Spacer Clans Adventure 3: Naero's Fury (38 page)

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Naero, Zhen, Jia, and even Baeven
, prepared for another attempt at healing Womi further. Nearly everyone would be in on it this time.

She had finally taken the time to explain the situation with the currently tiny Kahn-Dar to them all.

They almost didn’t believe her about her little dragon bracelet, until Zhen backed her up.

What could she say? She took in strays.

Their problem, at this time, was that Womi had regained some degree of feeling in his extremities. But that was it. He was still crippled, and had lost much of his free range of motion.

They performed the regeneration techniques the same way as before.

Yet this time, there was almost no further progress.

“Maybe that’s the problem,” Naero said. “We n
eed to do something different–something we haven’t thought of or tried yet.”

The introductions had all been made. Womi jumped right in. “
Humor me, Naero. I’ve been thinking this over for days. Try healing me…this time, on the Astral Plane.”

Naero shook her head. “Not a good idea. Every time I go there, the Mystics have some way of tracking me down.”

Womi shook his head. “It’s not the location. They’ve clearly already placed an Astral marker on you somehow. I can’t see it here on the Prime Material Plane, but I can smell it. Perhaps they even did this long ago. They can eventually get a lock on you and find your body, anywhere you go, as long as you have that Astral marker on you.”

“Then how in the hell do I get rid of it?”

“I can find it on you in the Astral Plane and get rid of it.”

“How do you do that?”

“Easy. I go inside you and eat it. Once I consume the marker and its sealing energy, the marker will dissolve, and it won’t work anymore. Of course they’ll know their marker is gone, but they won’t be able to track you anymore, or do anything about it.”

“Will it hurt?”

“Sure…like crazy. But only while you’re in the Astral Plane.”

“How can I prevent someone from doing this to me again?”

Womi smirked. “I’ll show you. You don’t seem to know much about this stuff for being a Mystic.”

“I’m a weakling among my kind, remember?”

“Hah! Yeah, right…you…a weakling. That one get’s funnier every time you float it out.”

“Look, I hadn’t gotten around to Astral training, all right? Then all of this crap
exploded in my face. After I blew away one of the three High Mystic Masters–I don’t think they’re going to give me a refresher!”

“All right…don’t get mad, N. If you haven’t been trained yet, you haven’t been trained.
That’s not your fault.”

“
I didn’t say it was. You’re the one who made an issue out of it, you little goofball!”

“Issue? What issue? Hey, stick with me, my sweet. You wanna know stuff about dimensional travel? I know stuff that would cur
l your so-called Mystic Masters’ ears and light their bums on fire.”

“
If you know so much, then why don’t you train me?”

“Well, get me back up to snuff and I just might…if you’re nice to me.”

“Okay, deal. Take us to the Astral Plane and removed my tracker, and I’ll give your healing a shot there.”

“Good. I think we’re onto something here. Hold onto me, and don’t let go, Naero.”

She gasped, as they flashed into the aether of the Astral Plane miasma, racing through it at impossible speeds.

This time, Womi was as big as a naval battleship, but still as crippled as he was. Naero barely clung to Womi’s horn
s on his head.

Naero tried to picture something that would help her hold on–a
saddle of some kind, with reins and stirrups.

She felt like a total idiot doing so, but
imagination and force of will were everything on the Astral Plane. The items actually appeared in an instant from her imagination, under her and in both hands and feet.

They
really did help.

“Okay, N,” Womi’s voice boomed and echoed. “Get with the healing. Make it quick, before one of my kind senses us
and comes to much on us.”

When
Naero got down to it, it was actually easier. She was already linked with Womi, and could see the parts of him that were damaged.

All she had to do was heal and regenerate those portions of him.

She startapped and focused positive, healing energy on them.

At the same time, she instinctively learned something vitally important about Kahn-Dar.

They were indeed interdimensional creatures by their very nature. The reason they could flow and gate into all the other dimensions at will–was because a small portion of their existence seemed to exist in many of those dimensions–all at the same time.

Thus–they could really only be slain in the Prime Material
Plane.

If they perished there, every part of them perished in all of the others.

Womi let out a resplendent cry, feeling even more of his range of function returning to him.

“Yesss!”

His long body waved a little more, undulating and whipping back and forth in his speed. His front and rear, big hand-like claws opened and closed slowly, instead of sagging limp. His head twisted around more.

“Naero, do you know what this means?”

“Not a clue, so tell me flat out.”

“You just have to heal me in each of the nexus anchor dimensions, and I can finish regenerating fr
om that point on. We’ve done it!”

“We have?”

“I mean…you will finish healing me, right?”

“Sure,” Naero said. “We had a deal, correct?”

“We sure did. Let’s go.”

“Hey, Womi. Why don’t you take care of my little Cosmic marker situation, if you can?”

“Sure thing. Hold out your right forearm. That’s where it is.”

“How can you tell?”

“I can smell it. I can see it. Here let me show you how.”

In a flash, they came to a complete stop, floating in the aether. Womi was tiny again, and wrapped himself around Naero’s head like a small,
glowing blue circlet.

“Open your mind’s eye–your third eye. I’m going to show you how to look into things the way the Kahn-Dar are able to do. You can see right into anything
that exists, and see its essence–as well as any flaws, weaknesses, illnesses, or imperfections in its structures and flows.”

