Chapter Text
In all dimensions, Geo Stelar’s seventh year is unequivocally his worst.
In most dimensions, this is because his father, Kelvin Stelar, disappeared into space, and is subsequently declared dead. Well, “missing in action,” really, but even at seven Geo Stelar is smart enough to understand he is likely dead—and he falls into a depression because of it.
But in some dimensions, the reasons behind the seventh year being his worst year....fluctuate. Sometimes it is because through a twist of fate Hope Stelar dies. Sometimes it is because both parents die. Sometimes it is because Lady Vega finds Le Mu early and so the world falls beneath her grieving heel. The seventh year being the worst is a constant. The reason is not.
In a certain dimension, the reason behind Geo’s awful seventh year is thus: a critical malfunction on Kelvin Stelar’s spacecraft the Peace is detected before take off, and the mission is canceled outright. Kelvin Stelar does not go to space on that critical mission, and therefore does not go missing. But Kelvin Stelar not going to space means he does not meet with a certain alien of a certain alien species….and that causes ripples.
~~~
Omega-Xis was conflicted. This was a rare feeling for him, considering he was more of an “action first think later” kind of guy, but….
A war was something to be conflicted about, especially since he still wasn’t entirely sold on the “let’s-conquer-Earth” thing. But even with his complicated feelings on the matter, his claws flexed in anticipation. It wasn’t every day Planets AM and FM joined together to invade another planet.
(-Awwww, is something having a moral crisis?-), Lyra cooed.
(-No-), he snapped. Lyra’s amusement-teasing-poke emotional waves gently bumped into his annoyed-conflicted-bloodlust emotional state. Not a challenge—just a gesture of friendship. Rarer, he thought privately, than maybe he’d personally like.
Lyra floated around him, her pink plasma fires burning brightly. (-Well, we do know that humans are supposed to be great food!-)
He grinned. (-They are, according to some EMians down there already.-) He actually couldn’t wait for that. EMians fed on emotions—all kinds of emotions, though negative ones were often preferred more since they tended to be stronger and easier to consume into data. Technically speaking, EMians fed on data, but emotion tended to make the meatiest data packages that filled them up the longest. Emotion and data were the source of their power and strength. Without some form of them, their species would grow weak, and their waves would end, which was understandably avoided at all costs.
Normally, they fed on the bonds between their own species, and the small conflicts sparked between EMians. Their culture endorsed small fights—even big fights—for a reason. No matter where you were in EMian social standing, everyone was allowed to duel and spar and fight with the other with a proper challenge or reason—it fed the combatants, and often times what was left over fed others too. These practices were enough to maintain their species, grow it, and stay steady….but hunger was never far away.
Humans, however, were a wellspring of emotions and bonds! A feast, really, and it was said an EMian never went hungry with a bonded human. And when an EMian took one over to forcibly combine, they got a lot more power, so they could fight in more battles and subsequently get fed more. It was a win-win. He could see why High King Cepheus of FM and High King Siderus of AM agreed on this alliance and this plan.
And yet for all his eagerness and blood lust Omega-Xis felt oddly—off about the whole thing. High King Cepheus of Planet FM was very young to be in the position he was in. Sure, maybe starting a conflict or two was a good way to get himself used to his people and vice versa, but an interplanetary war was something else entirely.
(-I plan to have a girl!-), Lyra confided, interrupting his thoughts. (-No boys for me. We can have girl’s nights!-)
(-Good for you-), he grunted back. (-Why no boys?-)
She sniffed. (-I deal with enough boy-things from you.-)
He snorted. (-I think I should be telling that to you.-) The amount of times Lyra flitted around him like a bee virus had been in the hundreds.
Lyra mockingly gasped, strumming her own strings that sent out emotions of mockery-laughter-friendship. (-Someone’s on edge~-) Then she flew around him, waving her little fires at the top of her body at him. (-What’re you going to do if your partner has a family?-)
Ah. That notion. He gazed down at the green-and-blue planet. It was so physical. Nothing like AM or FM at all, not really. Both of their planets were beautifully transient, meant for a species that could zip through electricity and coding at will. But Earth was its own sort of nice, with its wide variety of plants and animals, many of which he sort of wanted to take on in a fight.
And the humans, of course. The only sentient species on the planet. They were said to have a lot of bonds in-between themselves to a degree most EMians couldn’t fathom, which was why they made such good food generators. As for himself, Omega-Xis couldn’t really wrap his head around the idea of “family” that humans supposedly held so closely—it didn’t seem necessary to him, other than how it produced food.
He shrugged. (-Take him or her. What else? I can’t carry every bit of the family with me. Just the partner.-)
She tittered. (-So cold!-)
He eyed her. She was no better than him, the sadistic harp. She was practically giggling with glee over the idea of the pain of separating her partner from her family, because it would produce so much emotional energy.
