The several hours they spent in the Firmament were not enough to stabilize the network, it was barely enough time to provide Keeper with the tools to do so. The process itself would take months and even years to fully complete but Ciara and Taylor had established the foundation upon which things would be built. The shards would need to adapt to a sedentary lifestyle but, provided humanity didn't destroy itself in the meantime, they had plenty of time to do so.

  "How long will you remain?" Ciara asked her.

  "A few days at most," Taylor answered, "the process to integrate Negotiator and Reinforcer into my own network is underway."

  "You could bring many more with you if you wish. They are yours by right of conquest, I am merely their shepherd."

  "Maybe," she shrugged, "but I do not really want to, a fresh start is good sometimes. But if you want to recommend a few troublemakers I can harvest for their data …"

  "Should I expect Preceptor to vanish soon?"

  "Maybe …" Taylor grinned.

  "His loss will not be mourned," Ciara had a sly smile on as well.

  Taylor smiled as she smiled as she looked at the endless landscape before them. Thousands upon thousands of islands glittered in the void like thousands of stars. The Firmament was the domain of shards and their avatars and each was unique, a reflection of their nature and purpose. The massive garden of bone spikes and pulsating red flesh was likely Shaper's. It was as inviting as their personality.

  Ciara and her were in the process of solving a few important issues before she departed for good. Keeper and her host did most of the work while Taylor and Asteria offered advice on how to proceed.

  Right below them was one of particular interest. If one asked which of the shards was closest to a human in mindset, this one would certainly come to mind. Her self designation was [Waste], a very young shard formed during the current cycle from the discarded parts of several others. Waste's avatar bore a very familiar face, one that Taylor had not seen in quite a while.

  Victoria Dallon.

  Waste's overall appearance mirrored the flesh abomination Panacea had turned her sister into during the Nine's attack. Dozens of limbs were attached to torsos that sometimes intersected with each other with no rhyme or reason. Unlike the flesh and blood Victoria, Waste appeared as a semi transparent hollow force-field seemingly made from glass with a golden sheen when looked at from certain angles. The avatar also radiated a pale golden light that was almost solid in the Firmament.

  "You requested assistance?" Taylor asked.

  [Affirmation! ??]

  [Defective ??]

  "I see," Taylor nodded. The communication packets from Waste gave her the impression of a teenager texting very enthusiastically.

  "What's the nature of the issue?" Ciara asked.

  [Hub Destroyed ??]

  [Independent Reconfiguration Forbidden ??]

  [Shaper Altered Host ??]

  [Field Shape Discordant With Host ??]

  [Host Distressed ??]

  "It should not be difficult to solve," Taylor nodded.

  "Indeed," Ciara nodded.

  On Earth Gimmel, Victoria Dallon was going about with her day when, suddenly, her power had a strange … hiccup. She felt her force-field drop as if she had received a blow then, quicker than usual, it came back with a shimmer of golden light. Except it was no longer in the shape of the Wretch. Instead, it once again hugged her skin like it had before … her. Though this time it felt even stronger and more … affectionate. Like her power was unwilling to let it happen a second time.

  [Exultation ??]

  "What the fuck?"

  Taylor and Ciara stepped out of the Firmament on the helipad where her shuttle was parked. The former faerie queen took a big breath of air as they returned and stretched her arms.

  "Thank you for your assistance," she gave a curt bow. "I bid you farewell on your travels until our paths cross once again." As they were both immortal, it was more likely than not even with how vast the universe was.

  "The pleasure was mine," Taylor gave a short bow in turn.

  Valkyrie walked down the stairs towards the building and entered her access code to open the door that led into the building. Meanwhile, Taylor brought up her omni-tool and sent a message to her friends that she was back. A quick query to Negotiator told her where to find Lisa and she opened a portal a few hundred feet in the air near that location.

