The Power of Ten Book Four: Dynamo

They all broke out into knowing smiles, and my own wry one rose up before Dealer replied, “Twenty-eight hundred or so Clones, and at least six times that in Duplicates. Most of them in other dimensions, so half the Clones are all Primes of their own now, who have made their own Clones.”

My jaw slowly dropped. I reached up and pushed it closed as they all grinned at me. “Really...” was all I could say to that.

“There was a trans-alternity deconstruction of this entire multiverse. We saved the populations of other Terras using Uni-minds. Those worlds want someone there who can initiate a Uni-mind if such an Event threatens them again, and the Pocket Space we have access to for a final refuge,” Morgan said simply. “Dynamo placed Clones on each world, and they have made Duplicates and Clones on the sly to back themselves up.”

“That all turned out to have been yet another sly manipulation on the part of the Weavers of the Web,” hissed DiDi, and all of them looked grim.

“This sounds like something needing some tea,” I murmured, glancing back and forth between them.

-----

Feature was out, very interested in all these attractive women who were all doting on him with familiar ease, and by the time the tea was ready, another five of them had shown up. We’d passed around our Implements, and I sighed at the Mnecromonics on their Scepters and Staffs. Killing millions of Tainted in the Shadowlands back there didn’t add up to a tithe of what they all had done during that Annihilation War...

Heck, everything I’d done, including during the First Year, didn’t equal what they had done. Granted, they’d been much higher-Level and more capable, but that parade of billions...

And Dynamo had done much, much more than any of them...

I looked at Psylocke, Storm, Nimue, Circe, and the Black Cat, shook my head as they all smiled at me, and just waited and listened.

Telepathy at our intelligence level was incredibly fast, clear, and effective, but there was like thirty years of stuff to go through, all from multiple perspectives and different aspects and focuses. None of these ‘doubles’ actually thought all that much like me anymore, having their own focuses to their existences... and I didn’t mind at all.

At last I was all caught up on where things stood, just marveling at what was possible in a super-heroic universe where every power you could imagine was possible, and the scale went all the way up to non-finity. Dynamo had seemingly given up the chance to become the spirit of a universe!

“Well,” I muttered into the silence after everyone was done, “I’ve literally got nothing to do here, but make a Pyramid so I can head home, obviously.”

“Not going to take one of us home to meet Diana?” Felicia grinned impishly, and they all laughed at me.

“She’s going to laugh her ass off at me as soon as she learns of this, and you all know it,” I replied with a sniff.

“You are giving off no vibes at all,” Kwannon observed, rather curious at how I was withstanding the attentions of so very many attractive women I was literally part of while being the only male in the room.

“Vow of Chastity until I get home to my wife,” I said loftily, and they all blinked, and then burst out laughing together. Ten-ruble bills flicked up and went back and forth, and the churn of telepathic chatter assured me that it was taking place in more than one location.

“We can certainly help you with that Pyramid. We’ll see if there’s any problem with keeping it around, or if we’ll have to break it down afterwards,” Dealer informed me, waving six bills in her hands, obviously having won her bet. “However, there is the potential that you can follow Dyna, if you still want to.”

I tilted my head. “The ties to her Clones were severed by planar boundaries, but there’s no such thing for a soul-shard. I’ll be able to follow her without the implications that would happen if you all did so.” I considered that, and found nothing out of place with the idea. “Okay, I’d still like to make a Pyramid here, if only for a focus for trans-cosmic travel between multiverses, if Eternity is amenable. If not... well, I know a way here, but it could be sealed. The thirteen-place coordinates are known to me, so I imagine we could all find another way in and out if we have need to.”

“I know three ways past the Crunch and the edges of Eternity,” Dealer nodded to me. “We could find another path, but it would likely only be open to Eternals. Probably an XI Valence to traverse the route quickly.”

“I will leave that to your greater familiarity with Eternal-Level magic,” I coughed, and she just grinned. “Is there anything you all would like to send with me for the benefit of Terra-Luna?” I asked them, glancing about.

They all glanced at one another. “That... is a VERY loaded question, Ael,” Kwannon remarked. “You said you were at Sixteen... do you have Psicraft Ranks, or Psionic Lore?”

“One each, and that in passing from the Mentos.” They all nodded, recalling that particular event.

“We have IMMENSE amounts of science, psychic, and magical lore we could dump onto you,” Morgan told me. “How applicable it all would be back on Terra-Luna...”

“Vishanti-style Sorcery will be well-nigh useless,” I murmured, thinking about that. “Any such Entities inside our multiverse will be Aligned with either the Elements or the Alignments openly, and such things will be taken care of with a Divine relationship, or a Warlock Pact.” I glanced over them all. “Oh, why haven’t more of you taken a Warlock Pact?” I asked curiously.

“We’re all considered one soul reflected many times over for a Warlock Pact, so as the acting Prime I’m the only one who can have a Pact. I wasn’t able to gain a Heavenbound Pact until Dynamo was exiled and lost her link to the Underweb. Those of us stationed in other universes couldn’t Swear Pacts because of the Underweb Casting link reflecting that status across the universes, but the Primes there can now that we’ve lost the Underweb link,” Dealer informed me.

I nodded once. “I’ll take all the science stuff my Ranks can hold, any Weird Science that is relevant and will hold up, Spellcraft and Arcane Lore, anything new on Things Outside Creation that might apply, and...” I glanced at Kwannon, “those Moondragon Mysteries basically work off an enhanced ki foundation. Those could be priceless.”