(-As if you’re any better than me.-) Omega-Xis snorted, and turned his gaze once more back to the planet. He wondered once more if invading and taking over was really the best option here. Sure, maybe it kept AM out of Cepheus’s sights, and sure, maybe it gave their races a massive boost in power, but….
Something about this entire situation stank to him. He wasn’t sure what it was, but it did. He liked straight-up, fair fights. Equals, doing their best. Friends, fighting for the fun of it. Not—what was going to be an absolute slaughter.
EMians on the whole liked fighting. It helped them communicate. But a war was…War was nasty business and so was killing. Sure, maybe in the short term the emotional turmoil the war would produce would feed their race for months, but what about in the long term?
He might not like thinking about things in terms of long term consequences, but when a situation was this fishy—
GO-GO-GO!
Everyone jolted at the massive Wave signal.
Here they were.
Lyra giggled maliciously and fell down. (-See you down there!-) She trilled.
He nodded and took one more second to study the planet, flexing his claws. It was a decree from their old High King himself to help—all AMians were to help, and claim whatever humans they wanted. Cause chaos. Help in the war effort, etc.
And so Omega-Xis readied himself, flexed his claws once more, and dived down with many others onto the glowing planet.
Let’s go find his partner.
~~~
He’d forgotten how much fun (and how filling) the chaos of war was. Omega-Xis swiped through some more of the Satella Police units, cackling as they were crushed under his claws. Then he tore their heads off with his fangs, which made a satisfying crunch in his jaws, though the material itself didn’t taste very good. He spat out the remnants of the metal, and poked his head up. He ended up in a place called “Echo Ridge,” following a trail of emotions that he instinctively recognized would suit him the best. Every person’s emotions had a wavelength, and those wavelengths were unique. EMians would be fed the best on the emotional wavelengths that fit their own waves the best. The closer to harmonizing you got, the stronger you got.
Then there was the “perfect synchronicity,” which was said to be the perfect joining of an EMian to another’s wavelengths, but that was just a folk tale. In any case, he’d been following the traces of an emotional wavelength from the very first wave of attackers, trying to find the perfect human to bond with.
Some weren’t picky and just forcibly bonded with the first human they saw, which was stupid, in his book. If they weren’t a good pairing, the transformation was weak, and wouldn’t work in the long term. And if the EMian was concerned more about the energy loss than the human appendages, the human they took over would probably lose a limb or two when they de-transformed. There wasn’t any real long-term success with rushed bondings.
But in the short term it was a success, he supposed. Human-EMian transformations were everywhere, wreaking havoc as the EMians held the reins. Governments were overturned, lots of places were on fire, and the remaining humans were trying to hide inside, not that it would save them. Their own technology was their bane. EMians phased in through their internet-connected ovens and fridges and the like, and zipped into whatever human they wanted to control. Every human had a mediator device called a “Transer,” which only made things easier. EMians could go into one, and use it to help facilitate the transformation (but that wasn’t really needed, of course. Just a help.)
Some of the smarter humans had caught on and had ditched their Transers, but they were a minority and if an EMian wanted to hunt one down he or she could with ease. The planet was quickly falling, a small resistance led by a few EMian-human fusions that were already on planet (weirdos) and WAZA (about to be destroyed) notwithstanding. He thought one of the High Kings was about to handle WAZA soon, so that would handle most of the real planetary defenses.
And besides, they were only like—what, three hours into the invasion anyway? They were making good progress. Impressive progress, really.
He sniffed the air, trying to catch where the wavelength (and therefore his partner) was. Sneaky little wavelength. It took a little bit to find the exact location, but intriguingly enough “Echo Ridge” was also where High King Cepheus found a wavelength that matched his. Something something a human named “Boreal” something something. Who cared. Point was that if one of the High Kings found his partner here then clearly his partner would be here as well! High quality was found here, and of course his partner would only be high quality!
Omega-Xis hunted through the civilian town. It was nice in the way he knew it would give him hives if he had to live there. Too peaceful and perfect and boring. Blech. No partner of his needed that. ‘Course, with the war it was slightly less peaceful and perfect, since EMians were happily letting viruses run wild, taking control of all sorts of vehicles and speeding through the town with wild abandon. And of course not one bit of technology was working for the humans. The viruses were everywhere, and EMians were leading the charge.
He could see Queen Ophiuca cackling with Taurus Fire near a train; both of them had found humans here, it seemed. Just more evidence for this weirdly peaceful little place to be a hot spot! Let’s see….
He spotted some fleeing humans—sneaking away, really—through some back alleys. But they weren’t his partner, so he didn’t stop them, nor did he call attention to them. If their EMian couldn’t find them, that was their own fault…..and maybe a small part of him pitied the humans a little.
