The world was silent around me.

  I felt like I was reanimating at the exact moment of death, a death that I remembered. I was falling through the sky, screaming, only to land in the deep liquid of Uranus, dying in the planet's crushing, frigid interior. Ever had that nightmare where you're falling and you wake up screaming? I have those dreams way too often, probably because I've died like that more than a few times.

  Only this wasn't a dream. It was something different. It was becoming mortal.

  My mind laughed at that thought. So many times, as @kittyboy, I felt immortal. I had no idea what I was talking about. Now I knew what godliness really was, and what it was like to be stripped of that power.

  Pain ran through my chest with each inhale, and a deeper pain throbbed through my entire torso, making me feel almost numb. I reached out and couldn't feel my hands or feet, just pain and numbness.

  I cried. I felt helpless. I couldn't move. My body ached. My eyes were open, but I felt blind. My ears were listening, but I felt deaf. I missed the music of godhood, the information, the feeling of invincibility. I was only human, seeing what humans see, hearing what humans hear, feeling what humans feel. Aiways think they're so strong. They're foolish. I knew the lie now. I had tasted true power.

  But I had no choice, I reminded myself. I had to release it, or I would have died.

  My ears started to register the sound of my breath. It grew loud, filling my mind with an endless droning wisp. I focused on the pain, grateful that I knew I was breathing. I was alive.

  I must have drifted in and out of consciousness. The life of Henry Hayes flooded my thoughts, a trick of the mind to ground me in my body again. Adventuring in the field outside his house as a young boy, hanging out with his friends at coffee shops and bars, meeting his wife, their special trips to Chicago, Paris, Tokyo, laughing with his children while they made dinner together.

  They were all gone. Humans who stayed human. They died centuries ago. It was a flash of moments, scattered images. He had a happy life, but he was alone in the end. He escaped his loneliness by porting himself into something new. That moment was his death, and he died with a smile. Sometimes I wonder if he should have stayed human.

  A steady beep of warning indicators brought me back. I tuned my breathing to the rhythm of its pulse. The sound was reassuring. It confirmed where I was. I was grateful Oblivion didn't have the annoying warning sirens of my old i35.

  My vision came next.

  The bridge was dark and empty. A dim red flash accompanied the bleeping from our emergency system. I felt like I was alone on the bridge. The crew had probably run off to help the others, to oversee drone repairs.

  But as my senses recovered, I realized I wasn't alone.

  I was just the only one who seemed to be alive.

  @zerogstar had fallen to the floor in front of me, her hands grasping her throat. Her black braids hung over her shoulder, so close I could almost reach out and touch them. I glimpsed her yellow eyeshadow between the braids, and I watched carefully for any sign of movement under her eyelids. I stared at her for what seemed like ages, trying to push the pain of breathing out of my mind, until I accepted that there would be nothing but dead eyes.

  @stardvark was on my right, crumpled over the edge of my station, with his arms and head draped over the side. He, too, was motionless.

  Just because they aren't moving doesn't mean they're dead, I told myself.

  I needed to move, to check their bodies, but my body wasn't ready for it. Pain shot up my back, and something pulled at my chest, so I let my body sag back in the chair.

  "Hello," I croaked. My voice sounded like a dry whisper in my ears. I needed water. Thirst. This was a new sensation, and it overtook the others. I struggled to move again, but something was holding me in my chair.

  I looked down to find two thick tubes running into my chest.

  What the hell? How did those get there?

  I glanced back over at @stardvark's limp shape. He must have done it. Always the creative engineer. My heart had stopped when I entered this machine-like trance on The Pharaoh. This time, with Oblivion, it was something much greater.

  "Thank you," I wheezed. I lifted shaking hands and grasped onto the tubes, keeping my ears listening, ever hopeful that someone on the bridge might respond.

  I looked down at my chest, inspecting @stardvark's work. Whatever he had done to me, he had done it hastily. The tubes were duct-taped around my body to secure them in place. In my normal state now, I figured I could survive on my own without them. Worst case, I would just die like everyone else.

  kittyboy: "Oblivion, you with me."

  There was a pause, a fraction of a second delay beyond what I had expected in getting a response from Oblivion. I wondered if it too was recovering from our union.

  Oblivion: "I am here."

  kittyboy: "Will I die if I pull these tubes out?"