  She slowly flew down and landed a few feet from the terrace of a street café. Lisa was enjoying one of her culinary abominations she called a coffee, and which likely had at least three Italian words in the name, while Rachel had a glass of syrup between her hands. Mordin had a small cup of espresso while Niusa had a soda.

  Unauthorized content usage: if you discover this narrative on Amazon, report the violation.

  "Tay, finished with the Faerie Queen?" Lisa waved at her.

  "I have," she slid into the free chair. "Hopefully, I haven't made you wait too long."

  One of Rachel's dogs sniffed her hand under the table, she gave the little rascal a few scratches between the ears as a reward.

  "I found the human fashion here very interesting," Niusa chimed in. "It feels a bit more … vibrant."

  "And I found a few things for you too, Tay," Lisa had her trademarked grin on.

  "Woe is me," she clutched at her chest. "And you Mordin? Not too bored?"

  "Relaxation time welcome," the salarian said with a contented expression. "Observation of alternate twenty-first century human culture very interesting."

  "Glad you're enjoying your casual anthropology study," Taylor chuckled.

  "What's the next step captain?" Niusa asked.

  "Next, we're going to visit Defiant and Dragon. After that, I have a few choice words for Teacher and Contessa to occupy the time until Lisa's and Rachel's shards have finished their transfer and upgrades. Then we'll be off, back to your dimension."

  "Straightforward," Mordin nodded.

  "Let's go then, I'm curious to see how Armsie and his Canadian Girlfriend are faring," Lisa said.

  To get to Earth He, where Dragon and Defiant were, from Gimmel, the shortest route with a flying vehicle was to cross back to Bet and take the portal in Berlin that led there. With the ability to fly at supersonic speeds in the high atmosphere where the air was thinner, the trip took only two hours compared to the half-day that it would have taken with a commercial jet.

  As with Brockton Bay, the portal stood in the middle of the crumbling German capital. However, on this one, fortifications had been built on both sides. Mordin piloted the shuttle on a predictable flight path while Taylor contacted them and provided her authorization code. It went smoothly and they slipped through the portal at low speed.

  The Guild Headquarters was not in Neue Berlin which was much smaller than its Bet counterpart had been but to the west in Brussels, the center of the failed European Union which had been revived after Gold Morning. Once they reached the city, it wasn't hard to find the place. If the Wardens had built a fortress as their headquarters, the Guild headquarters was an impregnable citadel.

  "Narya, you are cleared for hangar two," traffic control announced.

  "Understood, Guild HQ. We will begin our approach."

  A massive door on the edge of the building opened. As they approached, Taylor spotted the array of dragon-themed suits on one side of the hangar. From the looks of it, they hadn't been directed to any old hangar, no, it looked like Dragon's own. Mordin landed the shuttle with grace on the right of the designated area, leaving enough space for another vehicle to depart if necessary.

  At the end of the hangar, two people were waiting. On the left was Defiant, whose face bore a few more scars than the last time Taylor had seen it, and on the right was Dragon. She recognized her as she looked exactly like her digital avatar, with no identifiable ethnicity, long dark hair, and a gentle smile that reminded Taylor of her mother.

  There was a moment of hesitation as she stepped out of the shuttle. The three of them looked at each other as their respective sensors seized the others.

  Her shard granted senses told her that Defiant was more machine than man, the amount of cybernetics he had installed was probably unhealthy in the long run, and that Dragon's gynoid body was a marvel of engineering. The synthetic skin and hairs were as close to real as was possible, which was damn near indistinguishable, and the artificial organs inside were all made to emulate the human body to an impressive degree.

  Taylor also had no doubt that her true nature was revealed to the two tinkers. Her current body configuration was immune to casual detection but not in-depth scans. With the amount of exotic detectors pointed her way, it was impossible to miss.

  "Taylor," Dragon spoke first. "Welcome back."

  "Thank you, Dragon," Taylor said with a smile and a tear in her eye. "It's been a while."

  "Legend was certain that …" Defiant let the last part hang.