He knew from the stories that their race had once been able to wave change by themselves, and had been AM and FM’s third in a sacred trio of planets, all allied together, but those stories were millennia old, and even under such intense pressure, Omega-Xis saw no wave changes happening. So either those stories were false, or humanity had lost that ability long ago. Omega-Xis wasn’t sure which one was the right answer, but he did know that humans weren’t transforming now, which meant they had little to no real way to fight the EMians. This wasn’t really a fair fight, which was about what they all expected. But he still pitied their race enough to let the humans he saw flee without letting anyone else know.
Slashing through more police robots with his claws (really just for fun), he kept on tracking the wavelength, all the way up a hill that overlooked the entire town. It was almost night, so he betted that his partner was some form of an adult, which wasn’t optimal.
A partner to an EMian worked best when they started wave-changing young, so all the side effects could sink in and the energy cost got less and less intense. The older your partner was when you started, the less side effects could even go in safely, limiting how much you could transform and how much power you had when you did over time. Past a certain age there wasn’t really any point in making someone your partner, other than a few transformations here or there. It wasn’t applicable for the long term or—in Omega-Xis’s estimation—really worth the energy cost for the short term gains.
So, if his partner was an adult, he’d figure it out from there. He zipped up the hill (the sign in the Humanese said “Vista Point”) all the way up to the top, where there was a little platform looking over the whole town. There, in the very center of the little platform, between look-out telescopes, was a small child, dressed in bright, vivid red, crouching down low against the cement platform. The vividness of his clothing made him stand out against the darkening sky and chaos behind him in the town below.
But what really caught Omega-Xis’s attention was not the vividness of his clothes, but the child’s age. His partner—for there was only one person on top of this hill, which made sense, as there was nowhere to hide up here—was young, and therefore an optimally-aged partner. Omega-Xis approached, and the boy gasped and scrambled back.
Looking at him closer, Omega-Xis could see the chubby cheeks and little fingers. He was young for his race, Omega-Xis presumed, but not too young, since there was a spark of intelligence in his eyes. And strength, too. Omega-Xis could sense a bone-deep strength that would never run out. Excellent.
“Go away!” The boy shouted, scootching closer to the railing. “Or I’ll use a battle card!”
Oh! He’d heard about those! Some humans had figured out that the only way to fend off an EMian was to try and attack using a battle card. It was—admittedly—a gamble, since the transer had to activate it and there wasn’t really a further conduit to hurt the EMian with, but in the right hands it would work.
“I’m not here to hurt you!” Omega-Xis said, a little intrigued at what his tiny partner could do.
He shook his head, which…his hair spiked up naturally in the back in an odd sort of way. Did every human have such ridiculous hair styles? He supposed he couldn’t talk, though…
“Papa told me to run! That you all were attacking!” His partner continued to shout, brandishing a little card at him threateningly. A golden star gleamed near his stomach. It seemed far too big for him, but the boy clutched at the star all the same with one hand.
“We are attacking but we’re not really killing,” Omega-Xis answered, which was true. In a sense. “What’s a ‘Papa’?” He guessed it was some sort of affectionate nickname for a member of the family, but none of the provided databanks matched the word to a relationship.
The boy blinked. “How do you not know what a Papa is?” He asked, seemingly befuddled.
Omega-Xis shrugged. “My race doesn’t really have family.”
His little nose wrinkled. “How can you not have a Mama or a Papa?” Then he blinked. “Are you an alien?! From outer space!?”
That made him grin. “Sure am, kid!” He posed with his claws on his “hips,” so to speak. “See? All this fire is plasma fire.”
His brown eyes lit up. “Like the stuff stars are made of?!”
The amazement and wonderment in his voice made him preen. “Sure are! I’m super strong!”
“Then—then—can you help?!”
Huh? That—
The boy leaned in a little closer. “Can you help?! A weird alien attacked our house….he sort of looked like you but he had white fire, and silver armor. Papa was holding him off, and he told me and Mama to run but I don’t know where Mama is!” It bursted out of him in a spurt of words, and Omega-Xis had to take a second to understand what he was saying.
Then it hit him.
“The EMian had white fire and silver armor?” He asked.
His partner nodded. “Yes!”
Aw plasma fire….That was High King Siderus. Welp. The kid’s father was going to be made a partner, that was for sure. But how to break it to the kid….wait—
“Your father is fighting!??!” Omega-Xis yelped.
He nodded frantically. “Papa’s a boxer and an astronaut and he goes boom boom pow!” His partner demonstrated the fighting moves with his fists, and then lowered them. “You have to help!” He begged.
“I’ll uh….do what I can,” Omega-Xis prevaricated, then came a little closer. “But I could do more if you and I worked together. What’s your name?”
He blinked. “Geo,” he said. “Geo Stelar. What’s yours?”
“Omega-Xis!” He replied, grinning. Finally! A name!
Geo tilted his head, frowning. “What do you mean ‘worked together?’”
“Just what I meant, kid,” Omega-Xis said. “See how some people and EMians combine?”
Geo scowled. “Yeah and it’s scary! I saw a kid from another class get caught by some snake thing and now she’s that!”