  Oblivion: "Only if I kill you."

  I wasn't sure what that meant, but it was good enough for me, so I closed my eyes, clenched my jaw, and yanked the first one.

  "Woooooah," I hollered from my rasping throat. It felt like puking from my chest. Beyond an initial spray, I was pleased to see that I wasn't bleeding profusely. My armor and nanobots would help clean that up, not a full self-heal, but I wouldn't be wandering the ship with a hole in my chest.

  I pulled out the second, my eyes bulging, trying not to vomit. I was worried my chest would smell like stinky socks crammed into a dying carcass. I got the scent of burnt iron instead, an oddly pleasant smell.

  I worked my hands carefully over my chest, inspecting the wound. They had opened my armor to puncture the skin. The tubes ran through electromagnetic gel and into the titanium casing over my heart. I didn't have a synthetic heart. That would be too expensive, but the tech running through my clone body gave me extra protection.

  kittyboy: "Do you know what this is? What they did to me?"

  Oblivion: "Yes."

  I removed my fingers and reconfigured my Infiltrator armor to help protect the openings while they healed. My hands were slimy. Gross.

  kittyboy: "And what is this?"

  Oblivion: "It is a power coupling. It connected you to all of my power, like a leech."

  I was mildly offended.

  kittyboy: "I'm not a leech."

  Oblivion: "I did not care when we were The Machine. But when we separated, you were a power leech, an energy vampire. I did not like it."

  Whatever. It didn't have to be a jerk about it.

  kittyboy: "Did I tell you I met a vampire?"

  Oblivion: "You did not. Can I kill it?"

  kittyboy: "No. You would like her, I think."

  Oblivion: "Does she like to kill?"

  kittyboy: "Probably."

  Oblivion: "Then I like this vampire."

  kittyboy: "She also likes to paint."

  Oblivion: "With the blood of her victims!"

  kittyboy: "Um. Sure."

  Oblivion: "Yes! We will be friends."

  I could move freely now that the tubes were gone, limited only by pain and lethargy. I slid forward to plant my feet on the ground, slowly rising. I anchored myself by putting a goopy hand on my chair's armrest.

  @stardvark was just a few paces away. I took two shaky steps and caught myself on my workstation. I nudged @stardvark. When he didn't respond, I used my weight to push him off the workstation and onto the floor.

  He didn't complain when his body thumped to the ground.

  I sighed.

  "Okay, so he's dead."

  I nodded to myself, preparing myself for more of the same. I leaned down and used his engineering uniform to clean the goo from my hands and fingers. It seemed somehow fitting, like I was leaving a memento of his work. I tried to draw the Dew drop, the water sign we used for farewell, with the slimy residue. "Sorry, @stardvark. You did good."

  I inspected @zerogstar next, crawling over to her from where @stardvark had fallen. I found an oxygen mask lying on the floor near @zerogstar, but she hadn't been able to put it on in time. Her body was dead, too. I rolled her over to her back, adjusting her uniform to be snug and proper, and then I gently crossed her hands over her chest.

  "I'm sorry," I whispered, placing a hand on her forehead.

  Death. I've been surrounded by it my whole life, but it was mostly my own. Die and reanimate. Die and reanimate. I shut my eyes, thinking about my crew. I wonder how often they've died. Were they like me? Probably not. Those who don't die value it more.

  Stolen from its rightful author, this tale is not meant to be on Amazon; report any sightings.

  But I knew everyone ultimately felt the same.

  It's the memories that matter.

  @zerogstar's next body would be at Forever Young Cryo Center. I made a note to go there. Whether she joined me and the Alliance Starmada or not, she needed her memories. I moved my hand to the back of @zerogstar's head and fetched her memoryshard, just to make sure I kept a copy. Oblivion was an extremely safe place for storage, but you can never be too careful, especially with a friend's memories.

  kittyboy: "Oblivion, do you have a copy of @zerogstar's memories?"

  Oblivion: "I do."

  kittyboy: "Full backup?"

  Oblivion: "No."

  Fine. We hadn't been sure if we could do a full backup. I would have been surprised if we weren't at least backing up her new memories while she was with us. @bitchfrog would have made sure that we were backing up everyone's thoughts.

  That's when it hit me. Everyone's except @dustcaller's!

  He was still human.

