Terpolite Monitor Station, Intersection

The job was boring. Uneventful. Unchanging.

But it was the job.

Their Queen had ordered the Walls of Creation to be monitored at all times for the last year, something about an accidental attempt to fuse megaverses, and now it was time for the change in shifts.

Finn collapsed into a chair as Jordan pulled a bag over their shoulder, the two other monitors in their team having already left.

"Have fun," they said with a wink.

Finn rolled his head over the back of the chair. "Watching a bunch of Walls do nothing at all. Oh, yeah. Lots of fun."

Jordan laughed. "See you tomorrow, Finn."

Finn waited until they left before turning back to his screen, pointedly ignoring the interested looks he got from his two workmates. It was hardly a secret that he and Jordan had chemistry. Hell, Finn was just waiting until he built up the courage to ask them to dinner! Next time, he told himself.

He scanned the readings on his screen. Everything was normal, as per usual. Nothing changed. Not that they ever changed.

"Maybe I should start that book . . ."

"Might as well," Ali agreed, kicking her feet onto the desk. "Nothing will happen. Nothing ever happens."

"I'd be amazed if it did."

A groan from across the room. "Why do we have to do this?" Xen complained.

"Queen's orders," Ali answered, blowing a gum bubble. "Someone tried to fuse megaverses together last year. Apparently that's possible. Anyway, it's possible something might've happened to the Walls."

"This is the spot where several Walls meet," Finn continued, pulling a book from his workbag. "If anything were to happen—which it won't—it would be here or other places like it."

"Still," Xen said, "ten-hour shift for a thirty-hour day doing nothing but staring at shit—"

"Hey, we agreed to this." Ali blew and popped another bubble. "This is hard to read shit. We're some of the few people who can make heads or tails of it!"

"Doesn't make it any less boring."

* * * * * * * *

Two hours into the shift, Ali stretched and yawned. She rocked to her feet, walking the length of the room to get the feeling back in her numbed legs. Finn watched with a fond shake of the head, turning back to his book. Xen's eyes were glued to his phone. He was focused on some Earth group-matching game.

"Coffee," Ali announced. "I need coffee. You guys want coffee?"

"Sure," Finn said.

"Same for me!" Xen called with an enthusiastic raise of the hand.

Ali laughed. "Coffee all around! Be right back, boys."

As she walked to the door, Ali stopped suddenly, backtracking to her screen. She leaned in closer with a frown. "What in the worlds . . ."

Finn and Zen spun at her tone.

"What is it?" Finn asked.

"Something impossible." Ali moved into the chair, eyes scanning the screen with expert precision. "Something is happening."

"What?"

"Something very very bad!"

She typed furiously, copying the readings into a message and sending it to the Research Station back home on Terpola. The message sent in seconds—thank the Gods for inter-universal signal! Ali had titled the message "URGENT VERY URGENT ABSOULTEY AN EMERGENCY", there was no doubt the results would be sent to the Queen as soon as possible. Hopefully that was before anything actually happened.

Ali sat back and stared at the screen, the two men peering over her shoulders.

The readings were crazy! No longer the flat lines they watched each day. Now they had spikes at regular intervals. Strangely regular intervals. It was almost as though something was on the others side, pounding against the Walls from the Void itself, but that was impossible! Nothing lived in the Void. It was just energy. Except . . .

Another spike.

The Station shattered, the closet wall blowing in on itself from something outside, throwing the three across the room in an explosion of metal, concrete, wood and brick.

Ali threw up an air shield, allowing the three to survive the onslaught with little damage.

The same couldn't be said for the Station itself. It was in pieces, part of the roof having collapsed, and an entire wall and partial corner missing.

The shield lowered, the three taking up defensive positions. They summoned their respective powers as something broke through one of the Walls of the Worlds.