He points to the faint figure of Queen Ophiuca in the distance. Ooooooo, so he knew whoever Ophiuca caught, huh….
“It won’t be with me!” Omega-Xis promised. “You’ll see!”
Geo thought about that. “You have to promise to help Mama and Papa,” Geo said. “Otherwise I won’t combine with you.”
“I can’t promise that,” Omega-Xis said. The kid began to back away. “But,” he said, floating closer, “your papa told you to run, right?”
Geo paused. “Yes…?”
“Then I can help you do that and protect you,” Omega-Xis said. “I won’t hurt you. Promise.” And that was entirely honest. This was his partner. He wouldn’t hurt him. Ever.
Geo frowned, clearly thinking things through. Behind him, there were more explosions from the town—likely from the Siderus-Geo’s father fight. What a monster if he was able to even partially fend off Siderus as a human…
Omega-Xis watched as more explosions arose in the town. It seemed he was.
“...you promise you won’t hurt me?” Geo asked.
Omega-Xis nodded. “Promise.”
Geo came a little closer. “Papa wanted humans and aliens to get along,” he informed him. “It’s why he became an astronaut. To become friends with aliens in space. Can you promise me we can do that?”
Something in him softened at the innocence, and hated himself. “I can, kid,” he said, and in a whirl of blue and plasma—
He and his partner Wave-Changed for the very first time.
And it was just as incredible as Omega-Xis expected—except for one, itty bitty tiny little detail.
“WHY AM I ON YOUR ARM?!” Omega-Xis yelped.
Geo—now masked and armored and helmeted—tilted his adorable head down at him, and was in, most importantly, full control of the body. “I dunno?”
Omega-Xis snapped his jaws, tasting the air in frustration.
You have got to be kidding him!
“Okay, kid,” he said. “I need you to listen to me. See those glowing roads up there?”
Geo blinked and looked up. “Uh….yeah?”
“We need to get on them.”
“But Papa’s fighting over there!” Geo said, pointing to a place where there were a lot of explosions….
“Your Papa won’t want you there,” Omega-Xis said, figuring it was true enough. Geo pouted. Omega-Xis then lunged for the roads, which dragged Geo with him.
Geo yelped as he was dragged along, waving his other arm frantically. “Hey! I don’t wanna go that way! I wanna find Mama!”
“Height will give us some more ways to look!” Omega-Xis grunted, yanking Geo to the roads still.
“Fine….” Then Geo ran and jumped, leaping up very high into the sky before landing on the orange Wave Road.
“Did you see that?!” Geo said excitedly. “I jumped so far!”
Not surprising. They were strong. Very strong…
“You can do a lot more than that in this form,” Omega-Xis said, amused. “Let’s run around on the Wave Road and get a handle on things before you start looking for your mother or helping.”
Geo stomped a little booted foot on the road. It cracked a little under it and Omega-Xis couldn’t help but preen. They were strong! This was excellent! “But I want to find Mama now!” Geo said, scowling at him.
“You don’t know what you can do,” Omega-Xis soothed. “You could hurt her like this.”
That made Geo stop and think again. “I guess so,” he said.
High Kings, he was young. Omega-Xis was glad his partner was young but trying to corral a human this young was a bit of a pain….oh well.
Time would help.
“Why don’t we try this?” Omega-Xis suggested. “We run around on the Wave Roads, and defeat some of those Viruses to help the town, and that should help you understand what your body is like now.”
“Viruses?”
“Over there.” Omega-Xis pulled his head towards some on the Wave Roads. They looked like a tasty snack. Viruses were always a quick and dirty way for an EMian to eat—they tended to have lots of data they could snack on, though Virus-data tended to be burned through fast, hence why emotional data was preferred.
“Do we have weapons? Or do I fight like Papa?” Geo asked, a little unsure. He flexed his now-armored and gloved hands.
Omega-Xis grinned. “Both!” Then he yanked them forward, and they fell into battle, even as the war went on below them.
~~~
“Now can we look for Mama?” Geo asked. They’d cleared the Wave Roads above Echo Ridge of Viruses—which genuinely impressed Omega-Xis, considering how many Viruses had been on those Roads. Geo was a battle prodigy, learning to fight in a disarmingly quick time. He’d used a combination of his fists, Omega-Xis’s mouth blaster, and battle cards that the boy had already had on hand to use in simpler online fights, but could now be used by himself. It made for a versatile combat style that, while rough around the edges, was promising.
And although they seemed to not have any elemental status, it didn’t slow them down any. Instead, Geo’s ability when combined with Omega-Xis seemed to be something similar to power copying. If he—or they—got hit by an attack and survived it, their body analyzed the data and created a power card they could then use, copying the exact same attack that had hit them.
The potential here was enormous.