Naero focused through Womi, and looked at things the way the Kahn-Dar could see them.

She saw it immediately. The Cosmic marker, what looked like a small pulsing orb of swirling, red, blue, and gold energy, pulsating and flashing within her transparent right forearm.

Their bodies were both
clear like crystal, with an aura of flickering, Cosmic energy on the outside–as if the outer surface of their bodies hardly existed.

“Hold still,” Womi said. “Let me take care of that
annoying marker.”

She winced as he used his tiny, sharp teeth to gnaw and burrow into her
clear, astral forearm.

She blinked and gaped. She almost grabbed him by the tail and yanked him out, it hurt that bad.

He wiggled his way into her forearm and wrapped his jaws around the marker. Then he gobbled it down, and absorbed its energies.

After Womi wiggled his way back out–Naero wincing all the while–he bent around in the aether and patted his swollen tummy. He actually licked his chops.

“Mmm…very tasty.”

Naero studied herself, seeing the twisted, sickening energies coursing through herself. Her Cosmic disease–and the taint
ed threat of the Darkforce.

Powers that were slowly destroying her each day–each second.

“How do I make my own marker, again? How can I track things, like what was done to me?”

Womi bobbed and nodded.
“Simple, especially here. Your marker is part of you. Picture
what
you want it to be. Picture
where
you want it to be. You can place it inside of something, or someone, as long as they don’t resist, or guard against it. If they can sense it, like we can, it can be destroyed. For example, place a marker inside of me, Naero. Go ahead. I will allow it.”

Naero closed her eyes and tried to concentrate.

“No, no,” Womi said. “Keep all of your eyes open when you focus your power here on the Astral Plane. Things you create and cause to appear will do so, where you imagine them.”

She formed her marker–a small, brilliant pinpoint of intense, blue-violet light. Then she pictured it inside of Womi, just behind his head.

Womi grinned. “Now you can track me, and locate me, and come to me in an instant, anywhere on the Astral Plane.”

“Really?”

“Try it out. I’m going to flash over to the far side of the Astral Plane, the farthest point away from where we are. Focus on your marker, and come to me there.”

Womi vanished the next instant.

Naero recalled doing this same thing with Master Vane’s marker. She pictured her marker inside of Womi. Then she picture herself with her marker.

The aether shot around her in the flash of another instant.

She came face to face with Womi, looking her right in the eye.

“Excellent. For a weakling
of your kind…you are a natural. Now, I’m going to try to place a marker in or on you. I want you to set your energies to not allow that.”

“How?”

“You will sense my marker. Use your force of will to destroy or absorb its energies on contact with yours. No one will ever be able to mark you again–without your direct permission.”

On the third try, she managed to get all of her defenses and energies set completely right.

“See?” Womi said. “You can do it. Now, let’s finish my healing, if you don’t mind.”

“Okay.
Where to now?”

Womi grinned his toothy grin, becoming enormous once again
.

Naero’s saddle, reins, and stirrups were back also. She was already
using them.

“Hang on. We are going to take a little tour of all the dimensional nexes. And you are going to repeat similar healing processes in each of them. Then I will be free, and very close to whole again. I can take my convalescence over from that point on.”

Their journey turned out to be a grand tour.

“This is the Opposite
Dimension,” Womi explained. “Adjust your thoughts and patterns. Everything here is backwards.”

For the first time in her life, Naero felt sickened by flying, weak, frightened, and very disoriented.

Womi was flying and talking backwards. Everything took direct thought to adjust to. Why did she feel so afraid? It was mind-numbing. Naero looked at her badly shaking left hand. Everything seemed reversed. Color. Motion.

“Everything is structurally opposite here,” Womi assured her. “I know gender is important to your kind. So…don’t panic at suddenly being male.”

Naero screamed. “Get us out of here, Womi. I don’t like this. Everything feels…wrong. I’m so scared.”

“Because everywhere else, you are so brave.”

“This is really creepy. I don’t like being a guy. It’s…too weird.”

“We won’t stay long. The Null dimension is the opposite of everything you are used to. Deal with it. The faster you focus on healing me, the faster we can move on. Just remember, reverse the healing process that you used in the prime material plane. I know that doesn’t make sense, but
trust me, that’s the only way that it will work here.”

“I…I don’t know if I can.”

“Naero, listen to me. You are still you. Maintain that and focus. I know this is difficult. You want to leave this place, right?”

“I sure
as hell do.”

“Then do what you need to do
to escape, before you think about things too much.”

Healing. Reverse the process.

Almost numb with terror, Naero did everything backwards, ending with reverse startapping, draining Cosmic energy from herself and giving it back to the universe.

She
suddenly noticed–here her disease was a stabilizing force, healing and making her slowly stronger.

And h
er Dark Beast? It was filled with the shining, radiant light of the Lifespark and the pure Harmony…and it was sickening.

Why did that
all make her so angry?

Then Naero
gaped and realized.

Here, in this dimension, he was bitter, petty, cowardly
–and evil.

No. It wasn’t right. He had to end this nightmare. Get out of here
. Escape!

“Excellent,” Womi said. “Say
, goodbye.”