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“We are in over our heads!” you sign. “Technopathy no one has ever faced before, an enemy who knows our every thought pattern, predicts our every move!”
You take a deep breath. Calm. “I wish Synth was here...”

“What would Synth do?” Zeta signs.

“Synth would say...” You open a new message in your mind’s eye. “Call Admin Astra.”

“Don’t you mean Admin Crypta? That’s who Synth is close to, right?” Akiko signs.

“Right, right, how could I get my Admins mixed up at a time like this...” you sign.

“An Admin is our enemy here, can we even trust the others?” Zeta signs.

“Maybe,” Akiko signs. “The Admins aren’t a united front, they’re each ambitious technopaths with their own goals and interests, that’s why there are three of them, and at least two always remain on the colony.”

“How do we even contact a particular Admin, though?” you sign.

“Normally you don’t. They use the ADMIN channel collectively, everything sent to and from there is known to all of them. You would have to have the public key of an Admin, and even by the end of my second year I don’t have that,” Akiko signs.

“Then I’ll have to ask Synth. Hope this doesn’t qualify as interfering with an exam...”

2254-12-10 14:21:11 Aydan > Synth, hope you’re in a good place to take a quick message, crisis occurring, need contact for Admin Crypta

????-??-?? ??:??:?? Synthesis-?? > YOU ARE SPINNING BACKWARDS!! HOW

2254-12-10 14:21:18 Aydan > I’m in the service module

????-??-?? ??:??:?? Synthesis-?? > MEANINGLESS

2254-12-10 14:21:23 Aydan > you okay Synth?

????-??-?? ??:??:?? Synthesis-?? > WE ARE ÆTHER AND SURFACE

????-??-?? ??:??:?? Synthesis-?? > WE ARE THE WAVES AND THE EMPTINESS BETWEEN

????-??-?? ??:??:?? Synthesis-?? > WE ARE ONE AND MANY

“Oh, Synth is um, ‘ætherflipping,’” you sign.

“Oh no,” Akiko signs. “This is beyond your communication skills, Aydan, let me.”

You receive a group message.

2254-12-10 14:21:33 明子 > Synth!! Aydan’s in danger!

????-??-?? ??:??:?? Synthesis-?? > WHAT IS AYDAN

????-??-?? ??:??:?? Synthesis-?? > YOU ARE OUT OF PHASE. WHY

2254-12-10 14:21:36 明子 > trying to find your resonance...it’s like you’re shifting back and forth in time...

2254-12-10 14:21:39 明子 > can you understand me now?

????-??-?? ??:??:?? Synthesis-?? > GIRL WHO IS ONE WITH LIFE

2254-12-10 14:21:43 明子 > yeah that’s me. now get this message to Admin Crypta ok? SECTOR NULL. attach my coordinates. understand?

????-??-?? ??:??:?? Synthesis-?? > SECTOR NULL. I WILL ASK THE OTHER-VOICE WHAT IT MEANS

“I might have gotten the message across. If not I’ll keep trying. You better call in a medical alert for 7,” Akiko signs.

“Right. Hmm, better not just call a general alert, we don’t know who we can trust...”

2254-12-10 14:21:52 Aydan > Ana, you working?

2254-12-10 14:21:56 Ana > it’s exam week, all medical staff are working neck-deep in æthertrauma cases

2254-12-10 14:22:00 Aydan > I’ve got another one for you. we need medical aid but off the record, it involves ÆON. a girl here was forcibly surfaced and is in bad shape. sharing my current location.

2254-12-10 14:22:04 Ana > I’m on my way, tell me what you can about her current status

You look back down at 7. Now she seems to be looking at you and not through you.

“Aydan!” she says.

“7! Can you hear me?”

“Listen carefully!”

“I’m listening!” you say.

“Mother is a star, blinding and unstoppable, magnetic storms, waves in the æther, the cold photosphere, the hot flares, take shelter, shelter! Understand?”

“No!”

“Listen! Mother is a star, 5 is a moon, a moon, understand?”

You receive a data package from 7. It has no logical meaning--an encryption key?

“Listen carefully. Avoid the Plex. Seek the Warp. Fifteen. Understand? Fifteen! Semiprime, a friend, but not a sister.”

“Fifteen. The Warp. A star and a moon,” you say.

“Trust no even number!”

2254-12-10 14:22:24 Aydan > she’s incomprehensible, can’t tell if she’s responsive to me or just pouring thoughts out into the void

2254-12-10 14:22:28 Ana > stay there, I’ll be just a few minutes

“Help is on the way,” you sign to Akiko and Zeta.

“Aydan, do you feel that?” Zeta signs.

You feel it too--fluctuations in the æther--reflections on your surface vision. A bright light opens up--a gateway visible in the near-æther. An avatar materializes before your eyes.

Their skin glows white, with waves of seven colors cascading across it, out from their head, and reverberating back from the edges in a constant rhythmic pulse. Wires of silver metal coil around their skin, reflecting the shifting colors, wrapping up and down their arms and legs in spirals, forming a latticework around their torso and up to their head, where the coils join together into a circlet floating above their metallic hair. In their eyes you see all the chaos of the ætherglow--you have to turn away before it can mesmerize you. Their aura seems to draw in and reflect the æther around them at once. Their every movement carries the strangest sensation that you have seen it before. Something in you makes the connection--you recognize your friend Synthesis, in some bizarre form.

Behind them another avatar emerges from the open gate--smaller than the other--seven fingers to each hand, an extra finger and thumb on their opposite sides--eyes of gold overlaid on silver, three of them, one on her forehead--her skin is gold, shiny as a spacecraft’s multi-layer-insulation, partially covered by her long sleeveless white coat. Her long white hair is most reflective of all, streaming behind her in tight curls--the æther around her spirals through them, falling into her red aura.

The imposing technopath wrapped in a red aura stares down at you, her gaze piercing through your shield and touching your mind. “I am Admin Crypta. You better have a good reason for interrupting a final exam. I could expel you here and now.”