“Yeah, sure,” Omega-Xis said. Why not. The kid had been doing well and hey, maybe he could find his mother an EMian that he knew—
Then he felt something. Something dangerous, something deadly approaching—
Omega-Xis acted fast, refusing to waste time. He yanked their body into a Sky Road entrance, making Geo yelp again, this time in confusion.
“What?! Omega-Xis—”
Then the entrance shot them up into Earth’s atmosphere, landing them right on a Sky Road that encircled the planet, just in the nick of time, too, as—
Geo watched, horrified. “Omega-Xis, what is that?”
It was a navy blue and dark red sphere. It was massive, and it resembled a face, with a massive mouth ready to eat. The amount of waves it put off were—
Hungry-angry-eat-destroy-destroy-DESTROY!
The negative Waves it put off were overpowering. He’d heard about this thing in legends. There was a reason why Planet FM had never been attacked, and why High King Siderus had agreed to ally with High King Cepheus rather than risk a full-out war. Why was it out now?! He knew for a fact their people hadn’t been told it would be used on Earth!
Andromeda got closer to Earth and it broke through Wave Roads to do so, causing them to shatter and splinter plasma plasma plasma—
Once those cracks reached them—
“We need to get out of here, kid!” Omega-Xis shouted, trying to find a Wave Road up into deeper space.
Where where where—
If they’d been partners for longer, or if Geo had been a little bit older or more experienced in battle when he’d met him, he knew they could take on the challenge, but not right now! Their partnership was only hours old and Geo was too inexperienced in battle!
“What is that?!” Geo said, taking a step back on the roads—the now crumbling roads. It was only a matter of time before the Sky Roads shattered beneath their feet and they fell back onto the about-to-be-eaten planet.
Omega-Xis could feel Geo’s fear-terror-anxiety like it was his own. In a way it was. “It’s called Andromeda,” Omega-Xis said, searching still for some road to deep space. “I’ve never seen it in person but it’s a planet eating weapon.”
Geo’s head jerked to his. “Planet eating weapon?!”
Andromeda opened its mighty jaws and crunched down on Earth, releasing rocks and other sediment into space.
Plasma-fire—
“We need to move, kid!” Omega-Xis yelled, jerking Geo in a certain direction, praying he’d take the hint. Geo slowly moved his feet in the direction, but he still looked back. “But what about Mama and Papa?!” He said, horrified and scared.
“Kid, we can’t stop that thing, not as we are right now!” Omega-Xis urged him. He could see other EMians fleeing the planet en-masse, trying to get out of Andromeda’s way.
“But—!”
“Kid if we stay here we will die.”
Geo’s mouth clapped shut, but his lips trembled. His face was pale and his eyes were big. The terror and fear and horror made him shake, but he couldn’t let Geo stop now. They’d die.
“This way, kid. We need to hurry.” He jerked his head into the direction a lot of other EMians were fleeing. And finally, finally, Geo started to run, zipping along the Sky Road.
From below on the planet, white fire flashed and lanced into Andromeda. That must be High King Siderus. His King was strong, but he was waning in strength—all of their people had chosen out of respect to not challenge him for the throne, knowing he’d die soon. This was his last gasp, likely. Buying time, and…
Omega-Xis’s eyes narrowed. What was that white fire doing? It was spreading across the planet in a heatless wave….
If he didn’t know any better, he’d say Siderus was converting the physical planet into an—
They reached the entrance to the Wave leading into deeper space. Geo stopped right in front of it, even as EMians rushed around them. Omega-Xis saw Ophiuca and Taurus rush on right ahead, along with Libra Scales. He could even sense Lyra, though when he tracked her waves and found her, he found that her fused form looked very different from her regular harp shape.
“Kid,” Omega-Xis said, trying to keep a handle on his temper (there was a PLANET EATING WEAPON BEARING DOWN ON THEM), “we need to go.”
“I know…” Geo still looked back to the planet. “But…”
“We can avenge them,” Omega-Xis interrupted. “But we need to live for that first. Come on.”
Geo’s face seemed to break at that, but he stepped forward just enough for the Wave to yank and whisk them away.
~~~
The entrance bounced them into a Deep Space server. Geo seemed pretty….numb, after their arrival. He didn’t say much and just went wherever Omega-Xis led him. After how talkative he’d been before, Omega-Xis was actually a little concerned, hence why he’d led Geo to Planet AM. The travel time was only about a day or so, which was really something, considering when he’d traveled to Earth from AM, it had taken about two weeks.
Although, he had let himself get distracted by fights and spars and hunting down tasty viruses….
Geo finally reacted to Planet AM, thank plasma…
“What’s that, Omega-Xis?” The boy asked.
Omega-Xis couldn’t help but feel aching relief at the sight of the swirling green planet. After Earth, AM seemed more transient—more hollow. There wasn’t any physicality to the planet, but it still sang to his senses a feeling of safety-warmth-home.
“It’s Planet AM, kid,” he answered. “It’s home.”
Geo blinked and turned to him. “It’s where you’re from?”
