“All passengers, please disembark. We have landed on Oranii Seven.” The landing pod’s attendant spoke with a smile as she greeted the travelers. Oranii Seven was one of the fringe worlds of the Kione system, one of the last few to be colonized before the Hyperlane Network had been cut off.
Understandably, there were not many travelers that would come all the way out here, so flights were few and far between. Most who came this far were simply looking to get away from all of the chaos that came with the primary worlds. These fringe worlds were more secluded, which also meant that they were less likely to be affected by some rogue god who had a score to settle with a local monarch.
Among the passengers leaving the landing pod, one was a lycan male with short, black hair slicked back atop his head. He had blue eyes framed by a square pair of glasses, and wore a black hoodie with faded blue jeans. This man had a smile on his face as he stepped out and down the ramp, all of his luggage safely tucked away in his inventory.
Unlike most of the residents of Kione, this man did not have a familiar, which was a typical sign that one was from one of the other realms, likely Earth. Still, he wasn’t against being known as a tourist, and quite enjoyed the life of constant travel. Only a select few knew his name, and few among those ever saw him more than once.
The streets of Oranii Seven were rather calm, as this planet did not have many established festivals or holidays worth celebrating. Still, he smiled as if he were looking at a bustling street. When he walked, at times he moved as if to walk around obstacles that weren’t there, letting his gaze linger on empty space, but nobody particularly took note of him. Compared to all of the things that people saw nowadays, someone who walked a bit funny was nothing.
Suddenly, the man’s gaze flicked over towards a nearby street and he smiled. He saw a girl walking down the sidewalk, selling balloons. She had a canine familiar, one that wagged its tail happily as it walked alongside her. The man walked across the street to her, crouching down to be at eye level. “How much for one of those?” He asked curiously, the girl stopping to look up at him.
She gave a bright, innocent smile as she answered. “Fifteen copper each, sir.” She said, and he happily produced thirty, which she traded for two of her balloons. As he did, a large truck sped down the street, its driver spewing profanities.
“Thank you very much.” The lycan tourist said, holding the two balloons. “Can you tell me where I can find a nice hotel here? I just arrived in the area today.”
The girl quickly nodded her head, giving the man directions. After which, he pat her head, rewarding her with a single gold coin for her help. The girl’s eyes widened, almost going wet for a moment before she held herself back and accepted the coin. She thanked him profusely, bowing towards the man as he walked away.
As he left, the man thought back to what he had seen. A horrible traffic accident, the body of the young girl shattered by the impact, balloons flying up into the air. A sick younger brother, unable to fend for himself without his older sister. Just one possibility among the many that he had seen in a single moment, but one that could be avoided with just a simple gesture of kindness.
This man held the balloons that he had purchased as he walked along the street, soon finding the hotel that the girl had directed him to. With a smile, he walked up to the register. “I believe I have a reservation here, under the initials PL? Booked for one week.”
“Is that so?” The woman manning the desk asked with a smile, checking her terminal. “Ah, here it is. Paid in advance. Your room is two-seventeen.” She said, handing over an electronic room key.
The man nodded his head, turning to walk up the stairs to his room. He already knew what hotel the girl would recommend, only needing to keep her attention for a few more moments to set things in motion. That was what he did, creating small ripples to influence the big picture. When he felt like interfering, at least. And, this time, he felt the need to interfere, at least a little.
He walked over to his desk, sitting down and pulling out his notebook. On it was a list of cities, categorized by planet. Without writing anything, he flipped through the pages, stopping when he found the page for Oranii Seven.
Some of the fates have changed… He said with a pleased smile. In his vision, he saw hundreds of instances of this one notebook. In most of them, the page remained unchanged, as it was in the present. However, in some, city names had been crossed out. In a select few, the entire page had been scribbled over with black ink.
One week… whether it falls to ruin, or pushes through, everything will be determined. He closed his notebook at that, turning his head to look out the window.
“You’re late.” A lycan security worker said, standing next to his living armor familiar. The man before him let out a disgruntled sound, stepping out of his large truck that began to collapse and fold in on itself, becoming a shifting tesseract of iron.
“Traffic, alright? Anyways, I brought the stuff you asked for. Where do you want it dropped off?”
The man arched a brow, glancing from side to side. “Third warehouse on the left.” He said, jerking his thumb back behind himself as the living armor stepped aside. “And make sure not to spill the containers, unless you like the idea of becoming a lump of flesh, or worse.”
“Yeah, I got it.” He shook his head, walking towards the warehouse that had been indicated. Once he arrived, his tesseract familiar grew larger, black crates floating out from the center of its mass to gently land on the floor. On the face of the crates was a company logo, a grinning figure with a vertical mark going through its left eye.
