Ever since she got her powers, Noriko Null has had trouble sleeping; even when she takes her sleeping pills, it’s hard for her to wake up truly rested.
Now that she regains consciousness, she’s almost shocked by how relaxed she feels. It’s such a surprise that she takes a few seconds to realize that she has absolutely no idea of where she is, or why she’s not wearing anything beneath a white sheet of satin.
<Every f##king time!> she complains, standing on the bed while trying to cover herself as much as possible.
There are four marble pillars placed at the four corners of the bed; the room smells of incense and vanilla thanks to the dozens of candles placed on the floor.
She wraps the sheet around her body and she gets off the bed, trying her best not to disturb the candles; the last thing she wants is the only thing preserving her modesty catching fire.
Trying to activate her Soul Relay to communicate with the rest of the Vanguard proves futile, so she awkwardly moves towards the only door. To her surprise, it’s not locked.
It leads to a rather weird laboratory, where an old-fashioned alchemy set stands next to complex machines even beyond her own medical equipment.
The only person in the room quickly turns towards her. Judging by the wrinkles on his face and the long white beard he seems to be in his seventies, but beneath his chiton he has the muscular body of an Olympic athlete.
<Good morning! I hope I didn’t wake you up? You had a lot of sleep deficit.>
<Who the heck are you and why was I naked in your bed!?> Noriko asks, her silver eye shining.
<The name’s Asclepius, and you weren’t. I never let patients sleep in my bed.>
<Asclepius. As in, “the god of medicine”?>
<Just a demigod, please. You were brought to me after you killed my father Apollo.>
<And you are… okay with that?>
<Sure! I’ve been trying to poison him for thousands of years. The least thing I could do for the one who finally made him pay for his misdeeds is purify her!>
<What… did you do? Exactly?> she asks, while searching for a way to cover herself even more.
<First I had my nurses give you a bath and anoint you, then I cured you.>
<Cured me from what?>
<Well, a lot of things. I noticed you used a Drylon device to reset your lost organs, but you did a sloppy job so I had to fix a bunch of microlesions. And don’t even get me started on whoever regrew your left arm! Such amateur work… you should only seek professional help, you know.>
<So you healed me better than the Heart of the Universe and Nyx? Is that it?>
<Hardly! I cleansed your lungs and your colon, fixed the microlesions in your grey matter, removed your lactose intolerance, restored your virginity, and you won’t have to worry about that ovarian cyst that was going to rupture in twelve weeks.>
<I didn’t even… wait what was that about restoring my…>
<Unfortunately there’s not much I could do about your life’s shortening. Mortals will be mortals!>
<Just slow down, Asclepius! What are you talking about!?>
<You have been checking how much life you have left, right?>
<Believe me, if there was a way to know that I’d be the first one to check it regularly.>
Asclepius raises an eyebrow, looking at her like she just said the weirdest thing ever.
<Oh dear. I assumed you knew about… here, let me teach you.> Asclepius says, moving towards the nearest wall: the surface reveals itself to be a perfectly flat screen, which projects a DNA strand.
<This is deoxyribonucleic acid, a a molecule composed of two polynucleotide chains that…>
<I know what DNA is, Asclepius. What are you getting at?>
<Well, if you know about this, I assume you know that your lifespan is related to this molecule.>
<Sure. And?>
<And I suppose you don’t know how to use this, as well as other factor, to extrapolate you much life you have left?>
<That’s not a thing. There’s a genetic factor in how long you get to live, sure, but…>
<Not to brag, but I know a great deal about medicine, definitely more than you. And from where I stand it’s abundantly clear that barring accidents, illnesses and poisons… which, judging by the state of your lungs, are something very common on your planet… in your specific case, your body is not built to live more than 90 years. Or rather, it was: you’ve made so much damage to your genetic code that your life expectantly has been significantly shortened.>
<My golden eyes.> Noriko nods.
<Human bodies are not supposed to withstand the immense stress caused by a Drylon device operating at full capacity.> Asclepius points out.
<Every time I use them I lose a year of my life, yes, I’ve been told.>
<Who told you that? Any god of medicine that I might have met?>
<If you must know, former Nexus users.>
<All of which are dead, I suppose. If you were a Lar or a Demon, perhaps that would be accurate. But human genetic structure is far more fragile; after every sixth use, the strain on your life doubles. How many times have you used your golden eyes already?>
Noriko becomes noticeably paler as she answers with trembling voice:
<Nineteen.>
<That’s one year per use from #1 to #6, then two years per use from #7 to #12, and it was four years per use from #13 to #18. Your nineteenth use against Apollo costed you…>
<Eight years of my life. Which means that I have just sixteen years left to live.> Noriko realizes, suddenly feeling dizzy as she realizes her situation once she does the math.
<I’m sorry. At this point the damage is too extensive to do anything about it, even for me. Normally I would recommend transferring your brain to a cloned body, but…>
<That would kill me because the Nexus has countermeasures against that sort of thing. I know it from the Scribe’s memories.>
<I’m the greatest physician in the universe, but even I can’t match Drylon medical technology. For whatever reason, those guys went out of their way to make absolutely sure that a Nexus user could not live forever.>
<Sixteen years. I thought I had more time to come up with a solution for the golden eyes drawback, but…> she says, then she stops and looks lost in her thoughts.