“Yeah, kid,” he said. “Come on. It’ll be safe.”
Especially with the Satellite Admins (he still wasn’t sure where they got that nickname from) now encircling the planet. He could feel how tense they were, considering they were letting off emotional waves of concerned-aggravated-damage control.
From what, he wasn’t sure, but…
Geo and he fell onto the swirling planet. As they grew closer, the structures built from the planet’s waves themselves became clear. Open villas, the markets, the many, many Wave Roads….it was home.
Geo looked around with big eyes. “What is all this, Omega-Xis?”
“Home, kid,” he answered. “See all this fire? It’s all made of Waves, the same thing you’re made of right now.”
“Am I not human right now?” Geo asked timidly.
Omega-Xis shook his head. “Not right now. When you combine with me, you’re an EMian, which is how you can interact with this stuff at all.”
Now Geo frowned. “What happens when we de-transform? Can I even breathe here?!” His partner’s panic was rising. “What if I fell through the floor? What about food? Or water? What about Mama or Papa?!”
His voice was also rising in volume.
“Kid, shhhhh,” Omega-Xis tried.
“NO!” Then his partner started to cry, his emotions a horrible mix of pain-sadness-terror—
Omega-Xis flailed for a bit. How did you handle this?!
“Kid, kid, please, let’s save the waterworks for the house—”
The crying didn’t stop but at least Omega-Xis got him to move in the proper direction until they reached the villa. It would be what humans might identify as a “roman” style, with big columns, a lot of open windows, and interesting tiles on the floor. He’d won it from another EMian a while back, and he hadn’t tired of it yet. There was even a Wave swimming pool and a small sparring room! Critically, it was also pretty close to the main palace, where—now that he thought of it—he’d need to go to to figure out what had happened, exactly.
What had happened on Earth? High King Siderus clearly hadn’t been told of Andromeda’s use, and likely neither had any AMian. Also, the High King had probably died there on Earth, meaning they were officially without a ruler. That needed to be rectified as soon as possible, especially if High King Cepheus decided to attack…
He pulled Geo inside, thinking furiously. What to do about his partner? His crying young partner? Also—plasma—Geo might have had a point about Planet AM! It wasn’t physical and it was meant to accommodate EMians, not humans. It was likely Geo would just fall through the planet, and not to mention—
There was no oxygen. There was no food. No water. Sure, they could detransform, but what would that accomplish other than Geo’s death?
This was an untenable situation, Omega-Xis quickly realized. They shouldn’t maintain the wave change for much longer, since this was their first and Geo wasn’t used to it, but he couldn’t detransform them knowing his partner would die.
And turning him into an EMian (something any AMian could do) wasn’t feasible either, considering that they wouldn’t be able to transform after that! EMians couldn’t wave-change with each other. One would inevitably absorb the other. It simply wasn’t possible. Omega-Xis scowled, trying to think through this. What to do….
“Is this your house?” Geo sniffled, looking around. “Omega-Xis, I don’t want to be transformed anymore…”
Aw cripes. That’s exactly the last thing they need right now—
“I know, kid, but right now we need to—look! There’s the swimming pool!” Kids liked swimming pools, right?!
“I don’t want a swimming pool I want my parents and my planet,” Geo answered moodily, and angrily. “And I wanna not be transformed anymore!” Geo then started to try and yank Omega-Xis off his hand which ow ow ow ow ow ow—
“Kid! Kid! Please!” Omega-Xis begged. “I’m trying to think of a way that’ll let you de-transform and—uh—” He couldn’t really give back the planet or the parents….
“What was that thing!?” Geo suddenly said, panting and sitting down—and thankfully stopped trying to pull him off. He’d likely realized he couldn’t yank him off, but Omega-Xis also saw him brush against his battle card deck, where there were swords and guns. Don’t you dare try to cut or shoot him off, you little—
“What was what thing?” Omega-Xis growled, still smarting from almost being yanked off the arm, but also trying to contain himself, since—well—Geo would likely try a battle card if he thought it would work.
“The planet thing! Andromeda!” Geo said. “Did it really destroy the planet…?”
Omega-Xis almost snapped that he’d witnessed the planet being eaten, so what did he think had happened, but then he saw Geo’s eyes, which….
…oh. The kid was genuinely…asking. He was—there was a fragile look to him. Something vulnerable.
“Yeah, kid,” Omega-Xis answered, exhausted. “It did. Andromeda is a weapon owned by the King of Planet FM.”
Geo sits down gingerly on a bed. “What’s Planet FM? Who are all you guys?”
Oh. Right. There really hadn’t been time for in-depth explanations during the war and then the flight from Earth, so…
Omega-Xis took in a deep breath. “Okay, kid, here’re the details—EMians are actually called Electromagnetic Beings. We’re made of electromagnetic waves. The EMians stuff is just for short. That’s our full species title.”
His little nose wrinkled. “Like….radio stuff?”
