Unity by Carl Stubblefield (epub read online books TXT) 📕

“It also lets out methane too, mate. Didn’t know if you were a gassy sleeper or not, but definitely something to think about in close quarters.” He winked at Gus. “Keep going.”

“So, if we wanted to get more oxygen in here, maybe we could extend a periscope up above the flames to access some clean air?”

“Where do you think all this hot, smoky air is going?”

Gus frowned. “Yeah, probably straight up.”

“Don’t get discouraged. This is exactly the process you need to get used to doing on the regular. Then get quick at making these kinds of assessments and acting. If this were a real crisis, I would grab the reins but, as it is, we’re safe and you get a good field exam out of the bargain.”

“I guess I could make one laterally, but I don’t know which direction the fire is coming from.” Gus looked over at BoJack expecting some form of hint, but all he received was a raised eyebrow.

“Okay. Maybe that’s the wrong problem to be solving. Besides air, I need to do something about the flames. If ether is such a good heat sink, maybe I can use it to absorb or contain some of the energy.”

Gus thought he could use his Energy Absorption ability and just drain the energy from the fire, but didn’t know if he would learn anything from that. Plus it was probably best to keep the full range of his abilities as close to the vest as possible.

Turning to BoJack, he asked, “How do you infuse something?”

“It depends on the type of energy. You have to think of what’s happening at a molecular level and make it easier for the energy to go where you want it than where it already is.”

Gus bit the inside of his cheek. He had always taken wood or paper burning as something simple to understand. But knowing something would burn was a far cry from knowing what was happening to it as it burned or why it burned when other things didn’t. He scrambled to think of what he had learned back when he was in school. Wasn’t it something to do with energy being released as bonds break? He honestly didn’t really know.

“Why do you not just check?” Nick asked, somehow infusing a disappointed sigh into the words.

“Check? How?” Gus asked, but Nick had gone silent again. An idea popped into his mind that he almost immediately dismissed but then thought better of it. Worth a shot, I guess.

Gus knelt on one knee by the door flaps and placed his hand where the flaps and the floor of the tent met. Initially, he thought they were on bare ground, but with Wreckognize engaged he noticed there was a floor, it was just transparent in relation to the opaque walls. He hadn’t even noticed they weren’t tracking dirt around inside the tent until he made the realization.

He closed his eyes and focused on extending an ether construct to the outside, connecting it to the inside of the tent. He extended it outward, finding it difficult not to use MP to force the shaping. He could sense the container growing at a measured rate, a perfect two-by-two inch plank extending outward. Meeting some resistance, Gus turned his focus for Wreckognize onto his construct.

After a slightly nauseating disorientation, Gus had another point of view. He could see a strange panoramic view of everything around the construct he had made, giving the world a strange fish-eye effect. It was blindingly bright at first, but reflexively he lowered the intensity to a manageable level. Flames danced around the construct, with areas near the corners becoming blurry, the sharp edge not giving a good resolution of things in the 3 o’clock and 10 o’clock positions.

Focusing on the construct, Gus shifted the construct from a square to an oval shape, resembling a snake. This took away the blurry areas and he perceived that the end of his construct had struck against a tree trunk, halting its progress. Altering the trajectory of the construct he began to curve around.

The flood of movement and visual information gave him an instant case of what he could describe best as ‘car sickness.’ Sizzling drops of sap and burning debris fell amid the flames, landing in front and onto Gus’ construct. Only by dialing down the visual input to a bare minimum could he have enough information to bypass the tree and continue out in a fairly obstacle free path.

After pushing the construct about fifty feet away, he began to notice a strain on his ability to keep it intact. Breathing deeply, he kept visual input to a minimum and turned his focus to his surroundings, imagining himself as if he were the construct. As he stayed there, he became more attuned to the little snake-like tube of ether. Melding with it.

He could feel the energy from burning pine needles and sap around him, quickly dispersing as it touched his skin. His attention turned to the energy touching him. Everything grew as his attention focused on a smaller and smaller area. A pine needle became as large as an aircraft carrier and he could see a combination of gasses released then being consumed as the needle burned.

Scale magnified over and over and particles sped away like bullets and hit his skin of ether. Bullets which grew to the size of beach balls then beyond. As the huge particles hit the ether, they came to an abrupt stop that reminded Gus of a pool ball hitting another and stopping as the force was transferred.

In comparison, the ether particles were tiny as sand, shifting slightly with the impact but quickly returning to their original configuration after a brief flutter. Gus watched in fascination as the incoming projectiles suddenly stopped after hitting the ether, reminiscent of a spaceship dropping out of hyperspace from some of his favorite movies.

How do I use this, though…?

The thought echoed in his mind as he pulled away