As the man turned to leave, the eye on the crate slowly began to blink. Once the man had closed the door, there was a faint hiss, the lid of the crates opening up.
Looking out his hotel window, the lycan tourist pursed his lips. He let out a sigh, standing up and putting his hands in his pockets. He turned, leaving the room and the hotel itself, walking down the street as his eyes scanned the surroundings.
Which one is this? He asked, his typical smile leaving his face for the first time that day. In parts of his vision, a black mass had covered the skies, mutating people into various random creatures. There were anthropomorphic rabbits, floating eyeballs, or twisted masses.
The worst part, this wasn’t taking place within a week, but rather this vision seemed to be only a day away. A moment of thought made him realize what must have happened. I changed it when I saved that girl. Though, that said, his notebook should have reflected it. It was more likely that saving the girl had opened the possibility, and now that possibility was starting to come closer and closer to reality.
In that case… what would it take to fix all of this? The man reached up, adjusting his glasses. For a moment, time seemed to halt, his eyes rapidly flipping back and forth as he saw numerous possibilities.
First, he needed to identify the source of the problem, and then trace back the possibilities to find where it could be cut off. That was easy, as he projected his senses outside of his body, seeing the city’s street bustling and calming again over the next twenty-four hours.
Once he identified the specific future he needed, his smile returned to his face. He reached into his inventory, retrieving a silver coin, and focused. A black line drew itself across the coin, before fading. Afterwards, he walked to a nearby food stall, and bought a hot dog, tossing the coin towards the man with a smile.
Devour… hunger… shift… The black mass thought to itself, writhing as it pushed open its box. All it had ever known was a dire hunger, a need to consume, to spread. It could become anything, it would become anything. And it would make others into anything, too.
The special material of the crate that had contained it until now dissolved away, devoured by the black mass within. Nearby, the other crates all began to pop open and dissolve, all leaking the same black mass that began to merge together.
The floor of the warehouse changed. At parts, it looked like it was melting, as if acid had been poured on it. In other areas, flowers began to grow and bloom, some turning into red roses while others grew fingers or eyes. Eat… change… become…
The door of the warehouse was next, but it took far too long to satisfy the black mass. This warehouse was made to hold things like it, after all. But that just meant that it had to change the door. Change it into something else. Cracks formed along the wall as triangular teeth grew out of the sides of the door, rotating along its edges like a chainsaw.
Once the door fell from its hinges, it began to writhe, squirming along the ground like a jagged worm. The black mass began to spill out onto the parking lot, dissolving under the sun and turning into a gas that rose into the air.
See… become… me… The creature rose like smoke, the ground and buildings below warping as soon as its shadow touched them. The more it changed, the more control it had over the changes. However, it did not want a controlled change. It wanted everything to become anything. It allowed the chaos to unfold beneath it, hearing the screams of panicked ants below, before its thoughts paused.
Why… not… change… Its consciousness turned towards the creatures running within its shadow. Those insignificant, tiny beings. They should change, they should become new, but they didn’t. They were stagnant, they defied his change. Even when he focused on them, they wouldn’t change.
Why… not… change…
The lycan tourist awoke the next day, hearing the panicked cries from the city outside the window. He turned, seeing the mass rising into the sky. This part was just as he had seen before. However, this time, there was no sign of anyone mutating. Buildings, entire landscapes changes, some turning into horrific beasts that lunged for the people, other into bundles of flowers.
The shadow was growing, extending towards the hotel where he was staying. An urgent knock rang out on the door. “Mister Laplace, you need to evacuate!” The woman who had been manning the desk the day before used her master key to open the door, a panicked look on her face. “There is a crisis outside. If you don’t leave now, you’ll be caught up in that! All of the other guests have already fled.”
The man blinked in relative surprise, before smiling. “That’s very kind of you, dear, but don’t worry.” He said, throwing her a gold coin. “Since you were kind enough to warn me, I’ll be sure to keep the hotel as it is now as my thanks. I may not be able to do much for the rest of what is happening, but maintaining one building should be fine.”
That wasn’t entirely true. If he wanted to, if he really wanted to, he could restore every building and destroy the black mass causing the damage. However, that was not what Pierce Laplace desired. He wished to see people overcoming danger on their own. He was not an arbiter of justice, but an observer of time.
Golden light spread out from the man’s palm, wrapping around the building. Once the black shadow crept over the hotel, the receptionist stepped back in fright, only to find that the building did not change as she expected. It did not grow tentacles or teeth, or turn into a shrubbery. It wasn’t walking or crawling or flying. It was just a hotel, as it had always been.
