Chapter 12-3 The Easy Armistice (II)

Chapter 12-3 The Easy Armistice (II)

Heavens are comprised of a unified retelling of a story. This is what makes them so hard to counterthey dont need to make exact sense in the broad scheme of things, but as long as enough people repeat the same rituals and mutter the same prayers and worship the same scripture, a sort of pattern forms in existence.

Something that lets the Heaven embed itself into a few central concepts.

Where hubris and Rend come in are curious as well. From the accounts weve collected, hubris seems to be born of logical pitfalls or hard limitations as stated in their mythology.

Take the Sangeist for example. How blood works around that thing is absolute nonsense, right? But we know this: It can use its blood and mimic the general qualities of solid matter while still maintaining its own. Two things about this. One is that solid matter means literally anything that seems solid from the perspective of the worshippers that defined it. This means structures like fissile material or adamantine can be adapted to their structures.

The expression of said materials can get strange, though.



But not antimatter. And not a hydrogen cell. Magma is more of a variable thing depending on if it's flowing or not. They can do it if it's not moving but the effects are confusing for the Heaven to say the least.

The Daemon, however. Thats something else. From our current suspicious, our best guess is that the Heavens still have some latent memories of the entities they once housed, allowing their users to wield them with almost no learning curve, and this is enough left behind that when something blatantly blasphemous or out of character occurs, so to speak, it risks awakening inside the user as wellthe connection between the forming a metacognitive link.

All this is to say operate with caution. The Ruptured function on a few shared restrictions, but most of their rules vary wildly.

When there are Heavens for everything from dogs to soundwaves, your best chances of staying safe are staying away and staying aware.

-Orientation on Frames and Heavens for Planetside Assets, Node Aegis, Voidwatch

12-3

The Easy Armistice (II)

The first layer of the Easy Armistice unveiled itself with the aeros slow rotation. With each inch they turned, the foreground unzipped, revealing a bright new horizon through a blurred cleft of space.

Looking back to gaze upon the sprawling shanties below, Avo found them wobbling before its sight, their geometric outlines jiggling like vibrating strings. Nausea painted Essus expression as he swallowed sour spit.

Were transitioning, Denton explained. A low frequency followed her words, the pitch light but constant, rising and falling in a repetition of patterns. The turnings for aligning ourselves with the signal. Too fast and we miss the frequency. Too slow and the curtain doesnt lift.

Heaven of Pitches? Avo said. Or geometry?

The Glaive shook her head. The Easy Armistice is special-made. Heaven of Signals. World around them brightened as the interior of the voidship dulled away into the background. It was like all other than the Easy Armistice was losing focus, dissolving into faint clashes and dappled light and muted sound.

The pitch spiked. The glass of the wielded squealed momentarily before the Twice-Walker passed beneath its translucence and pinched it still.

It wasnt going to break, Denton said, reassuring Draus.

The Regular didnt reply.

Enshadowed within the light, the Armistice resembled something in the shape of a hanging acorn at the heart of the radiance. Light spread out, enveloping the aero as the frequency rose to its apex.

Avo hissed as he felt a spike of pain pulse throughout his cochlea. The violence of his reaction made Chambers jerk back in his seat.

Uh, you alright, consang? the man asked.

The light began to settle. Casting his gaze out through the vehicles sensors, he found himself in a place shrouded by a canopy of titanic brambles and spilling leaves. Through crevices offered by wrestling branches fell the first spills of miracle-infused light.

Bathed in the rays, Avo felt his injury promptly dissolve.

I feel a nearness to this place, his Woundshaper said. Something that once belonged to our Domain of Biology shares an origin to the mythos that covers this realm within a realm.

Must we stay, the Galeslither said. Must we linger? This is a cage This is a trap. We must be free. We must

Calm yourself, mule. This eventuality has been prepared. Let the huntress serve her purpose. You just be prepared to serve yours.

A low note of discontentment mantled the Galeslithers emotions. I rode free once. Now I am debased. Mine is not shadow. Mine was storm and sky and message. Mine wasThis chapter made its debut appearance via N0v3lB1n.

Past and lost! The Woundshaper cut it off. We are all past and lost! Struck down by the childrenstruck down by the ephemerals and partlings. Hewn from our foundations. What shame, I ask? Let us fall, I say. If the tower cannot stand upon the base that was built, then it was never a tower to be.

