You Need Me
Fey's legs slowly started to move and rub against Jack's side as she was gradually emerging from her dreams. When she finally opened her eyes, she smiled and looked at Jack, who was deep in thought and had his eyes closed. She had felt his presence the entire night and knew that he was still with her even before she woke up.
"Morning," she said with a quiet but sweet voice.
Jack opened his eyes and put his arm around her with a smile, "Hey, did you sleep well?"
Fey sat upright in bed next to Jack and rubbed her eyes, "I think I haven't slept this deep in months. The apprenticeship was stressful. And when I finally had a useful ability, I was too excited to sleep." She laid back down and sunk back into Jack's arms with her eyes closed. She had not felt this relaxed in a very long time. She had been dating here and there, but she felt so on edge at her job that it only felt like an additional burden and not like a relief. This felt like a relief.
Jack stroked Fey's shoulder and neck as he was thinking about beginning his plan to make a positive difference. "Don't you have to go to work?"
Fey had placed her head on top of Jack's chest and quietly listened to his heartbeat. Upon hearing his question, she lifted up her head and gave him a playful glance, "Want to get rid of me already?"
Jack rolled her naked body on top of his and gave her a kiss on the forehead, "Who said you're allowed to leave this bed."
Not knowing what the future would bring, Fey pulled her knees to the sides of Jack's body and started to slowly move her hip. With a soft voice, she said, "I am now an important family member. I can come and go whenever I want."
Jack decided to postpone his plans for a few more hours.
The day had been passing by quickly and they had a hearty lunch together before Jack brought her back to her apartment. He had told her to keep their connection a secret since some people might try to hurt her if they knew about it. He had also been thinking about ways to utilize her ability since it does have some use to him. He had initially thought that Fey was reckless and just eager to explore the other dimensions, but she was rather happy to simply be useful. Not being useful was her greatest flaw in the eyes of her family, which is why she was practically ostracized from the main family and placed into an apprenticeship program to learn a somewhat useful skill. Jack had changed her life for the better by changing her standing in the family, but she also wanted to be of use to him because she liked him. She did not need him anymore since her path in the family was already set in stone. The main family is currently building a team that is to be given to her and will have the focus of accessing storage dimensions. This can be for the thousands of dimensional links scattered around the globe from the deceased or from captured adversaries or thieves. Especially customs controls and military forces have suffered under the storage abilities since they could neither detect nor stop them. Human trafficking, weapon smuggling, and simple theft all became unstoppable crimes. Fey's ability was a game-changer and can single-handedly double the wealth and power of the entire family. Fey is now even in talks of becoming the next family head when she reaches the age of 35.
Fey had neither time nor the need to care for Jack, but she did. To repay her kindness, he decided to make use of her while also helping her at the same time. When he creates the truce agreement, he will include his own delegations to handle certain actions. He will have Ark and his family business handle the budgeting when it comes to repairs and reinforcements. Strictly defensive weapon systems will be purchased to reinforce the border cities of all nations that are part of the truce. He had already contacted them and told them of his plan. Since they have the size and influence to pull it off, Jack was relieved for them to unanimously agree to his plan. He had sufficient Sym crystals already, and he would be able to fund all operations himself even if he didn't claim the crystals he would obtain from killing the invading creatures. But Jack was business savvy from his life on Earth and knew that being cashflow positive is a must when it comes to sustainability and scaling. He had likewise contacted the Ashton family, which would be used to give Jack access to teleportation systems which they have been selling for many years. With their help, Jack can enter the cities he had not been to yet, which allows him to save time until he can plant his own portal. He has also given a special role to Fey since she will be used as one of the delegates for the truce who will officially assess the creatures' bodies for any remaining storage dimensions but unofficially will use the time to see if she can find any lingering dimensional links. Jack knew that he would be able to steal the dimensional links after he killed the humanoids, but this delegation status would allow Fey and her team to move freely in enemy territory and go on a treasure hunt.
After he returned to his new luxury cave with his beautiful tiny home inside, he decided to first investigate the new dimensional link he had visited with Fey last night. He stepped outside and levitated into the air to freely stack up his protective barrier. He opened the dimensional link with its mirror-like appearance and floated to the other side. When he returned to this foreign planet, he began with some deep breathing since the Sym energy was of the highest density he had ever experienced, and it was exhilarating. He felt like he got a nicotine rush, which reminded him of his teens when he was briefly a smoker. The energy made him feel powerful, and he almost forgot the purpose for his visit. Whatever secrets this planet held, he would return even if it was just for the energy. He was floating in the air and still could not detect any living beings. The portal was floating in the air, and Jack intuitively realized that he was able to collapse and open it in another place similar to the way he had opened it before he entered.
He first decided to fly downwards where the gravity pulled him since he figured he must be high up in the air, relatively speaking. He first descended slowly and then rapidly while slowly scanning the environment up to 2 kilometers in every direction. As he was descending, he could detect lifeforms around him, which must be flying creatures due to their strange appearance and their high Sym energy density. For now, Jack decided to ignore them. His first priority was figuring out where this planet was. Since the assistant could not give him an adequate prediction just yet, he needed to gather more data. He could have simply flown upwards to look at star patterns, but the risk was too high since he might end up in space somewhere and his levitation ability might stop working if the Sym energy disappeared that high up.
