🌘

A technopath should only reveal information when absolutely necessary. But in this case, you decide your friends need to know.

“We were amazingly synchronized, one mind. The æther led us to a strange place, where everything I ever thought I knew was incomprehensible, and everything I could never grasp felt trivial. There were no boundaries between anything in that space, not between up and down, hot and cold, many and one, surface and æther. And we felt for a moment here and there that we understood everything there is to understand, that we and the æther were one. But I can hardly put it into words just hours later,” you sign.

“That’s called ego death,” Synth signs. “Every technopath experiences that sometimes. It’s one of the dangers of the æther. You can lose yourself like that, your ego might never reassociate, or you might not be the same person you were when you come back. In your third year, you’ll be tested, put into ego death with a drug, on an ætherwalk, and tested by technopathically finding your way back together.”

“Wow, have you done that?” you sign.

“I’ve known ego death before. But the æthereal test, the so-called ‘ætherflip,’ not yet. But it’s what third years told me would happen. I suspect it’s going to be my final exam, though you know how secretive those are,” Synth sign.

“Are you ready for it?” you sign.

“Maybe. They all said nothing can prepare you for it. Part of getting myself ready for that was confronting my past, what you helped me with during mid-term break,” Synth signs. “Any inner conflict might become a threat to you in that state of consciousness.”

“Well, luckily, thanks to ÆON I think I was fine. Æ kept us from getting lost deep in the ætherglow,” you sign.

“Still, you’re lucky,” Synth signs.

“I’m glad you’re safe,” Zeta signs.

Akiko sends an emotional response, concurring.

“Well, things got a lot more complicated after that,” you sign. We encountered a technopath, an incredibly strong technopath. She gave us a little advice, and we were able to break the temporal binding program Pulse put on me!”

“That’s great! You completely disabled it?” Akiko signs.

“Yes! However, she turned out to be one of the Chosen of ÆON. One of the sages, even, the Sage of Time, who created that program in the first place,” you sign.

You feel a mix of negative emotions--anxiety, fear, suspicion, radiating from your friends.

“And one of the other sages, the Sage of Stars, was with her. They took us back to their homeserver, the Throne of ÆON, where we had been once before. We didn’t feel we had much of a choice but to go along.

“We discovered a rift in the cult, internal factions secretly conspiring against each other. It seems the sages have very different ambitions, even if they share a common...religion. The sages of Time and Stars, they claim to have altruistic motives, but I don’t know if I believe them yet. The others, though, they have completely fucked visions of the future. I barely understand what we saw, but we knew it couldn’t be allowed to happen.

“Those two--Ganymeda and Astræa are their names--they made us an offer,” you sign.

“Aydan,” Synth signs, spelling your name. “Tell me everything. Leave no detail out.” You can feel their gaze pressing on your mental shield.

“I will, don’t worry,” you sign. “We negotiated, and we reached this agreement.” You send each of them a copy of the contract text. “And we signed it.”

[Synth disliked that]

After a moment processing it, Synth responds. “I don’t like this. Obviously. I don’t think their word can be trusted. However, a non-aggression pact with one faction of our enemies, enabling us to better focus on the other, is not a bad tactical decision. But I don’t know how I feel about your special training arrangement.”

“Even now, I’m not even sure why we did that,” you sign. “In the moment, as our synchronized self, we were in awe of their power as technopaths, and wanted to learn those skills ourself. Maybe it’s that it’s just the kind of technopathy that already comes naturally to ÆON, that I’ve had a little taste of synchronizing with Ær. And maybe, it’s just a technopath’s natural ambition to learn as much as we can.”

Synth sighs. “I can’t deny you that. Just about any technopath might’ve done the same thing. But you have to be careful. This puts you in a vulnerable position, letting them get so close to your mind as to teach you.”

“I know it’s not ideal,” you sign. “But it was between this arrangement or facing all of them at once with our limited defenses. We’ll be outside of TLA’s protection soon, and outside of your protection too, Synth, once you graduate and begin your service contract. I have no choice but to get stronger, and be able to defend myself. It was the best option we had. I wanted it, but at the same time, we needed it.”

“It is what it is. You did good in negotiating this agreement, and we can uphold our end, but, we absolutely can’t trust that they will, we still have to keep our guard up against them,” they sign. “Do not let your guard down, even for one server-tick.”

“I won’t. I understand,” you sign.

“Ok. Well, with this new development, we can plan our defenses accordingly, and be ready for whatever they might try,” Synth signs.

“First of all, we have our therapy session,” Akiko signs.

“And good luck with that, that should also help Aydan be more prepared, to have less psychological conflict,” Synth signs. “But Aydan, I need you to be completely honest with me for a moment. And Akiko will know if you’re not.”

“Okay.”

“The ambitions those sages of Stars and Time showed you, on an æthereal, fundamental level, all other variables aside, what do you think of them?”

END CHAPTER SEVENTEEN

✴

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