  "Rumors of my demise were greatly exaggerated," Taylor answered. "Contessa tried but her power failed to take some variables into account."

  "And I am glad that she didn't succeed," Dragon said. "When Legend asked me to confirm the authenticity of your master-stranger codes, I was surprised. His update after your meeting was welcome but I'm certain he didn't say everything. There were also some … rather unbelievable claims about aliens and spaceships."

  "Unbelievable until now," Defiant corrected her, "that ship is very advanced but it does not look to be tinker-tech"

  "Maybe I should do the introductions first," Taylor said.

  Lisa was the first to step out of the shuttle with Rachel and Bastard right behind her. The young wolf was curious about everything but her girlfriend kept him on a tight leash, literally. Niusa was next and Mordin brought up the rear.

  "Dragon," Lisa said. "I had heard rumors but … you look great," her girlfriend said with a grin. "Congratulations on the upgrade."

  "Tattletale," Dragon replied, "or do you prefer another name?"

  "Lisa is fine," her girlfriend shrugged, "I don't plan on bringing my old identity with me."

  "So it is true, you plan to leave earth for good?" Defiant asked.

  "Yes," Taylor nodded. "I've earned my retirement don't you think?"

  "Some would probably disagree," Defiant said, "but I think you have earned some rest. Not that I expect you to stay idle for too long."

  "Probably not," she admitted, "but that's a problem for another time. I'm sure you all know Rachel, my other girlfriend." Dragon smiled at that. "And finally, allow me to introduce Niusa T'Saro and Mordin Solus."

  Niusa gave the two a wave and a smile while Mordin gave a small bow.

  "Let's retire to one of my workshops," Dragon offered. "The hangar is not the most conductive to discussions. And please, call me Theresa or Tess, we are between friends after all."

  "Colin," Defiant said curtly.

  When they reached the workshop, Tess graciously offered to give a tour to Mordin and Niusa as the former was full of questions about tinkers and their tinkering. Thankfully, Lisa dragged Rachel and her three dogs along for the tour as well, leaving her free to talk with Colin.

  "My memories of the later parts of the fight against Scion are very fuzzy but I didn't forget what Saint did before that," Taylor said quietly. "I thought that …"

  "The Ascalon program did erase most of her backups," Colin said, "but, somehow, Teacher got his hands on one of them and …"

  Taylor could fill in the blanks very easily. That bastard had brought Dragon back during the fight but he likely left something inside of her in the process.

  "I was already planning to kill him but … it won't be quick or painless," Taylor said as her anger flared.

  "I managed to remove most of the code he left in Tess but … it had a cost," Defiant said with a frown.

  Several of her forks had already explored the possibilities of AI with Hephaestus. Most of what the shards provided in that regard was heavily restricted to prevent any super-intelligent digital intelligence from being born. If there was anything that could potentially threaten an entity, it was that. The network knew which shard had been granted to Tess' creator and she had quickly found its match in her own database.

  "Each time you removed a restriction," Taylor said, "another part of her framework was damaged as well because the two were intertwined. If you were to remove, say, the restrictions against killing, the backup sub-system could become unstable for example."

  "Yes. Your new powers include something related to tinkering?" Colin asked, curiosity obvious in his cybernetic eyes.

  "I have access to the full tinker database without the black-boxes normally imposed by shards," Taylor admitted. "I was planning on providing you two at least part of it before I left."

  "That is … generous," he said, "why us specifically? There are many others …"

  "I know that Tess and you would use them for the betterment of everyone. She is a good person at heart and you're too, even if we had our differences in the past."

  "Will this include …" Something to help Tess, he left the last part unsaid.

  "Digital intelligences can be extremely dangerous," she said. Colin wanted to say something but she preempted him. "You and me both know it, Tess could have turned out very different under other circumstances. That being said, of course I will help her if she accepts."

  "And if she doesn't?"

  "Then it's her choice and we'll have to accept it."