The Heavens argued on thereafter, sparring within the gilded cage that was his Frame. He himself found more interest in examining the establishment that was the Armistice.

Convenience was another hallmark of the citys heights. Here, the structures of existence could be remolded to suit the needs of the individual, with distances shrunk and verticalities altered through the whims of the basest canons.

After a month of being a Godclad, Avo felt a deeper kinship forming between him and New Vultun.

A city of predation.

A city of vultures.

A city of technology and mythology entwined.

But ultimately, a city of presiding stories.

That was what a Heaven was in the end: Overriding narratives told in place of what was.

Whoa, Chambers said as they arrived at the heart of the thinkeasy. Its gonna take me a while to get used to this.

A single tree-like pillar spun in place before them, a vast structure that stretched vertically for three miles. Its entire expanse was parted into five different platforms, and impossibly, there were people sitting and walking on both ends, be they upright or upside down.

The constant buzz of shuttling service drones deepened the hive-like theme presented by the Armistice. Holocoated bodies with heavily warded Metas formed the bulk of the clientele and as Avo took in his surroundings, he found them walking across every flat surface.

Gravity adheres to different rules here, Denton said, waving at the pillar before them. Thats the center. Force comes out from that and presses down on everything with an edge. Dont jump off the sides or youll be falling at terminal velocity in endless loops. The drones will have to catch you, but they wont be gentle about it.

You speakin from experience? Draus asked, eyes darting from point to point as she took in her surroundings. Doubtless, she was considering her exposure, her potential angles of attack or defense.

He couldnt fault her his own preoccupation in the present was not so different as he scried at the Necrotheurgic talent present.

From the wards alone, he wasnt in milk-run territory anymore. They werent Incubi, but judging from most of the accretions around him, competence was the expected baseline. These were seasoned street squires and snuffers at the very least. A few offered hints of potential above that.

A link shot out from Dentons mind, hooking out to capture a passing drone as it flashed red and then green. I got us a booth. If any of you are hungry or thirsty, theres a scan-in menu in place. My associates will be joining us shortly. We can talk in-depth then.

Might we know one of them, Draus said, her voice edged with thin disdain.

I doubt it, Denton replied. As I said before, the old woman will probably be occupied for a while.

The supposed booth she procured was a small alcove that sunk inward from the side of the cylinder surrounding the central pillar. The sensation of stepping over the threshold and expecting to fall before gravity adjusted to their sense of verticality was uncanny, but in moments, they found themselves situated around a risen marble table lit by a hovering locus.

Soft frequencies continued to play from speakers embedded into the walls, their notes masked by the somber melody of a strange wind-based instrument. There was sourness in the music. A certain feeling of longing and nostalgia he couldnt quite place.

You like it? Denton said. Avo turned to regard her.

Dont know the instrument.

Its called a saxophone. The players name was Osjon Coldtrain, I think. He was a Vodiwatch musician. Old. Very old. She smiled faintly as the notes continued to flow. You know this song is banned, right? This, along with its entire genre? Supposedly, there was an attempt to make a Heaven out of them. It went wrong. It went bad.

New rhyme same as the fuckin first, Draus said. Now. Wherere your consangs? Well hear what you got to say but you gotta forgive us if we aint feelin all that patient after today.

Of course, the Glaive said. The two of them should be

A holocoated figure fell over the alcove. Sorry, Denton. Got caught up putting her in the corner. So. Is this our little band? A victim, some half-strand, a Color-Puppet, and a rotlick. He laughed. There was an unnaturally silken quality to his voice, with the way he spoke almost alluring to the ears. Godsdamned do the fates frown on us.

Just sit down, Cas, Denton said.

His answer was lost to a low humming chorus of bees that flooded in over the edge.

To Avos disbelief, the ghostly faintness of thoughtstuff wove between them, like their interconnected mind was a cloud of cognition from pheromones and hive-like synchronicity.

Sorry, the swarm buzzed as they fused into a ball. We had some delays. The Paladins nearly looped half of us off.

Chambers blinked. Are these fat fleas talking to us?

The swarm formed the vague approximation of a frowning face. Im Sunrise, and it's more like I'm a collection of bees.

Essus leaned over the table and frowned. And what is a bee?

Somehow, the collection of insects managed to sigh.