<Is something troubling you? Apart from, you know, the whole dying thing?>
<Time. I think I just figured out how to beat Ares. Where are my clothes?>
Bridge of the N01-Ragnarok
Neptune’s orbit, 4 light-hours from Earth
Max Black a.k.a. Quantum yawns, staring at the screen of his console: it feels like he’s been staring at it for ages. Noticing it, Kari Zel creates a duplicate that appears right behind his chair.
<Ares sure is taking his time. I can take charge if you want to take a nap.>
<Thanks, but I don’t think I’d be able to sleep. Besides, can you even see anything?> he asks, pointing at the screen. In Kari’s eyes, it’s a jumbled mess of squiggly lines.
<Not really. I still can’t believe you can actually read this stuff!>
<Well it’s not exactly reading… I can’t really explain how I can see anything when I transform into energy, but this is what the world looks like to me when I change into tachyons. If Ares shoots his faster-than-light giant javelins against Earth like he did against Hell, I’m the best early warning system we have: even Nori’s tech isn’t perfect at detecting high-energy tachyons.> he explains, suppressing another yawn during his last words.
<I’ll trust you on that. If Ares was able to shoot these things into another galaxy, I’m afraid that even the Amazon fleet won’t stop him.> she points out, sounding less sure of herself than usual.
<I don’t trust the Amazons. We’ve been burned with the Talos before. Don’t get me wrong, ODIN’s alright, but I don’t trust artificial intelligences in… whoa!> he interrupts himself: something caught his attention, and he wasn’t even looking at the console.
<What? What is it?> Kari asks.
<I saw a huge spike in… gotta go!> he cuts short, transforming into ultraviolet light to leave the ship without blinding Kari.
Moving at the speed of light he leaves the Ragnarok behind, gaining a distance of a few million miles before stopping. He changes into a holographic version of his real body and looks around. He can see a huge object decelerating drastically: a red javelin, the size of a skyscraper, is flying towards the inner Solar System at a significant fraction of the speed of light.
“Crap! Crap crap crap!” he tells himself, chasing the weapon: changing his body into a massive laser, with some effort he’s able to reduce it to ashes.
<Max, what was that? I just came out of nowhere!> Kari tells him through the Soul Relay.
<Ares just threw that thing at like a gazillion times the speed of light! And it’s not the only one!> he replies, hurrying to fly towards yet another javelin: he needs to change his body into tachyons for a few instants in order to intercept and destroy it.
<They’re too fast for the sensors! Is this the same way he attacked Hell!?>
<Seems like it! Thank God we still have the Palladium back on Earth… nothing solid can go faster than light in the solar system as long as it’s active!> he recalls.
<How long do you think it’ll take him to figure out he’s not hitting anything?>
<Long enough I hope. There’s another dozen of those things coming.>
<Can you stop all of them?>
<Yeah, they all seem to come from the same direction… I assume the Ares sector is that way in a straight line?>
<Yep. Ares always seems to take the most direct approach.>
<Call the rest of the Vanguard. It looks like we’re about to fight Ares directly.> Quantum warns her, then closing the communication to concentrate on intercepting every single javelin.
Asclepius Sanitarium, 80.000 light-years from Earth
Noriko Null looks at herself in the mirror, wearing her green leather jacket once more. She may look fine and she’s never felt more well-rested and in shape… but deep down she recognizes that Asclepius was right: she’s much closer to death than she thought.
<You could’ve asked for improvements, you know.> someone asks; she turns to see Kylon standing at the room’s entrance, leaning against the door.
<What do you mean?> she asks to her Lar ally.
<Asclepius is famous for his medical miracles. You could’ve asked him to change your body into any way you desired. I did.>
<You don’t look any different.> she remarks; he still resembles an ordinary human, grey skin aside, but she does pick up one change.
<You’re not wearing your refrigeration unit. Isn’t this temperature way too hot for a Lar?>
<Not anymore. Asclepius made me able to survive human temperatures just fine.>
<Must feel weird.>
<A little. But there are records of the ancient Lars being able to do the same; according to him, our adaptation to colder environments is due to genetic engineering.>
<Kind of makes sense. You had a long and bloody war with the Demons, who are extremely susceptible to coldness, so it must’ve made sense to live on planets they could not invade.>
<Hiding in a place that nobody else wants and convince ourselves that it’s an improvement, yes, that was a very Lar thing to do. Back to Hell now? I’ll be able to follow you this time.>
<Not yet. I have some business to attend to before I can join the fight with Ares.>
<What kind of business?>
<Nothing that should concern you.>
<You spent a lot of time talking with Asclepius. You’re not pregnant, are you?>
<Definitely not! Why do people always ask me that when I have a medical issue!?>
<Sorry. I know that’s a touchy subject for you.>
Instead of answering, Noriko simply gives him a puzzled look.
<Your ex-boyfriend talks. A lot.>
<I’ll need to have a few words with Dmitry.> she sighs, just when she feels the Soul Relay installed in her brain initiate a call from Kari Zel.
<Nori, it’s started. We have intercepted the first attack, but Ares must be ready to strike.>
<Make sure the Amazons are ready to stop the Ares fleet and position the Demon army around Earth’s Solar System to protect it from further attacks. Keep Quantum and Vesta on stand-by; do not engage Ares until I’m there.>
<I can use the Key of Heaven to get you here in a sec!>
<No. Send it to the Null Zone with one of your duplicates and tell Dmitry to meet me there.>
<Nori, the Key is the most powerful weapon we have, shouldn’t we use it against Ares?>
<You’ll see once I’m done with the Null Zone, Kari. Ares is going to wish that I only used the Key against him.>
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