The beam stayed concentrated at its fast-soaring tip while the back end of it expanded to a tunnel-shaped cloud. Like all SkyLine nanotech, its resting state was this formless cloud, so solid objects were free to pass through until scheduled flights needed it. The cosmic bullet shot forward relentlessly, until it struck the outer wall of existing nanomachines that projected the main SkyLine. Only then did the beam fully unfold to its true form, a tube-shaped cloud of nanotech. From where Kalus watched on the deck, it looked like the bonding of two pipes of darkness. One, the original, stretched all the way back to Earth in one direction and Neptune in the other. The newer pipe, created by Sophia, was still connected to the barrel of the Launcher.
“Visual confirmation,” Kalus said into his earpiece.
“Computer AIs are syncing,” Lilia announced. She watched the calibration bar fill on the scanner layered over the Cerberus’ main viewing screen. They couldn’t activate the new branch of the SkyLine until the new nanomachines were synchronized with the original, or conflicting energy flow patterns would tear the thing to shimmering pieces. “AIs are synchronized. We’re almost there, Soph.” Sophia gritted her teeth in concentration tense enough to draw sweat.
Now they were connected. If she rolled one of her orbs even the slightest bit off course now, she might rip a hole in this subsection of the main SkyLine. Sophia felt the pulse of every life that could end or go on depending on her success through the palms of her clutching hands.
“Pulling back now,” she huffed. Sophia tugged each of the Launcher orbs outward about half an inch. That closed a guillotine of fine blades at the tip of the SkyLine Launcher’s barrel. She snipped the dense tube of nanomachines free from their source inside her ship. Sophia let go of the orbs just long enough to pull her ship back a few feet. They flew back just before the nanomachine tube could destabilize. The touch of her hand refocused their shape and gave her control of it. “Beginning extension to Saturn.”
“Steady now, Sophia,” Demi hummed when he heard the tension in her voice. “You’re more than halfway home. Take it slow and easy. We’ll guide you into the launch station.”
“Alright,” Sophia nodded. She finessed the Launcher orbs into a consistent forward roll. She walked her fingers backward along their glossy surfaces to unfold the new SkyLine through space. The nanomachines distributed themselves according to the calmness of her will. The tube of darkness grew toward the Rings of Saturn. Kalus trotted across the charred deck of the Cerberus to the raised rear platform to watch it. He focused the lenses on the unfurling tip of the nanomachine cloud.
“You’re hanging left a little, Soph,” Kalus told her. The SkyLine was headed toward Ring 3, while Saturn’s new Launch Station awaited it on Ring 5.
“Correcting,” Sophia exhaled. She realized she’d been holding her breath only when spots of color began to sparkle on the fringe of her vision.
“Not that much - ease into it, that’s it. You’ve got it now. Straight on,” Kalus told her. Sophia kept the end of the tubular cloud perfectly in line until Kalus lost track of it. Even with his binoculars dialed to the highest magnification, he couldn’t see all the way to the Launch Station of Saturn.
“Of all the times for you to finally shut up,” Sophia chuckled nervously as she rolled her orbs ever further.
“What can I say? I might actually have a little faith in you,” Kalus told her.
“Rightfully so, it seems,” their Captain smiled as he said. Sophia flattened her clammy palms on the Launcher orbs.
“Does that mean…” she almost couldn’t bring herself to say it, not before a new blue line drew itself across the stars.
“Nanomachines connected at Ring 5 Launch Station,” Lilia told her. The triumphant notification blinked across the Cerberus’ viewing screen seconds from when the engineers on Saturn confirmed it. “You did it.” Sophia melted backward into her chair. Her muscles unraveled at the fibrous seams, so suddenly released from tension.
“I’d have blamed all of you if I didn’t, so…you can say we,” Sophia laughed.
“Nice work, Dogs,” Captain Demi even let out.
“Now…are we all ready?” Lilia grinned from ear to ear. Her finger hovered over a switch in the corner of her massive console. A single push was all it would take to activate it.
“Let it rip,” Sophia sighed. Lilia looked back to their Captain for a confirmation nod. Hardly an idle second passed between the two, yet it was just long enough for a dark blur to rip across Kalus’ binocular lenses. He pulled them down to find the shape just as Demi said.
“Ready.”
“Wai-”
But Lilia’s brain had already sent the signal. Her finger pushed down automatically, even as she realized her brother had called out. The Cerberus sent out the silent signal to the Launch Station on Saturn, which in turn pulsed it through the tube of waiting nanomachines. A perfect tube of searing silver-blue light ignited across the abyss, from Saturn to the central SkyLine. In minutes the cosmic road
from Earth to Neptune went from singular stem to two-tined fork.
The deck of the Cerberus lit bright around Kalus. He lifted his arm to shield his eyes from the sudden change but stopped when the same shape that had crossed his binoculars shot up from below deck. A black outline not unlike a human body floated there, inside the ship’s shield. A hole in the new blue light. Then, from its back unfolded two wings, almost doubly as massive as any Dragon Kalus had seen. A single flap of them wrenched his overgrown hair back in a gust of controlled air.
“Dragons!” Kalus shouted into his speaker. He snapped up his pistol from his belt, leveled the iron sight on the beast, and pulled the trigger. The same smoldering energy that made up the SkyLine behind the Dragon burst from its opponent’s gun. The Chrysum bolt seared straight for its mark, the Dragon’s chest. Kalus’ aim was impeccable, yet his shot never connected. He shuffled back, mouth agape, as a pitch black mist surged from the plates of the outline of the Dragon and converged in a solid wall between them. Kalus’ Chrysum bullet struck the misty wall, then instantly dissipated. “What…” Kalus tried to shake off his shock to aim again.
“I’ve come to deliver something,” a voice, thin and wispy, descended on Kalus along with the colossal Dragon. Each word was like a prod at his brain with an electric rod.
“You… You ought to take me out to dinner before you go dancing around in my head!” Kalus growled. He clenched the grip of his pistol to steady its shaking barrel on the scaly head of the Dragon. Its talons flattened on the deck. Its wide wings folded around it like a comfortable coat.
“Funnily enough, what I’ve come to deliver to you is actually an invitation,” the Dragon rumbled. Again, the nerves under Kalus’ skull clenched with the absorption of every word. He lined his Chrysum pistol up with the bright scales of the Dragon’s approaching chest. The flutter of Kalus’ finger ignited a burning white thunderstorm. Each bullet, however, dissolved against the counter-pulse of darkness from under the beast’s wings. Boom, flash, fizzle - the cadence rolled on until Kalus’ gun clicked empty.
“Sorry, I’m busy this week,” Kalus managed to defy, even as his useless gun fell from his grasp. “Hey, Howard! Could really use a nice ambiance up here! Some fog, maybe some tunes to set the mood if you know what I mean!” He screamed down through the boards of the deck. Despite his best efforts not to alert his foe, the Dragon understood Kalus better than his ally.
“Going to play me a traditional song of your people? The one that boils our blood?” the Dragon asked with a tilt of its scaled head. The winged hole in the SkyLine’s light grew with every step it lumbered toward Kalus. Then he heard it. That slight, distant ringing. Kalus gripped the handles of his Chrysum swords at the backs of his belt. He waited for the signal, a screech or a twitch that never came. The Dragon stood tall and kept right on course for Kalus. The only visual reaction was a thickening of the dark mist around the Dragon’s skull.