Wormhole Cultivation [Book 2] - Chapter 58: The Badge (Patreon)

I returned to the same queue, earning me a hostile look from the same guard.

I couldn’t see his expression behind his helmet faceplate, but the way he turned his head said it all. This time, though, I didn’t leave the queue, and it moved faster. Within a quarter of an hour, the guards, half of whom were technicians in armour, had lined up my group of ten for departure. After Zola’s tea, I felt much better, so I didn’t need support like some of the other patients, but I had no strength to spare for helping anyone either.

The girl behind me clearly could barely stay upright and needed help. They hung her on the right shoulder of a cultivator with a bandaged left hand. They put both behind those who could move on their own. I was third among those.

No one had a clear line for us. When the transit membrane spread across the portal, we shuffled into it like a herd. I’d braced for the change in gravity, so I didn’t embarrass myself, but several people behind me fell to their knees. Those behind them nearly tripped over them, but the staff quickly helped the wounded up and steady themselves, avoiding a pile-up.

The hall was typical. Almost identical to the one I’d seen at the desert complex. Same design, same exit archways with markers, but the staff jumpsuits were an unpleasant shade of pink. What wasn’t typical was the hum of voices, technical announcements and the clatter of armour, like a railway station at rush hour.

The portals on the platforms barely ever went dark; groups arrived one after another. Orderlies pushed dozens of trolleys and more wheelchairs. Few people needed to lie down, but many were unsteady on their feet. The girl who’d been behind me was put in one too.

The briefing was much shorter this time. A technician shouted, “Check your personal messages. Your accommodation and list of procedures are in your interface. Don’t crowd around the platforms!”

I checked. I activated the first geotag and trudged toward the portal hall exit with the rest of the herd.

A guard stood by one of the archways. A proper Four in armour, but against a herd like this, he couldn’t have done much if trouble had come. Still, the new arrivals had no wish to make trouble; they wanted to get to a bed as quickly as possible.

The marker led me to a residential block two floors up. The room was the same as at the previous complex, but strangers had already taken four places. Two were asleep, and on the other two lay bottles of water as markers that those places were taken. Since the beds were bunks, all the bottom ones were occupied.

I decided to catch my breath before climbing up.

I also needed to buy a bottle of water from the vending machine, since I still couldn’t use my pocket and had to mark my place. I sat down on a chair at the table. Its legs scraped against the floor, but the sleeping cultivators didn’t even stir.

I opened my list of procedures, checked the appointments against local time and saw I had four more hours until the first one.

I opened my contacts.

Bao was active. At least a third of my contacts were back online. I got up and went to the corridor wending machine, calling my friend on the way.

He answered after the first ring.

“Jake.” His voice was hoarse, as if he had a cold. “You’re alive.”

“Alive, on Earth, but I don’t know if I’m where you are.” I opened the map and zoomed out as far as it would go, to see the facility's name. With so many mortals on the staff, it couldn’t be secret. “Rehabilitation Centre 7B?”

“Same here!” said Bao. “Where shall we meet?”

“I can barely stand,” I said. “If you want, grab my tag, but I’m not going further than the first corridor from my room.”

Bao agreed and came over about five minutes later. I’d just grabbed a couple of cans of fizzy drink and a few nut bars. They’d woken my appetite. I’d also found a window at the end of the corridor. It looked out onto a wheat field, with a thin belt of trees beyond it.

“You look like shit,” he said instead of hello.

“Like you did after Drexin?” I asked.

“I’m after Drexin now too,” he corrected me.

His face had turned pinker, but pale blotches still showed on his cheeks and forehead, and hair was missing above his left eyebrow, as if he’d started going bald unevenly.

Bao told me about Drexin, about two more sorties after our meeting in the cafe, about the new members of his group who’d replaced the dead and wounded, and about how he’d finally caught such a dose of radiation that his gums started bleeding.

For a cultivator of his level, it was nowhere near fatal, but he did need treatment. His team hadn’t been disbanded; they were all undergoing treatment together.

I told him about the Five, about Mardal, about the needle in my heart, but the first thing struck him most.

“You took down a Five? Seriously?”

I didn’t have time to answer; a call flashed up in my interface.

Incoming call: V. Novak

Accept / Decline

I raised my hand, signalling Bao to be quiet, and answered.

“Master.”

“Go back to the central portal hall. You’re being collected.”

“Won’t I have problems with the guards?” I asked, remembering the hospital.

“Mark shouldn’t. He’s already at our portal, so don’t keep him waiting,” said Novak, and hung up.

I lowered my hand.

“Novak’s ordered me to go to the portal hall. He’s sent Mark for me.”

“Who the hell is that?”

“No idea.”

“I’m coming with you,” said Bao, getting up.

I didn’t argue. After all, it was a long way and not an easy one. I might need a friend’s shoulder.

