“Do you have translators?” I asked Ryan and Ant.
“Yeah.”
“We should probably hide the tech and use the comm stubs so we don’t stand out as much.”
Ryan nodded. He and Ant both started patting themselves down their pockets looking for their gear. I crooked my finger at his blue eyes. “Let’s see if your stole gear is complete.”
Alex’s eyes went wide with the playful accusation. I tugged his hand closer and reached for the invisible zipper against his jump suit. I pulled the zipper down. “Check the pockets. Inner chest pockets most likely. You were smart enough to take the watch. Did he have the node?” I pointed to the metal bit above my right eye.
Alex shook his head. “Don’t think so. I don’t remember it when I punched him in the face.”
I grinned. “Good. Means its hopefully in the charger.”
Alex started patting down all the pockets and found a tin can in his inner chest pocket. His zipper revealed a slip of his chest and I couldn’t help but look and bit my bottom lip. Alex cleared his throat. “My eyes are up here.”
“I can stare at them all day too.” I said letting my gaze drift down before back up to meet his eyes and pulled the tin can from his fingers.
I pressed the optical node to the stick pad and then hovered it over Alex’s right eye until the light turned red. “When the light turns red the nerve is close and when it’s blue you can stick it down. That’s the optimal location.” I took the large node out of the box. “This goes behind your ear. You want me to do it or you want to try?”
“Why are you telling me all this?” Alex asked.
“Because you can’t go home. Even if I can get to the Nexus, or they take us back to Arcadis, we can’t get to Shift #0. I can leave you someplace close, or you can stay with me or them but we can’t get you back to zero. It’s just impossible, the only way to zero is through Nexus and your Nexus is buried deep in the ocean and we can’t survive it — no tech can get inside the portal room that could make it.”
“So I’m fucking stuck in this shit hole.” Alex growled.
“Not this one. No. We can shift out of here — go someplace else. Use another Shift to get to the Nexus and we can get back to Arcadis. We could go to a place where Merlin still rules. We can go into outer space. We can go wherever the fuck you want. I just can’t take you home no matter how much I want to make you happy.”
Alex growled again, his blue eyes lit with fire and he stood up and pulled away. “What the fuck is my family going to think?”
I shrugged. “No idea. I don’t know why you are here. But I intend to find out. If there is a way to get you home we’ll look for it.”
“Why would you help me look for a way home? You don’t even fucking me.”
“I’ve known you my whole life. You weren’t a dream to me, Alex. I got beat up in school because I had an imaginary friend. My parents removed me from school early because of it.”
Alex growled and moved to the door and shook the handle. It wasn’t going to help. I got up and took his arm with the watch on it. “We need to hide the tech.” I put the comm unit behind his ear and then removed his watch and put it in the tin box to keep charging.
I parted the jump suit careful not to touch his skin and put the tin back in his inner pocket and zipped his jumpsuit back up. And turned my back to him and walked across the room to the wall.
I pulled my shirt back on and pulled the jumpsuit back up and zipped it. I sat back down against the wall and closed my eyes leaning my head against it. I didn’t hurt because he was angry at me for his predicament. I was angry I couldn’t give him what he wanted. Nyx fluttered in the air and then poofed out, his time up and he needed to recharge again. He chittered softly in my head to calm me, the fire raged inside and I used the calm of his soft voice to find an anchor to my anger to burn and keep Nyx alive.
Nox Luxignis is a Mystical Warrior who Bears the Phoenix Feather and Drifts from Shift #0
Effort: 1
Armor: 0
Recovery:
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Damage:
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Speed: (1)
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Intellect:
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XP:
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Abilities: premonition, sense magic, hedge magic, manifest phoenix, shroud of flame, drift, determine shift
Weapons: unarmed (caestus) 2 – eased, unarmed (caestus) 4, blaster 4 long range
Cypher System disclaimer and Open Game License
Numenera, the Cypher System, No Thank You, Evil!, Invisible Sun, and their respective logos are trademarks of Monte Cook Games, LLC in the U.S.A. and other countries. All Monte Cook Games characters and character names, and the distinctive likenesses thereof, are trademarks of Monte Cook Games, LLC. Content derived from Monte Cook Games publications is © 2013-2022 Monte Cook Games, LLC.
The Mind of Nox 