Chương 200: B2 Chapter 200: Galaxy First

They came back through the wormhole to an exhausted Aurelia trying to explain the mission to an increasingly excited Xarr. Jupiter filled half the sky behind the Carrier, enormous bands of cream and rust curving past Ganymede below. Against that scale, even the Carrier looked tiny.

"Yes, we got the cargo," Aurelia said over the comms.

"Yes, it's the right material. Yes, we were besieged immediately. Yes, the KKFs were borderline inadequate for the task. Yes, the others just came back. Everyone is accounted for. Yes, the Frames are damaged." Meno corrected his trajectory with whatever thrusters he had left. Without legs, his SpaceAssault frame looked like somebody had cut a giant robot in half. Xarr cut through Aurelia's report.

"Did you eliminate the orbital platform?"

"Nice joke," Meno said.

"We blew a hole in it. Unless you give us something that can fragment an asteroid, that thing is staying there."

"PBG, she said okay?" Karmabeast asked.

"Did you hear that? Is it real?"

"Yes." That was enough to send Karma's damaged Frame into a small uncontrolled rotation before he corrected it. Meno reached Aurelia and Thorn near the Carrier, angled toward the Deep-Fryer, and bumped one shoulder into the giant containment unit. The box started drifting away, and Thorn immediately grabbed one of the grips.

"What are you doing?" Thorn asked. Aurelia understood first. She loosened her grip and motioned for Thorn to stop fighting the drift.

"Oops," Meno said.

"The big box is floating toward Jupiter. That seems bad. Quickly tell us what's inside so we can rescue it."

"Please stop," Zirya said over the channel.

"You are in orbit around Ganymede. It cannot fall into Jupiter, and the contents are extremely important to Earth."

"Small miscalculation." Meno nudged the Deep-Fryer a little farther from the Carrier.

"Aurelia here is holding her blade wrong. It's close to the box. She might accidentally cut it if you unplug us." Aurelia drew the monomolecular blade and held it over the containment unit. Thorn finally caught up to the mechanic, moved around the other side, and stopped the Deep-Fryer from drifting any farther.

"Do you even know the periodic table?" Zirya asked.

"What would knowing the material change?"

"I don't, but Aurelia does. And maybe nothing right now, except we just went through a wormhole into an alternate version of the solar system and robbed some kind of automated mining operation." Meno rotated slightly, Jupiter sliding across his vision behind Aurelia's Frame.

"I'd like to know who we just robbed. Another corporation doesn't make sense. That setup was huge." The comms went silent long enough to feel deliberate, even in space, before the unfamiliar male voice from the mission briefing returned.

"Listen carefully. This goes beyond an NDA. If any of you speak about this in any capacity, you will be immediately terminated, regardless of how useful you are. Do you understand? Ignorance protects you. Don't throw that away." Meno considered that.

"If I throw a chicken into the water and refuse to look, I learn nothing about whether there are crocodiles. I might have killed the chicken for no reason. Do you take me for a chicken killer?"

"I don't get it," Thorn said.

"The chicken dies either way."

"Chickens can float and paddle out," Meno said.

"If there was no crocodile, it could survive. But if I refuse to look, I never learn what happened, so I wasted the chicken."

"What if something else ate it?" Thorn asked.

"Like a hippo."

"Hippos mostly eat plants," Aurelia said.

"Maybe a large snapping turtle."

"How large?" Meno asked.

"The crocodile is still the most likely answer. Everything else is noise."

"Your brainfart is inherently flawed," Aurelia said.

"Unless you throw the chicken directly on top of the crocodile, it might get out of the water before anything eats it. Then you learn nothing about whether there was a crocodile there at all."

"Aurelia, I am not testing whether crocodiles exist. We are testing whether that specific spot has one. Basic science. You read too many books and confused yourself."

"Yes, Meno," Aurelia said.

"Years of education for this. Years." Thorn was still thinking.

"But if you get close enough to throw the chicken and there is a crocodile, it might ignore the chicken and eat you instead. Then you know it was there even if you never look."

"That's true," Meno said.

