfather, in a way he was part of her extended clan. Even if it had been years since they had spoken, until the events of nearly two decades ago had faded into relative obscurity.

He still has the frame of a chiseled god.

“The Golden Spiders need a new start, old man,” which was why she decided to be upfront with the spook built like a warrior. “Though I doubt we’ll be at the helm of it this time around.”

“You wish to reform your clan, despite the danger?” Momoa raised an eyebrow, and Yaga smiled sadly.

The Golden Spiders would not be hers, her child was an adult and will grow into her power and own purpose. Their first domain was built for the old ways, and things have changed since she was born.

Yaga tilted her head, and with an effortless turn created a massive shield of flames. Blocking the concentrated blue-white spear of fire aimed for the head of the Second Star Lord of the Alliance Navy.

Her red hair flared around her head, and she turned her own energy into a vast wall of fire as she picked up on their attackers.

Niji’s head snapped up, and his body moved, all nine feet of his bulk twisting on a dime. Air shimmered, and his four arms smashed into a stealth cloaked woman. She screamed as bones snapped like twigs, and his claws pierced right through the current of winds around her form.

Stupid, to attack so soon.

A net of water emerged from above, a channeler with dark hair and draped in dark blue and white clothing, eyes like ice chips burning with hatred. The rain fell upon them… and Yaga felt sad as she reached out with her power to the water and…

The rain caught fire, blazing white hot and the channeler just above was trapped in the firestorm. She didn’t flinch away from the deaths she caused, as the net of water became a trap for their ambushers, fire lashing out like a living thing. She had poured all her rage, all her protective fury and ambition into the flames as it roasted people down to blackened bone.

That left the air channeler whimpering in pain, unable to pry herself out of the tight grip of Niji’s four hands. She moaned painfully but while… Yaga was sympathetic.

Clan came first.

She lashed out, and tore away the helmet and mask that obscured the air channeler’s features. Dark curly hair and pale skin, small rounded prominent grey eyes. Despite her whimpers, she remained focused on trying to twist out of her friend’s grip like an angry viper.

“You’re not getting away brat, you’re going to answer to—” The attacker’s expression went blank, and she pulled out a frequency knife, but instead of aiming for Niji.

She aimed for her own neck.

Her hand convulsed, and she was held aloft by a flick of Momoa’s wrist. Blood channeling, he finally learned after that bastard almost killed him.

“Not today, suicide might be part of your grandmaster’s Way but it’s not part of ours.” Momoa’s voice was deep, and rumbling with power as he bent the very blood in the air channeler’s body.

“So a new domain isn’t out of the question then?” Yaga said with an easy grin, even while surrounded by death.

“The Solar Alliance is a mosaic of domains Wildchild,” Momoa spoke honestly as he gently pinched the neck of the woman, dropping her into unconsciousness. “It’s not exactly difficult when anyone can start one to run a segment of humanity.”

“True, but the Solar Alliance still has a central government, even if it’s mostly just there to implement the agenda of everyone below them, fuzzykins.” She pointed out the hair on his chest with a cheeky grin. “And your domain is part of the united military of all humanity.”

“Just the Navy, not the Army or the Colonial Guard or the Espatiers, even if they are in my chain of command.” Which still left him in charge of millions of people, and entire fleets were under his domain, with but a word he could reduce worlds to rubble.

“Well… if I know my kid, she’s not going to stay out of trouble, and she’s going to need something to fall back on in case of the worst.”

Momoa had a glint in his eye. “I’ll see what I can manage, though I’ll need some help with a flighty westerner.”

Her smile was bone chilling. “I’ll see what I can do… but my wife will have to arrive.”

There was a quiet tip tap of feet, and the meaty smack of a body hitting the ground, as Aitana silently slid in from the darkness. She dragged an unconscious body, and turned to a slightly surprised military lord.

Aitana simply raised an eyebrow, ‘You’ve gotten slow’ written all over her face.

Yaga laughed.

I love my wife.

Compendium Entry (Historical): THE MIGRATION

Beginning around the year 100, the human Homeworld of Terre found itself in a crisis after the Collapse that led to the destruction of the Promethean Civilization, as technology dropped from the equals of at least the thirty second century to borderline Stone Age, and the near complete annihilation of a significant fraction of the ten thousand odd years worth of human history.

The freshly dead outnumbered the living three to one, and the devastated lost empires peoples fled through any means necessary. Some fled to other lands and continents and held the torch of civilization against the darkness, while others underwent a great exodus through the Spirit World, following the long path that connects every world in the known universe.

This exodus continued for centuries, millions upon millions running for greener pastures across the inner solar system and beyond. This is believed to be largely responsible for the loss of knowledge and technology as the most educated ran off-world. Yet without suitable locations to consolidate, they could not pass on their knowledge to their descendants, or became isolated pockets of advanced technology not dissimilar to the guardian priests of the kanaloaa.

Humanity colonized the inner solar system, and isolated groups spread out across three dozen inhabitable worlds in their space. Only a dozen including Terre, Mara and Big Demon retained sufficient genetic diversity to survive. This laid the seeds for the Days of Iron, and the birth of the Solar Alliance that binds humanity together.