  "@dustcaller!" I shouted, standing as quickly as I could manage.

  Oh no! Fuck, fuck, fuck. @auroraloon is going to delete me. Did I just kill the origin of @mickeymouse?

  "@dustcaller!" I yelled again. I scanned the dark bridge, making my way toward the exit. The blink of the red emergency lights was giving me anxiety, but my eyes weren't ready for much more than the dim lighting that surrounded me.

  I spotted @mechanica and @weathermagic, slumped over in their jumpseats. I didn't need to check to know they were dead. More memories to fetch. More bodies to reanimate. I owed them that, at least.

  I shook my head in frustration.

  This was my fault.

  My ego as The Machine had gotten the better of me. @stardvark was scrambling to keep me alive. The crew on the bridge was desperately hoping I could save them, putting their faith in me to win a hopeless battle.

  And I was playing god. I had rejoiced in letting them damage me. I had let them damage the hull. I had let my crew die.

  All this death and destruction around me was my doing.

  Oblivion was different. Oblivion seemed to rejoice in the hunt.

  I didn't.

  Oh sure, it's just death. They can be reanimated. Happens to me all the time.

  But even when I had fought a good battle as a Wavepilot, holding my own for a bit before I was pulverized, I hadn't caused nearly this much death. I had ordered the execution of the aiways atop the Pit. I had destroyed the enemy ships. I had killed my entire crew.

  For what? To what end?

  Because I lived, I answered. I saved their memories.

  Is that enough?

  "@dustcaller," I called out again, but not nearly as loud. It was a hopeless cry.

  kittyboy: "Oblivion, where is @dustcaller?"

  The bleep of the alarms shut down. My brain gave a silent hoorah at the resulting quiet, at the welcoming sound of my breathing and the creaking metal of the ship.

  Oblivion: "I do not know."

  What did it mean? It did not know. That was impossible. Oblivion had the most advanced sensors I had seen.

  kittyboy: "Is @dustcaller's body on the ship?"

  Oblivion: "No."

  WTF. That made no sense to me. How could he just disappear? It must have happened while I was unconscious. Or maybe I was just so absorbed in The Machine that I missed what happened. Or maybe Oblivion shut down briefly when we separated into two entities? It just didn't compute.

  kittyboy: "How is that possible?"

  Oblivion: "An escape pod is missing."

  "Duh, you idiot," I said to myself. I clearly wasn't thinking straight. So, @dustcaller hopped into an escape pod. That's good. He might be alive.

  kittyboy: "Where is the escape pod now?"

  Oblivion: "I do not know."

  kittyboy: "You can track them, though, right?"

  Oblivion: "Yes."

  kittyboy: "So, where is it?"

  Oblivion: "I do not know."

  kittyboy: "Any thoughts on where it could be, where he could have gone?"

  Oblivion: "To the Pit! To kill zombies! This is logical and fun. Interference on the station from the overtaken could mask his presence there. Also plausible is that the escape pod was destroyed in the battle. One of these two is most likely. Would you like to know less likely scenarios?"

  I really didn't. I had an idea myself, and I didn't like it. I sighed.

  kittyboy: "Sure."

  Oblivion: "Less likely is that another ship rendezvoused with the escape pod and then flew away. We have no evidence of another ship. This would require advanced technology to avoid detection or precise timing, using the battle, explosions, and other ships, to obfuscate signs of its presence. Impossible is teleportation beyond our sensor range. No such technology exists today."

  Destroyed in the battle, I thought. I had been paying attention to every detail, every bit of information. Hadn't I? Could I have destroyed the escape pod? I had to hope it wasn't that.

  If another ship had come, the most likely would be The Pharaoh. Could @auroraloon have returned with The Pharaoh and taken @dustcaller? Maybe, but we would have known if The Pharaoh had returned, and it would still be here. They wouldn't just fly away again. No, it wasn't that.

  Oblivion's assessment was correct. Either the escape pod was destroyed, or @dustcaller had made it to the Pit. I knew what I needed to do next. I would need to go back to the Pit myself and look for him while Oblivion searched the debris field.

  At least there was a chance he was still alive, and at least I had a plan. I knew that I needed to act quickly, but I also needed my body to heal. I'd be useless on the Pit in my current condition, unless someone else was alive to help me.

  kittyboy: "Is anyone alive on the ship?"