"Thank you, Thorn. My point exactly. We are already too close to the water. Looking away does not stop the crocodile from eating us." Aurelia was having none of it.

"That is absolutely not what you said. You said—""PLEASE SHUT UP RIGHT NOW!" Zirya shouted. The unknown man returned to the channel sounding at least a year older.

"You people are truly special. Fine. I no longer consider disclosure a significant operational risk. I doubt anyone would believe a word of your account." Stolen content warning: this tale belongs on Royal Road. Report any occurrences elsewhere. Meno accepted that as a compliment.

"The region beyond the wormhole is designated the Astatine System. Intelligence is limited. All confirmed contacts have been machine entities, with no response to any communication protocol. Current assessment indicates that their Ganymede has been transformed into a planetary-scale reserve of stabilized astatine." The Deep-Fryer floated between them, black and featureless against Jupiter.

"Do you understand what you just recovered?"

"No," Meno said.

"Astatine is the rarest naturally occurring element," Aurelia said.

"There is barely any of it on Earth at any given time, and what does appear usually lasts only hours. The amount we just put into that box must be worth trillions."

"That much?" Thorn asked.

"We need a raise."

"Put the fantasies away," Xarr said.

"The material is not for sale, which means its market value is irrelevant. It is Hyperion research property. Your compensation has already been set at an exceptionally generous level, and I will not revisit it." Thorn's Frame remained wrapped around one of the Deep-Fryer's handles.

"And if you damage the cargo," Xarr continued, "your return becomes a secondary concern. We do not yet know how long a human mind can remain safely synchronized through an XTachyon, and violating the speed-of-light limit is not without cost. Do not give me a reason to find out."

"I wasn't going to shake you down," Meno said.

"I want something else before you unplug us."

"What?" Xarr asked.

"Get us a healer, a priest, a Herald, a Seraphim, a city official, whoever can marry people. We're having a wedding in space." Aurelia's Frame rotated toward him.

"What? Who? Meno…"

"Sick idea," Arayu said.

"Let's gooo." She turned toward Karmabeast's damaged Frame.

"Unless you chickened out."

"Never! I'll marry you anywhere. We can even go back through the wormhole and do it on the angry platform." Karmabeast hesitated for half a second.

"But I don't have a ring."

"Can someone explain what the hell is happening?" Aurelia asked.

"I feel used," Thorn said.

"You had your chance, big guy," Arayu said. Meno pointed one arm toward Karma and Arayu.

"They're getting married with Jupiter as the backdrop. Maybe we can remove some redundant part from the Carrier and bend it into rings."

"Do not do that," Xarr said. The answer came so quickly it sounded prepared.

"Hyperion does not maintain clergy or civil officiants on staff, and I am not exposing this operation to an outside civilian so two people can get married in orbit. Secure the equipment aboard the Carrier. We are terminating the connection."

"I like you, old geezer with the mysterious vials," Karmabeast said.

"You can do it if Arayu is okay with it."

"Sounds cool," Arayu said.

"The guy had big the CEO works for me energy."

"This conversation has become absurd," Xarr said.

"Are you going to do it or not?" Meno asked.

"It's a small ask. You just have to talk. That's your specialty, is it not?" Xarr stayed silent, which Meno chose to interpret as negotiation. They secured the Deep-Fryer first. Thorn and Aurelia guided it toward the Carrier while Meno and Karmabeast corrected the drift with whatever thrusters still worked. A recessed bay opened in the hull, clamps caught the box, and armored doors closed behind it. Now they could deal with the wedding.

They needed rings, and since Hyperion had forbidden them from stripping parts off the Carrier, their own wreckage would have to do. Meno had lost both legs, Karma was missing an arm, and between the three damaged Frames they had plenty of loose cable to work with. Meno cut two short lengths from a dead bundle near his hip assembly and bent the first around the remaining fingers of his Frame. It looked rough but held its shape. The second one was better.

"Legendary VI wedding rings," Meno said.

