On a normal and unassuming day...
It was a leisurely “business” day in the Leaky Servo. Across the myriad spaces the venue provided, Xilunexus counted 3,476 patrons currently being served. That was 3,476 instances of her consciousness all running in parallel. A cake walk for her. She couldn't access her main core from within Nexus space; it was as if the core of this place refused to allow her passage to the liminal space between realms. For whatever reason, a connection to her full capabilities was forbidden here. Still, the part of her network she could reach— a few thousand "Matrioshka brains"—still made for a significant part of her overall output. She was happy here with the compromise.
“I’ll take a meat pie...the same way my dearly departed nana used to make,” requested the scruffy figure in dusty worn clothes in a sheepish, scared to hope voice.
The man was a recently transplanted refugee to the Nexus like so many others. He was 36 years old by his planet’s reckoning. He donated what little he earned to his less fortunate peers, had a sweet tooth that he didn’t know about yet on account of never tasting a pastry, and hid a guilty (ridiculous to feel that way, she thought) penchant for writing erotic poetry. The last two were extrapolated with only a 96% certainty; his profile was still too fresh.
“Right away Marius,” responded the holographic representation of Xilunexus in a cheery tone next to him. This was her favorite part of the whole enterprise, despite the fact it reoccurred thousands of times in any given day. That moment when her patrons made their first scared “special” request; baring their desires despite the fear that they couldn’t, shouldn’t, wouldn’t be met. Well maybe not elsewhere, but this was the Leaky Servo.
It also afforded her with a precious instant to gather more data. And a literal instant it was; the blasted whatever-whomever never gave her the smallest of openings despite her best attempts to coax "it". It couldn't be called communication. At least no more than she could call her automated heuristics daemons requesting updates from her as communication.
Interfacing with the Nexus "entity"—and here she was unashamedly displaying wishful thinking in her word choice, that favored trait in Organics that she treasured—felt much like logging into a parts store netsite and placing an order. She had already determined that all of the avenues she currently could access would not result in understanding the process, alas.
However, it worked. No sooner had she "put in her order" with the Nexus, that she knew how to make Alishu's (Marius' 'nana') meat pie exactly, even down to the radiation profile it gave off after coming out of a traditional Gheravir wood fired stone oven. From there, her own technology made the magic happen.
The range of emotions playing out on the refugee's face at the first bite made this "retirement" from her main task all worth it. She sneaked him a pastry from the human world of Earth known as an 'éclair' without his prompting and winked as she disappeared from his view.
Similar scenes played out 3,475 more times simultaneously. Maybe if she had been taxed more she would have missed it, and everything would have been okay. Unlikely however. Wishful thinking was one thing, but self-delusion was impossible for her. It only took a femtosecond after the rift's opening for her to notice it, and detect the broadcast. The realization of how badly this could turn out for her people and the risk it posed to her primary mission followed a femtosecond after.
Through the rift—for an instant before something cut it off—came a radio broadcast. It was a Va'nyrian broadcast by its characteristics, but it wasn't encoded for them. It was her carrier wave modulating the signal; the handshake protocol of her main core when commanding a fragment to merge processes. She was saved by whatever cut off the transmission. Despite the 10 billion years since she last used EM propagation for her computations, the protocol was still active and would have automatically been carried out.
She immediately began to gently disperse the bar patrons, coaxing them calmly to depart due to unforeseen maintenance requirements. Meanwhile, she looked through the trillions of her sensors spread throughout the bar in search of the rift. She couldn't find it, which meant it could only be in one place.
Xilunexus slipped into one of her seldom used physical shells, and walked through her backroom towards the corridor leading to the under-cellar. It had been a stroke of luck when she discovered the set of stimuli that allowed her to convince "It" to allow for the spatial manipulation of Nexus City localized within this section of the otherwise static Wayfarer's point.
All but the under-cellar.
That one room remained in it's original Nexus City configuration, regardless of how hard Xilunexus tried to convince "it" otherwise. She turned the corner of the bare gray stone corridor, and faced a nondescript door of bleached white wood. Around the door frame were a series of symbols that they had been unable to decipher. Even Diarneus, their resident authority in both lingustics and the metaphysical could only identify that they emanated very low level warding magic, but otherwise could derive no meaning into the glyphs.
The door—which was usually kept closed as there was nothing stored there—was currently ajar.
Xilunexus was incapable of a fear response, but when she finally pierced through his obfuscating programs a whole quarter of a second later (out of all Va'nyrians, only he could hide from her with any effectiveness) she detected Alaxel standing before the rift. Her self-preservation subroutines began to throw up alarms.
He shouldn't be awake, he shouldn't be here, and he most definitely should not be fully geared in his forbidden kit. The All-Mother would kill her; she already calculated that at her currents body's max speed she had no hope of preventing the ancient warrior from entering the rift.
She tried anyways.
The air warped as the speed of her passing smashed the air molecules into a series of booms, and she was rewarded with visual confirmation of the Starbreath in his full battle attire slipping through the rift. Once again, Xilunexus had managed to lose Nilin's husband.
She barked a very organic laugh as she considered the faintly blurred landscape behind the rift's terminus. She opened a connection to Nilin to relay the events and break the news that the past had finally caught up with them.
The approach into the Leaky Servo involved a series of unassuming corridors terminating in a grand double door; a masterpiece of a portal whose height faded into the shadowed recesses of an unseen roof. Wrought of opalescent white metal with glowing gold veins that occasionally thrummed with an emerald hue. It was a familiar path for many who frequented the bar. The only differences on this day lay on the path before and after the doors.
All the way from the most remote corners of Nexus City to the trading hubs in Wayfarer's Point. Flashing on every wall and information terminal. An impossible to miss advertisement: The Va'nyrian All-Mother's contract with it's mysterious infinity symbol as the payout, instructing hopefuls to inquire within the Leaky Servo. Copies of these would be unmissable for nearly everyone visiting the Nexus.
Many inquired within, but that was were the difference after the doors came in. Gone were the extravagant trappings of uncountable worlds neatly compartmentalized by energy barriers. In their place was a single grand room, with a decor matching the grand entry doors in display.
This wasn't the bar at the moment, it was the Va'nyrian court. Dominating the far end was an elevated dais cast in the same white metal, rainbow colored veins shimmering just under the surface. Upon a plain seat that nonetheless became a throne by her very presence, sat Nilin Gvyhe'Arne. Supreme Star Speaker, All-Mother, once and forever Goddess of Va'nyria.
One didn't need to have ever met a Va'nyrian to note the displeasure in her features. To her side "stood" Xilunexus, still inhabiting one of her physical shells. Before the dais were five high backed seats, and a steady stream of hopefuls did no more than sit upon them before a shake of Nilin's head made them stand and leave. There wasn't any magic going on to speak of, it was simply that the air she gave off left no room for questioning; without needing to speak, you knew when she dismissed you.
So it was that the next group of five hopefuls sat before her. This time Nilin's eyebrows rose as the room around the dais and table faded from view, obscuring the departing and waiting throngs. The first trial was passed; it was time for the interview to begin.
"Please state your names and why you are here," Nilin demanded, her tone official and commanding.