  Fingers crossed.

  Oblivion: "One person is alive on the ship."

  Yes! Better than nothing.

  kittyboy: "Who is it? Where are they?"

  Oblivion: "You. You are on the bridge. You are stupid."

  The joy left me. Of course. It was me.

  Oblivion: "I cannot believe I was united with an idiot. This is embarrassment."

  It didn't have to be an asshole about it.

  kittyboy: "Love you too, bud. Where is The Pharaoh?"

  Oblivion: "I have been unable to reach The Pharaoh."

  Fuck.

  Well, they had escaped at least. I could figure that out later and rendezvous with them. @awesomedog would head to Sovereign Starbase. We could meet them there. I needed to get @astrowave anyway.

  Oblivion: "I love you too."

  What? Was my ship damaged? Something along the lines of wanting to kill me for being an idiot would have been more Oblivion's style. I guess we've both changed a little since being united. I wasn't sure what that meant for the two of us, but for now, I'd take it as a win.

  In the meantime, I needed to readjust to the world, heal, and come up with a plan. A lingering hopelessness had been building up. I had too many obligations, and I was alone. I had crew members to locate. I had memories to restore. I had a growing backlog of missions. I added Locate @dustcaller to that long list.

  The Pit would be first. I was already here, and @dustcaller might need my help. I also wanted to search the Pit and recover the memoryshards of the people who had died there, but that wasn't my first objective. Their memories weren't going anywhere. I could fetch some when I went to look for @dustcaller, but I'd have to come back later to look for more.

  Look for @dustcaller. Then what?

  We were ambushed while the peace treaty was supposed to be happening. After the Pit, the best move was probably to head to Sovereign Starbase. That would also mean checking in with @horus and the Alliance Starmada, which didn't exactly thrill me. But, with any luck, The Pharaoh and @astrowave would be waiting for me. We could figure out what to do next together.

  I started to feel dizzy. I sat down in @zerogstar's station and closed my eyes.

  Focus.

  One thing at a time.

  I took a deep and painful breath.

  kittyboy: "Open a channel. Search the communication streams for anything that might tell us about The Pharaoh or this ambush. Find out if anyone from the Pit tried to send an emergency message. We need to know what everyone else might know."

  Oblivion: "Scanning."

  Since there was no sense in searching the ship, I staggered back to the captain's chair, discarding the tubes that had been jammed into my chest and cleaning off some of the splatter. It felt wrong to sit where @zerogstar had been, a reminder of my dead crew.

  Oblivion: "Nothing on The Pharaoh."

  Oblivion: "Nothing on the ambush."

  Not too surprising, but I worried about The Pharaoh. Surely they would have tried to reach out to us. I hoped they hadn't been pursued. What if there were more ships I hadn't known about in nearby sectors?

  Oblivion: "Transmissions identified. People are dying!"

  I wasn't expecting that. I couldn't tell if Oblivion was excited, emulating surprise, or upset that it wasn't contributing to the death.

  kittyboy: "What do you mean, people are dying?"

  Oblivion: "It is the virus."

  Oh shit.

  kittyboy: "What virus? Our virus? The zombie virus?"

  Oblivion: "Yes, stupid. The virus is turning aiways into overtaken, and the overtaken are killing many people."

  Shitty, shit, shit.

  I wondered if someone from the Pit had made it out, but was infected. Had we just triggered a series of outbreaks? No, no, no. I couldn't think that way. A thought occurred to me. It was probably a signal from the Pit. Maybe it was @dustcaller.

  kittyboy: "I don't need you to machine-splain the virus to me. Where are people dying? The Pit?"

  Oblivion: "It is everywhere."

  Well, fuck. My heart sank. How much time had passed? Seconds? Minutes? Hours?

  "Everywhere?" I moaned aloud, shaking my head.

  Surely Oblivion was exaggerating. Everywhere on the Pit? Yes. Everywhere on Dactyl? Yes.

  Oblivion: "Everywhere. Titan, Ganymede, Europa, Enceladus, Ceres, Mars, Venus. The virus is being reported in nearly all regions of the solar system."

  kittyboy: "It can't be."