"No modifiers." Karmabeast held out his remaining hand, and Meno passed one over while Arayu took the other and immediately slipped it onto one enormous metal finger. It barely fit. Perfect. They moved away from the Carrier until Jupiter filled the space behind them. Nothing on Earth could have competed with the backdrop. The planet occupied most of the visible sky, its clouds stretching across impossible distances while the Great Red Spot curved farther around the horizon like a storm painted onto the universe.

Ganymede hung below them, familiar and brown-grey again on this side of the wormhole, while the five damaged Frames floated between the moon and the Carrier, tiny against something large enough to make cities feel irrelevant. Their damage made the scene better. Meno had no legs, Karmabeast was missing an arm and half his armor, Arayu's cannon mount had been torn apart across her back, and even the relatively intact Aurelia and Thorn carried melted sections and battle scars from the run.

It looked less like a wedding party and more like survivors from the end of the world deciding there was no point waiting for a better venue. Meno approved.

"Formation." Karmabeast and Arayu moved to the center and faced each other. Meno positioned himself beside Karma as best man, while Aurelia drifted to Arayu's side and became maid of honor whether she liked it or not. Thorn ended up behind both of them.

"What am I supposed to be?" Thorn asked.

"Pretend you're the priest while Xarr does the talking," Meno said.

"Just this once," Thorn said. The Carrier hung behind them with its engines dark while sunlight caught the edges of the Frames. Nobody had music or flowers, and nobody had even known there would be a wedding five minutes ago. Still, once everyone stopped moving, the scene settled into something grand enough that even Meno felt it. Xarr's voice entered the channel.

"Kevin Fizznu. Yua Arakawa. You have chosen to make this commitment here, in the presence of those who fought beside you and returned with you. I will treat that choice with the seriousness it deserves." Karmabeast moved his remaining hand toward Arayu until their giant metal fingers touched.

"Kevin Fizznu," Xarr continued. Karmabeast froze. Hearing Karma's real name spoken in the middle of orbit somehow felt more classified than the Astatine System.

"Do you take Yua Arakawa as your wife, to remain beside her through whatever follows from this moment, in good circumstances and bad, for as long as you both choose to share your lives?" Karmabeast did not hesitate.

"I do." Arayu rotated slightly in front of him. For once, she was quiet.

"Yua Arakawa," Xarr continued, "do you take Kevin Fizznu as your husband, to remain beside him through whatever follows from this moment, in good circumstances and bad, for as long as you both choose to share your lives?"

"I do," Arayu said. The answer came softer than most things she said, with no joke attached. Karmabeast lifted the cable ring. His one remaining hand was huge enough in the SpaceAssault frame that the gesture should have looked ridiculous. Against Jupiter, it did not. He slid the ring onto Arayu's finger, and she took the other and pushed it over one of Karma's. Xarr let the moment settle before speaking again.

"You have made your vows, exchanged your rings, and chosen each other before witnesses. Kevin Fizznu and Yua Arakawa, from this moment forward, I recognize you as husband and wife." His voice remained perfectly steady.

"Honor what you have promised here." Karmabeast moved toward Arayu. Meno briefly wondered how two war machines were supposed to kiss. Apparently Karma had reached the same problem, because he leaned his Frame forward until its forehead touched hers. Arayu mirrored him. The two damaged machines floated together above Ganymede with Jupiter swallowing half the sky behind them. Aurelia went completely still beside Arayu. Thorn forgot to complain. It was one of the coolest things Meno had ever seen.

Arayu wrapped both arms around Karmabeast's damaged Frame.

"Married in space," she said quietly.

"You better not become boring now."

"Never." Xarr let another moment pass before speaking.

"Return to the Carrier." That was enough ceremony for Meno. They broke formation and headed toward the Carrier, five wrecked Frames drifting across Ganymede orbit while Jupiter burned behind them. Karmabeast and Arayu stayed together the whole way. Meno watched them for a moment. Veyrath had died. Rina had been fake. Feltforge and Hyperion were starting an alliance. There was an alternate solar system full of hostile machines mining a moon made from impossible material.

And Karmabeast had gotten married in the same space he had previously insisted was fake.