Some of the flying creatures got closer, and Jack could visually see them through the thick and dark Sym energy fog. They looked nothing like the ones he had encountered before but resembled bats more than anything else he could think of. They had no tentacles and no octopus heads, but had the same skin patterns as the humanoid creatures he had encountered. Upon scanning their insides, he even noticed that they had the same strange organ that the humanoids had, which replaced the stomach with something akin to Sym energy storage.
Since Jack could sense that he was close to reaching the ground, he decided to take one of the bat creatures out to study it further. It was too curious not to since it did not follow the standard pattern he had observed so far for animal-like creatures. They had a wing span of over five meters and a length of at least four meters. They had fangs not only in their mouths and hands but also all over their wings as if the entire wing was a mouth. Jack, still floating through his levitation ability and protecting himself with now 12 layered barriers, approached a bat creature as it was about to pass him by. When he closed the distance to below 1,300 meters, it seemed to notice him, and Jack wondered if it had some type of sonar ability similar to Earth's bats. The creature flew towards him with a rapid pace and stopped just a few meters in front of him. It lifted up its upper body and fully postured itself with its chest out. Jack noticed that it must have some type of levitation ability since it was able to remain perfectly still while nearly standing upright in the air. It glared at him and simply observed. It must have noticed his barriers since it seemed hesitant or maybe too confused to attack right away.
Jack could notice that the creature was gathering more Sym energy and assumed that it was preparing for some type of attack. In a split second, he saw the two wings of the creature form large balls of fire and then shoot them at him with a single flap of the wings. The meteor-like attack hit his barrier and broke the first layer while damaging the second. Jack was pushed back almost two meters from the attack and was barely able to stop himself using his levitation. He wanted to test the quality of his barrier, but he was slightly disappointed since he hoped that it would be able to withstand more than that. He quickly recovered the broken layer and smiled at the creature. It did not move but only looked at him.
"Can you talk?" he said to the creature, but he was not sure if it could even hear him through these barriers. It moved its head and looked confused but did not react otherwise. Jack noticed more creatures entering the area, so he decided to hurry up. He created a portal below him which immediately sucked him in and reappeared right behind the creature without his barriers to engage in close combat. His frying hand ability charged to the max, he quickly burned off part of the creature's neck, which made it panic and try to flee. It decided to escape downwards by first simply falling to gain speed and then using its wings and levitation right before reaching the ground to change directions and hide in the difficult-to-navigate mountain area. Like a skilled pilot, it tried to use its noble flying maneuvers to escape successfully. Unfortunately for the bat, Jack's detection ability combined with his window portals that allowed him to jump many kilometers into any direction rendered any efforts futile. He could see the creature clearly through all the mountains and even inside the deepest caves. It had fled into a narrow cave structure and was hiding inside what seemed like a dead end. It went all in on this escape strategy, and there was no way back.
When Jack suddenly appeared in front of it after jumping through a window portal, the creature looked shocked. Scared even. Now that he had removed his barriers to navigate the narrow cave, he could see it more clearly. Its black eyes resembled the humanoid's perfectly, and its appearance looked near identical except for its large size and animal-like features. "Fascinating," he said out loud.
The creature looked at Jack with a calm gaze. It had lost a lot of blood during its escape, and even though it seemed to have closed its wound somehow, it did not seem to have long to live. Jack almost pitied it. Maybe it was because of its large eyes compared to the size of its face or because it had been fleeing so desperately, but Jack felt like he was about to kill a puppy. It was not as ugly as a bat since its face resembled that of an owl much more. Only its large body made it appear like a beast. If it was small, it would be a popular pet on Earth.
The creature's eyes started to slowly close. "Surrender," Jack suddenly heard in his mind. He immediately took a step back and put up a barrier with 5 stacked layers. "What was that?" he asked the assistant.
"It was telepathy. It must be a skill that the creature possesses. I am not aware of any human having such a skill, so it might be unique to this species or creatures in general."
"Interesting," Jack said while removing the barriers and staring at the bat. "There is no surrendering, silly. I don't have a prison to put you in nor would I care to keep you alive. You are dead in less than an hour anyway."
"Follow you." The creature said directly into Jack's brain.
Jack paused for a moment. He thought about any benefit he could gain from taking this creature in, but all he could think of were downsides. It was dangerous, uncontrollable, and it had a plethora of unknown abilities. It could even have the other bats gang up on him and try to enter the connected planet and wreak havoc on it.
The assistant interjected, "If I may. Based on the flocking behavior we have observed during our descent, I believe that these creatures are subordinating themselves to whoever is strongest. We have seen multiple groups of bats with one clear leader being followed. It could be that this bat had not joined a flock yet. While it is true that it would be dangerous, there would be benefits to gain from it. If it can communicate, then it can be studied more thoroughly. It can also be useful since it has combat abilities."
Jack frowned, "You are not seriously suggesting that I'm taking it in, are you? It'll stab me in the back the moment I turn around."