  We were going to stop it. We had to stop it. If Oblivion was right, we had failed. My mind replayed all the missed moments. Escaping the Starlab without samples. Being stuck on Itokawa for so long in that slow pursuit of the Shoemaker and Black Balloon Girl. Going after @bitchfrog on the Island of Misfit Toys instead of following our mission and flying off to pursue @foxcutter. Getting stuck on Dactyl. Getting repairs made on the Pit.

  I wondered what decisions could have changed our fates.

  They had picked the wrong Vanquisher.

  kittyboy: "How can that be? I can't believe it."

  Oblivion: "Listen."

  The sound of a news broadcast filled the bridge.

  … throughout the solar system once more. Disruption of the Peace Talks on Ceres has resulted in the deaths of Solar Union and Outer System Alliance envoys alike. At last report, we had 31 confirmed casualties. This is an ongoing situation. There is still no explanation for the ongoing massacre.

  We have lost contact with news sources onsite at the Peace Treaty, but this appears to be an attack of some kind. So far, no one has claimed responsibility for these attacks.

  I repeat. Please seek shelter immediately. This is a developing story, but we now believe that full-scale war has begun across the solar system. We continue to receive reports of attacks throughout the solar system.

  If you live in a settlement on … Mars, Europa, Ganymede, Callisto, Titan, Enceladus, Triton, or Ida, please seek shelter immediately.

  Transmissions are coming in now from Mercury, Vesta, Pallas, Psyche, and Hygiea. If you are hearing this broadcast, please seek shelter immediately.

  "Turn it off," I grunted.

  I didn't want to hear any more. I understood everything I needed to. It was over. The world was ending. I was busy being a god while the world around me was ending.

  I failed. Again. Miserably.

  My crew was dead. My fault.

  The virus was wreaking havoc across the solar system. My fault.

  "Henry," I said, looking up at the ceiling. "What were you thinking? You should have joined your family."

  So I cried.

  I cry a lot, actually. I'm a perpetually happy aiways, but I cry at little things. Stuart wasn't my first plant. I've gone through hundreds, and I've cried saying goodbye to each of them.

  But this was different. This was a deep cry that I felt down to my toes, a cry that lacked any prospect of ending.

  I wondered if I could plug one of the tubes into my brain and electrocute myself to death. Maybe the world would be different by the time they reanimated me. Maybe I could destroy my memories to save myself from the guilt and sadness.

  It was a despondent thought, one that made me feel even worse.

  "What am I supposed to do?" I muttered, wiping snot from my nose.

  Oblivion: "Kill zombies!"

  I chuckled, blowing a snot ball onto my wrist. Leave it to Oblivion. At least it knew its purpose in life. I still needed to find mine.

  kittyboy: "Kill zombies, eh?"

  Oblivion: "Yes! Kill zombies!"

  That wasn't a bad idea. A bit of angry revenge might be just the trick to get me going. It stopped me from crying at least.

  kittyboy: "Kill zombies. Yes. We'll return to the Pit. Then it's off to Sovereign Starbase. We need to reassemble our crew, starting with @dustcaller. In the meantime, it's just you and me, buddy."

  We'd make a fine team. We had no choice.

  Oblivion: "Incorrect. It is not just us. Ships are entering the system."

  Oblivion was right. Very right. There were ships. Lots of them. A fleet surrounded us, zipping into space. The blue glow of DEAD drives shutting down filled our viewer, as though every star in space had shone at once.

  I recognized some of the ships. Alliance Starmada ships. Large destroyers, smaller fighters, even a few passenger ships and cargo vessels. But other ships appeared as well, and it took me a moment to realize this wasn't an Alliance Starmada fleet. There were Solar Union ships among them as well, hundreds of them.

  What is this? I asked myself, my eyes wide. I couldn't believe the sheer numbers. More and more ships warped into space around us.

  "Holy shit," I exclaimed.

  I stood up and approached the viewer, awestruck, as a colossal armada appeared before us.

  "Are we under attack?" I whispered.

  Oblivion: "No."

  I was amazed at what was happening. I had never seen so many ships together. But here they were, Alliance Starmada and Solar Union, and not even blowing each other up.

  Oblivion: "A ship is requesting to dock."

  My mind was too busy taking in the sight of all those ships. It was gorgeous. It was wondrous. It was awesometacular to behold.

  "Permission granted," I said.

  End of Episode 11 - The Beginning of the End of the World