Before we’d covered half the distance, someone started knocking insistently in my messenger, in the chat for Novak’s disciples, which I’d long since forgotten about.

Cheruiyot: Sullivan, where are you?

Cheruiyot: I’m already here.

One of Novak’s most senior disciples, still under his wing. Cheruiyot had the initials M. K. Evidently, M stood for Mark, but I’d never crossed paths with him personally in all these years.

Instead of replying in the chat, I called him, reckoning it would be easier to find each other that way, and explained that I’d only just come from the hospital and couldn’t walk fast. Cheruiyot replied that he’d been discharged from the same hospital himself a few hours earlier. If he’d known about me, he’d have picked me up.

We agreed to meet at the hall exit, where I suspected there’d be a conflict with the guards.

And not without reason. One of the armoured men immediately spotted a pair of cultivators moving against the main flow of people and came straight over.

“Can I help you?” he asked, with extraordinary politeness.

“Mark, you’re up,” I said. “The guards want to help, and I’m not in a state to explain.” I tried to say it so that the guard understood I wasn’t trying to insult him.

“I can’t see you…” said Cheruiyot just as the armoured man turned round, looking for the Mark I’d mentioned. “Ah! Got you.” The connection cut off, and among the stream of blue and pink jumpsuits I saw a black one heading our way.

Dark skin, a short boxed haircut and a fresh, moist scar across his nose from his left eye to the right corner of his upper lip.

“He’s with me,” Cheruiyot said, waving.

He held up a metal badge and showed it to the guard. My interface didn’t pick up any details, but the armoured man stood to attention.

“I won’t keep you,” he said.

“Master Cheruiyot?” Bao asked in surprise.

“Bao Fen,” he said, surprised too. “You’re with us as well. Johansson is supposed to drop by this evening.”

“You know each other?” I asked.

“Master Cheruiyot is one of Master Johansson’s regular sparring partners,” said Bao.

Johansson was a Five, which meant… Yes, a quick look at my interface confirmed that Cheruiyot was a Five as well.

“Move along, don’t dawdle!” Cheruiyot hurried us along, waving the badge hand and pointing elsewhere.

“Can I have one of those?” I asked, setting off in the direction he’d shown.

“Hasn’t the master given you yours yet?”

“No. What is it?”

“A Bureau of Counterintelligence agent’s badge.”

I couldn’t help snorting.

“Novak’s got his people in there too?”

Cheruiyot smiled at me.

“He still hasn’t told you? Novak is the Bureau’s executive director responsible for Verdis. Technically, the third person in the Bureau.

“In practice, the second, if not the first.”

I opened my mouth and closed it again. Head of the Hall of Diplomacy: teacher and schemer, demon hunter and counterintelligence officer. Then again, it was logical. I’d suspected something like that for a long time.

“Wait!” I said. “If the master was supposed to give me a badge, does that mean I’m an agent too?”

“Since your second year, as far as I know,” said Cheruiyot.

“And you talk about this so casually in front of outsiders?” asked Bao.

“Do you think they can hear?” Cheruiyot asked, pointing at the exhausted cultivators in the oncoming stream.

“I can hear,” said Bao.

“I’m afraid I’ll have to disappoint you: your candidacy was confirmed recently as well. At least, that’s what Johansson told me. Sorry if that wasn’t part of your plans, but the decision doesn’t come with a choice.”

“Mu master is…” Bao began.

“Of course!” Cheruiyot snorted.

Cheruiyot led us to the farthest portals, which weren’t working, but technicians stood beside them. He flashed his badge at them, brushed aside any objections and took a tablet to enter the coordinates he needed. Evidently not secret at all, since no one mentioned wiping the records.

“Send us here,” he ordered, handing the tablet back to a technician.

The technician hesitated, so Cheruiyot took the tablet again, jabbed the confirm button, and handed it back.

The ring filled over with a black film. He stepped into the membrane first. Bao and I followed.

No hum, no trolleys, no queues. The silence was so resonant that our footsteps echoed. Still, the hall was small for a portal hall. Two rings framed opposite walls; the floor and one wall were dark stone, and the opposite wall was a panoramic window.

Beyond the glass were mountains.

The hall hung over a precipice. Far below, a steep white slope began, and across a wide valley, a ridge stood opposite. White, with very rare black streaks of bare rock. No trees, as far as the eye could see. This place was probably above the tree line.

Above the white peaks, the sky was so deep blue I could see stars even though the day hadn’t ended yet.

A majestic view, just the way the master liked it.

Then again, all cultivators liked that, but majesty came in different kinds.

Bao’s estate, for instance, showed off well-kept terraces, old-style architecture, clipped trees and antique paintings on the walls. Every leaf there was in its place because someone had put it there, and every detail shouted about money and power.

These mountains didn’t need shouting or upkeep. This majesty was raw and primordial.

Bao and I lingered, spellbound by the view, but Cheruiyot hurried us along.

“Sullivan, the master’s waiting.”