Her eyes widened, and she smiled slightly, glancing at the others. “I think we can do one better, Ael.”

“Oh?” I asked in interest.

“We have the Captain’s Comet,” Felicia stated, “chased down from one of the Justice League variant Earths.”

If I’d had eyes, they would have popped. “Captain... Comet’s Comet?” I asked, shocked as I glanced over them. “Was it useful?”

“We’re already beyond the level it could affect us. The meteor’s radiation basically shifts the evolution of any creature it bathes well down its evolutionary path to near the apex. It has little to no effect on Forsaken immediately, but does allow them to easily develop a Forsaken Psionic Core which they can use much like a Nog basis to self-evolve over time.

“Junior Powered gain a template not dissimilar to that which Captain Comet developed, locking them into a specific evolutionary path based on psionic ability. Senior Powered will get their physical prowess raised to Nog Perfection and possibly beyond if it isn’t there already, and gain the ability to open a Psionic Core.

“The greatest effect is on basic Primos, of course, who benefit from the entire template and basically become Psionic Powered.”

I really missed being able to blink. “A Psionic Core would be pretty useful...”

It would also give me another eight Theurgies and two Archclasses to take, and who knew how many potential Advanced Classes, in addition to base Psion and Psi-Warrior.

“I can also probably convince Eon to grant you Cosmic Awareness. I am not sure how effective it will be outside of this multiverse, but it certainly won’t hurt,” Dealer told me.

“Cosmic...Awareness,” I repeated, astonished at the very idea. “Am I even ready for something like that?” I had to wonder aloud.

Dealer just sighed as everyone else looked at her sympathetically. “It is VERY powerful here, as you might imagine, especially if you have the mental chops to put it to frequent use. Basically unlimited area, range, and duration Clairvoyance and Clairaudience at will. Granted, I’m an Eternal and have a lot more stamina than you do, AND the Alignment Wars aren’t filling the ethersphere with obfuscation, but... you’re a Div Spec. You know exactly how powerful just Seeing the Now is.”

“And without something against fear, that level of awareness could well be crippling,” I murmured, understanding the problem without experiencing it. “You know, I killed an Onisu of Terror by feeding it my Fears and forcing it to kneel before me after it glutted itself on them?”

“Oh, yeah, that sounds right.” “Cool!” “Appropriate.” “Mwa hahaha!” “Served it right, no doubt!” they all chimed up in support of me.

“We... have an awesome level of Fears built up,” Circe the purple-haired Munroe finished for the rest of them.

“But we haven’t seen something that would terrify our eyeballs into trying to eat us,” Felicia admitted, and they all murmured condolences for that happening to me.

“Yeah, well, Mithar stuck It with a Silver Spear full of half a demon nation’s worth of vivus to show His appreciation for Its existence. If It managed to live through that, It’s lost almost everything,” I shrugged it off.

“We must have a damn gift for pissing the things off,” Ursula observed. “I think you just added another one to your ‘hate me’ list, Ael,” she pointed out.

I groaned theatrically. “Thank you for adding to my proper List of Fears. I’ll stick it right under what’s left of The Thing.”

Everyone caught something in their throat at the same moment, including me.

“I could do without that memory,” Nimue muttered after a moment. “But it made us what we are, didn’t it?”

Everyone agreed with that under their breaths. The horrible moment that had made me Aelryinth, delivered us the power to fight back, searing us all with terrible, uncaring cosmic Evil right at the same time...

Yeah, I understood fear pretty well. It was one of my huge motivators.

“How would you like to handle your stay here then, Ael?” Dealer asked.

“Well, there’s no way I wouldn’t want to meet some of my childhood heroes, even if it’s just to say I did.” I found myself grinning more widely. “You could introduce me as one of your instructors, I suppose?”

They all burst out in chimes of laughter despite themselves, the Chords of Magic humming about us happily.

“I think we can manage that,” Morgan agreed, amused. After all, to them the comic book heroes were friends and colleagues.

“Also, and I may be overthinking this, but if you’re still Karma-sharing, would that work with me?” I wondered.

They all blinked, even Dealer. “Wow,” she muttered for all of them. “I can say I honestly didn’t go there...”

“Why? Because of the gender shift?” I asked archly. “Or because you’re all old farts with thirty years on me?”

I was promptly pelted with hisses and force bubbles. I threw up my hands in mock defense, letting the chromatics attached to the bubbles stain me harmlessly. They’d clear up.

“It makes sense. We’ve already got all but the last six months or year or whatever of his memories,” Morgan pointed out in resignation. “He IS the ultimate Prime of us.”

“You could say we’d have just a little bit of deviation, without thirty years of telepathic communication to keep us tight,” Felicia put in, holding her fingers just a little bit apart.

“Oh, please. If you can’t partition off personal memories you don’t want me to experience, I’m a monkey’s uncle.” Feature informed me with great interest that I had blue, orange, and yellow all over my face and glasses, to which I didn’t care a bit. Blindness, yah?

Dealer just smirked at that. “You know if you take it, you’re going to get everything. It’s probably a really good idea with the Cosmic Awareness.” I just lifted a currently pink-splattered eyebrow. “Mental timelessness from Divine personas. Karnilla the Norn Queen and Amora the Enchantress are represented among our immediate number.”