He nodded encouragingly. This was far better than tears! Or trying to rip Omega-Xis off his arm! “Exactly!” He crowed. “There are generally two broad types of EMians—FMians (which live on Planet FM) and AMians, which live here, on Planet AM. There are other EMians out in deep, deep space, but they’re the exception, and not a rule.”
“What’s the difference?” Geo asked. “Is there one? Between AMians and FMians?”
“Ehhhh,” Omega-Xis answered, making a so-so gesture with his eyes (since he didn’t really have any limbs right now). “Not really. There is one difference, but it’s minor in the scheme of things. AMians can turn physical objects into EMian waves, while FMians can’t.”
Geo frowned. “But aren’t I an EMian right now? Isn’t anyone who’s—what’s the word, Wave Changed?”
“You are, but I’m talking permanent changing, kid, without a combination of two,” Omega-Xis said, shrugging. “It’s a rare ability and it takes a lot of energy, so we don’t do it often.”
Geo digested that. “So that’s the only difference? Are you going to do it to me?”
He grimaced. “Not unless I have to.” And he sincerely hoped he didn’t. This taste of power in this wave changed form—!
That, and…..he got the feeling that Geo himself didn’t want to change.
“Oh.” Geo looked around the room. It was his personal “sleeping” quarters, not that EMians slept in a human sense, of course. But there was a Wave Bed with lots of pillows, and the room was kept dark on purpose so as to make him feel safe enough to go into resorting mode, which was their version of sleep. He’d go into a sort of trance while he resorted and looked through all the code and data he’d consumed that day, but doing so did leave him vulnerable, hence why he structured the room in such a way that he could feel safe enough to resort. The trances could be longer or shorter depending upon how much data he’d eaten that day, or depending upon when the last trance was.
“Everyone’s gone,” Geo whispered, breaking the silence. “Mama, Papa….Echo Ridge….”
“Not necessarily,” he interrupted, causing Geo to glance at him doubtfully. “All the Wave changed forms escaping the planet—each and every one of them means a human escaped too.”
“But it’s not Mama or Papa,” Geo said, his eyes drooping. “I want Mama and Papa.”
Awww plasmafire….
“We can look!” Omega-Xis said frantically. The last thing he wanted was another crying fit. “There’s a lot of EMians that escaped the destruction, kid. We can look.”
Geo just turned away. His sadness-tiredness was almost overwhelming. Omega-Xis winced. What did he do?
He sent comfort-I’m here-it’ll be okay but it was pretty viciously rejected with a no!-never the same-go away! from Geo. Yikes…
What did he do here?
Then he felt the ground rumble. Wait. Ground?
Before his and Geo’s very eyes things seemed to shift, and become far more physical. Actual air seeped into the room. It felt like the entire waves of the planet were shifting! What in the world….?
(-AMians. I, along with Leo Kingdom and Dragon Sky, have put a solution in place for all the humans rescued and brought back from Earth.-)
Geo jolted. “Omega-Xis, he’s talking inside my mind!”
“Not quite, kid,” Omega-Xis replied, distracted. “It’s an internal communication using Waves, going out to every AMian on planet. You can hear him because you’re an EMian right now. It’s Pegasus Magic, one of the guardians of AM. We gotta hear this. Shhh.”
(-I have implemented a technology from the humans called “Real Waves.” It turns EMian waves into “matter,” something humans can grasp onto. It was used by their militaries, though there were plans to commercialize it in a few years. Dragon Sky has created an atmosphere for humans to breathe in, and Leo Kingdom is working on getting proper food and water. But now, thanks to the Real Waves, humans can detransform safely.)
He—and Geo—perked up. Yes! This is exactly what he was looking for!
(-We are also calling every AMian left into a grand assembly. Take your humans or leave them, but move quickly. Things must be discussed. Meet at the Palace in—using human terminology—thirty minutes.-)
The communication cut short. And thirty minutes? Sheesh, that was short….
But!
“Kid, kid, did you hear?!” He said, elated. “We can de-transform!”
Geo nodded gingerly. “Can we do it now, then?”
“Of course!”
Time to guide him through his first detransformation! Omega-Xis gently disentangled him and Geo apart, making sure every piece of the boy was in place.
Geo blinked as he was left on the bed, newly made to be physical. Then he rubbed his eyes and made a weird sound with his mouth.
Omega-Xis tilted his head. “What’re you doing?”
“Mmm?” Geo said, rubbing his eyes. “Yawning. I’m sleepy…”
Huh. So humans had vocal expressions of tiredness? Interesting. “That’s because this was our first transformation, and it was long and pretty taxing, too. Get some sleep.” Omega-Xis said. “I’ll be back when you wake up—”
“You promise?!” Geo said desperately, suddenly right in his face. “You promise you’ll be back?! You won’t leave me or abandon me?!”
He held up his claws. “Easy, kid, easy! Yeah, of course I’ll be back. Promise.”