Tentacles slithered through the wreaked building, closely followed by a gaping mouth filled with razor sharp teeth. It pulled itself through the Wall into Creation, raising itself on the back of its strangely smooth almost-clear body. Everything it touched begun to disintegrate, being pulled into what lay beyond the Wall. Many dark eyes sat atop the creature's head.

"By the Gods . . ." Finn breathed.

Ali's eyes were firmly on the creature. "That's not possible. There's no way . . ."

Xen stared. "But how . . ."

The creature stared down at the three workers. They readied themselves, the colours of their power flaring at their hands, casting the remains of the Station in multi-coloured light.

The Void Beast roared and leapt forward.

* * * * * * * *

Horus' Base, Nox --> Deep Space

Things were fairly simple today. No sudden outbreaks. No signs of a fight. There weren't even protests about Tes-Pyroc joining the U.F.W. Hopefully that was a good sign that the people had finally accepted it, not that they had to be happy about it. All in all, considering all the shit that went down a year ago, things were pretty good. For the first time in ages, Horus had allowed himself a nice long sleep-in. The Suns had long since risen over the System by the time he rolled out of bed.

He scavenged the kitchen for any sign of caffeine, finding an almost-empty pot in its usual spot on the bench. Hmm. Perhaps it was time for a shopping run after all. They could draw straws for that later. There was enough left for everyone who wanted it this morning. No doubt there was an emergency stash somewhere.

"Morning, fearless leader," Mel teased, holding a cup of lava tea.

"Yeah," Brayden agreed, raising a piece of toast in salute. "Nice to see you alive."

"Fuck both of you," Horus said, sitting across from them.

Mel and Brayden looked at each other.

"I'm down for a threesome if you are," Brayden said.

Mel shrugged. "Why not." They turned to Horus. "You in?"

"I was joking! Gods!" He shook his head. "Why I let both of you be in the same room, I don't know."

The pair grinned.

Selina yawned as she came into the room. "It's too early for your bad sex jokes."

Brayden looked outraged. "It's never too early!"

She sighed, bringing a cup of star juice and what she called "light cookies" over. "Can't we go one day without them? Please?"

This was mornings with his friends, Horus thought fondly. When they weren't taking care of the U.F.W. or doing favours for beings from other worlds—not naming any names—they spent the time bickering in the way only families could bicker. That and keeping an eye on things throughout the System via monitor.

The calm was making Horus uneasy, if he was totally honest with himself. He never had liked it when things were calm for long periods of time. It made him jumpy, like he knew something very bad would happen any moment now. Everyone knew it. They tried to convince him that a bit of a vacation was good for everyone, but even that wasn't enough to get rid of the edge. The sixth sense. Or maybe it was sheer paranoia from spending so long dealing with vastly large amounts of shit on a regular basis. There was no way of knowing.

The morning passed fairly easily. Iridia and Jax were placed on shopping duty, coming back within the hour. Jinx, unsurprisingly, hauled up in the garage. Sol and Selina worked on one of Selina's many secret projects. Mel made a spot at their computer and only moved when necessary. Valria relaxed on the lounge with a book as Kindra and Horus went head-to-head on battle video games.

Kindra was readying to make her final move, the one that would beat Horus for the third time that morning, but he was ready this time. His hands were on the console, readying for a counterstrike—

All screens went blank. The lights went out. There was silence.

"The fuck was that?" Brayden asked.

Selina snapped her fingers. Small faelights flickered to life around, providing light for all.

Mel connected their computer to an off-grid power source, immediately looking concerned as they read the screen. "Anyone up for a mission?"

"What is it?" Horus asked. Mel turned the screen to him. "Okay, that's bad."

* * * * * * * *

Ten minutes later, Horus, Selina, Jax and Jinx were floating in space. Selina, being a Star-Weaver, had the power to survive without a shield. Her power currently covered the other three, keeping them safe from the vacuum. They were flying outside the U.F.W. System, heading toward another nearby one about five light-years away. Thank the Gods for teleportation crystals! Otherwise it would've taken years to reach this far.