Geo nodded slowly, and sat back down on the bed. “Okay. You promised.” His eyes burned with a desperate sort of fire.
“Yeah, kid,” Omega-Xis said. “I did. Get some sleep.”
Geo’s eyes tracked him the entire way out, still burning with that desperate fire.
~~~
Omega-Xis sped his way to the Palace. He went as fast as he could, since—well—
The Earth got destroyed, and none of their people had been told that had been the plan.
It also could’ve potentially killed his partner, and their budding connection. Planet AM had not been welcoming to humans before…
He had to admit things were very strange, as physical as they were. He could still slip through the molecules of the waves, but there was also a sort of bouncy layer overtop the waves, making them…..touchable, he supposed, by the very physical humans. Pegasus Magic had accomplished this in record time. Having an atmosphere, too, was new and strange. He was now having to push through more molecules than before to move, which slowed him down. He could see this being annoying to AMians that had lived for the speed and efficiency with which they moved….
He arrived at the Palace, landing himself a spot near the throne. The three Satellite Admins—or Guardians of AM—were already there. Their massive size emphasized their sheer strength as fighters, guardians, and EMians, though it belied their overall gentleness and wisdom. Omega-Xis had never really met EMians quite so…unwar-like? Was that the word? As the Guardians of AM, though that didn’t mean they couldn’t put up a fight.
More and more AMians zipped in from Wave Road after Wave Road. There were a few humans, but their attendance was minimal, and mostly kept to being in a Wave Changed form. He could see Cipher, that red-armored idiot, coming in fast but somehow—like always—landing perfectly. There was Columba, the gray colored Elite Royal Guard, next to—oh, that was interesting, Aquarius, the vivid purple and blue artist. He had heard that they used to be very close, but after the fiasco with a break out of a few criminals things got complicated for a while. Something about a murder? Huh. Nice to see them sitting close together again.
Eventually, the massive throne room was full, and the thirty minutes were up. But Omega-Xis was surprised—because the entirety of AM couldn’t fit inside the throneroom, and yet there was no one waiting just beyond the doors. Yes, there were hundreds—maybe even a few thousand—AMians in here, but there should’ve been far more.
“Thank you all for coming so quickly,” Pegasus Magic said, disrupting his train of thought.
Dragon Sky curled up like a spring, his head lowering down. “There have been many developments. Earth has been destroyed, as many of you are likely now aware.”
There were general nods in the hall.
Leo Kingdom took up the next “turn,” so to speak. “The destruction of Earth was not alluded to, nor was it ever told to our people. FMians were told, but not AMians.”
The atmosphere chilled—both literally and figuratively. There were plenty of water element AMians in the room whose bodies let out cold “air” to match the emotional switch.
Oh, that would be something else to get used to—air that would actually change in temperature. Plasma, their planet would have temperature changes now thanks to the newly created atmosphere!
“As a result, this is the last of our race,” Pegasus Magic said. “Many escaped Earth’s destruction because former High King Siderus sacrificed his last remains of energy to slow Andromeda down, and also convert much of Earth into an EMian lifeform.”
He perked up as murmurs spread. He knew it! He knew that’s what Siderus was doing—but why?
“However,” Dragon Sky continued gravely, “many did not escape, High King Siderus being one of them. And many humans did not escape the destruction. Whatever left exists of the race now exists here on AM—where we have hastily converted the planet to be hospitable to their race—and FM, where we will do the same.”
“What about High King Cepheus?” Interrupted a voice from the crowd. Omega-Xis craned his neck to spot the—ah. Columba. He had been one of Siderus’s guards…
“High King Cepheus,” paused Lion Kingdom, “will be negotiated with. Andromeda should not have been used, and in the scuffle the Andromeda Key was stolen.”
Stolen?! The crowd erupted a little until Pegasus Magic pawed the ground next to the throne once, and the room stilled.
“We are making sure it stays that way,” Pegasus Magic rumbled.
Ohhhhhhh. Goooot it.
“In the meantime,” Dragon Sky sighed, “we have the humans to consider. Everyone here—or almost everyone—has a human. If your human is what humanity would be deemed “underage,” you will be their guardian while we sort out who survived and who did not.”
Yeah yeah yeah, human stuff. But what about—
“The throne,” Aquarius interrupted. “Who’s taking the throne, Guardians?”
They paused and leveled their weighty gazes at the soldier-turned-artist.
“That,” they intoned together, “will be revealed at a later date through a method that will be explained later.”
They all nodded at that, unwilling to a man to break the silence.
Leo Kingdom got up on all four paws. “For now, think of the humans, and how to begin integrating them into our own society. They have suffered a great loss. We will handle the diplomacy between FM and AM until the next king or queen is crowned.”
Then the three Guardians disappeared in a flash of light, which Omega-Xis took as a signal to leave, as did everyone else.
As he zipped home, he had to scoff a little. Being a guardian to a kid? How hard could it be?