"It should be up here," Jinx said, looking up from their scanner. "Stop!"

The four stopped, hovering in open space, looking around for any sign of what Mel had discovered. All things considered, it should've been pretty obvious, but there was nothing in sight.

"Strange," Jinx said, hitting the side of the scanner. "Whatever it is, it should be right in front of us."

"You mean right behind us." Horus said, grimacing.

The other three turned, following his line of sight, but still couldn't see anything. Horus, on the other hand, could. His heritage let him.

Racing straight toward the group was a wave of strange-looking matter spilling from what looked like a tear in the fabric of space itself. The matter moved through space, devouring planets, pulling their matter into itself. The destruction could be seen by everyone.

The matter paused and turned toward them.

"Oh shit!" Horus waved a hand at Selina. "We have to get out of here. Right now!"

"But what is it?" she asked, searching her pockets for another teleportation crystal.

The matter was coming closer. It was too fast. There was no way they could outrun it, and Selina seemed to be out of crystals. There was nowhere to go.

The matter came together, forming a smooth body, a head covered in eyes, a large mouth with pointed teeth, and a several tentacles. The thing was almost clear, as though it was struggling to take on a true physical form on this plane.

"Void Beast!" Horus yelled. "Brace yourselves!"

The Void Beast pounced.

* * * * * * * *

Back at the base, Brayden yelled into the communication network. "Are you guys there? Hello?" He was answered by only static.

Mel looked over her computer readings. "Whatever it is, its overtaken where they were."

The six exchanged glances. This was not good. And Horus was the only one with access to the God Worlds! There was no way to call for help. They were on their own.

Where could their friends have gone?

* * * * * * * *

Hall of Judgement, Duat

The entire world shook.

The Lava Lake brought up massive swells, crashing onto the black docks. Only the power of the Gods stopped the Sun Boat from sinking into its flames, the Gods themselves being thrown this way and that. The mountain itself begun to crumble, black stones of various sizes falling onto the pathway or into the lake.

The Hall itself didn't fair much better. Demons and spirits fell to the ground, stone archways cracked and crumbled, the floor fractured, the Golden Scales fell on their side. Ammit barely avoided being crushed, yelping and jumping into Yinepu's arms.

"What was that?"

Auser pulled himself to his feet. "Whatever it was, all the Realms must have felt it."

"The whole world must've felt it." Yinepu turned to his superior, alarmed. "Apep?"

The God shook his head. "No, that would have felt different. There would have been a wave of Isfet accompanying it. Amneris reinforced his chains with her power. I doubt we will be hearing from him any time soon."

Amneris? Yinepu grimaced. "You don't think she destroyed another galaxy, do you?"

"We would not have felt it," Auser assured him. "She is strong, but not that strong."

As the shaking lessened, four more deities ran into the hall: the Cat Goddess Bastet, the would-be-king God Heru, the Great Mother Aset, and the God-King himself Ré. To say they were shaken would be nice, they were all in varying states of shock and horror. Never had something like this ever happened in the Duat.

Yinepu, still holding the quivering Ammit, bowed respectfully. "Do you know what caused this?"

Ré became thoughtful. "I do not know, but its power was felt well beyond out Realms."

Heru crossed his arms with a snort. "Nothing is that strong. You would know about it."

"I would know about it if it was of our world."

"That's bad," Bastet said, her tied back hair poofing.

Aset rolled her eyes. "Anything that goes beyond our Realms is concerning. No doubt that wave of energy was felt throughout all the worlds within and without our own."

Silence.

"Is there anything we can do?" Auser asked.

Ré shook his head sadly. "This goes beyond my power and my territory."

The Gods exchanged glances. If there was nothing they could do to discover what caused the world-wide quake, then how were they supposed to protect their people and themselves from it? They could only hope aid would come from the outside and put a stop to the threat, assuming there was a threat, before it was too late.