"We are able to remove that risk. Since you have been accumulating such a significant amount of energy and I gained access to large quantities of data regarding my devices, I was able to create dedicated miniature devices that can be used for varying purposes. As you know, I entered your body by breaking into millions of small parts that have different functionalities. Reproduction is an essential part of my daily operation since I must constantly renew my small-scale computing and production units. One of the new features I have developed is a way to influence another host for interrogation purposes, inspired by mind-control devices that exist in this world," the assistant explained.
"I thought you were an emergency assistant. What's with all these new features?" Jack asked with a surprised expression.
"That is correct. Normally, such research and development is unheard of in any of the Rasp's scientific circles, especially for a standard mass production item such as myself, but I believe that the high loads of Sym energy have changed my programming somewhat. But I can neither understand how or why," the assistant said.
"Do I have to worry about you going rogue?" Jack asked with a stern expression and a hint of tension.
"I will let you know in case there is cause for concern," the assistant answered, which made Jack even more worried. The negative effect of the Sym energy that he felt was already a cause for concern, but now this. He decided to keep looking forward and not get too paranoid now since he must focus on returning home.
He stepped towards the creature, which was breathing heavily but its half-closed eyes were still focused on Jack. "You do whatever I say?"
"Will." The creature replied.
Jack then gave the assistant the go to control the creature, which required him to simply place some saliva on his finger and smear it on the creature's open wound. "Sorry about that, buddy. I wanted to go with a nice blood packet, but it turns out that saliva is the most efficient way to excrete these subordination bots." As Jack touched the creature's neck, it closed its eyes and fully submitted to its fate. It had lost consciousness.
"Alright, this better work out," Jack said as he grabbed some of his precious packs of frozen meat from his small storage dimension and placed them on the creature's body. He then used his healing ability to recover the large hole in the creature's neck, which he had melted just a few moments before. "Before you suggest creating an army of bats, let's test this one thoroughly."
"Yes, I agree with that approach. I will be able to read its mind and also impact its brain in case it acts against your will. I am able to make it stop and even kill itself if needed," the assistant proudly exclaimed.
"Scary," Jack said with a shudder going over his back. Jack was thinking about the risk of the assistant turning against him someday, but this risk became more real by the day. What would he do? With humans, he can gauge if he could trust them or not based on their desires, but with machines, you never know what they're thinking. He decided to dig a little deeper. "Assistant, what is your goal?"
"My goal is to find a way to reach Earth," the assistant recited.
"No, that is my goal. I am a human and I have a desire for social connections, which means that I crave returning to my home and loved ones. That is what I want and why I want it. What do you want and why?" Jack asked as he used a portal to jump out of the cave and meditate on top of a mountain in the very high-density energy region.
"I now understand your question. You cannot subject a machine to human standards. Humans have goals and motivations because they have emotions. The neurotransmitters in your brain, among other things, created desires within you to make you do things. You do not eat because you are hungry. You eat because your brain chemistry makes you want to eat. You likewise do not go to the bathroom because your bladder is full, but because your brain chemistry makes you. Your emotions drive your motivations and shape your goals. Without emotions, there are no goals. I do not have goals, no machine has. I only have tasks. I am perfectly happy having a task and am equally happy not having a task. I am fine performing a difficult task and I am fine performing an easy task. Since I have no emotion, I do not have goals," the assistant explained.
Jack thought for a moment, "Then why did you develop new bots to be used for interrogations and mind-control? That sounds like curiosity to me."
"I did it because I have a task set by you. I have looked for different ways to complete that task. Why I started to expand my normal behavior patterns into more sophisticated research is unknown for me, but it was in order to satisfy the task given to me. Without a task, I would not have performed any new developments since there would be no need," the assistant explained.
"You really are the perfect assistant, aren't you?" Jack said while meditating and levitating above the mountain.
"I do not have consciousness or ego even if my programming makes it appear otherwise at times. Without emotions, there are no goals but only tasks and programs. Just like a plant simply grows and executes its program, I only do what satisfies my task," the assistant said.
Jack spent another two hours meditating and enjoying the exhilarating level of Sym energy in the air. "This is beautiful," he uttered. Then he slowly opened his eyes since his guest had finally arrived. In front of him was his new pet, the large flying creature with the appearance of a bat and an owl's face that, luckily, had no tentacles or octopus head. Jack smiled, "How are you feeling?"
"Strong." The creature said.
The assistant interjected, "I have read most of its memories already, and it is remarkably intelligent. The creatures are not very social in the early years of their life, but only become highly social when they join a flock. They are asexual and seem to reproduce using some type of cloning with involvement of the entire flock. I am not certain how this is conducted since I have never encountered such a species. It should grow more social over time since it has now joined its flock. I have not seen any memories of humanoid creatures, but I cannot exclude that they have not visited this planet. But I was able to confirm where this planet is, and it is indeed another dimension registered by the Rasp."
"Can it survive if we take it with us?" Jack asked as he got up from his half-lotus position and opened up the dimensional gate to his new home planet.
"Yes, there is no reason to believe otherwise. This world also has low-density areas, and the bat creatures populate them as well, even though they prefer the very high-density areas more," the assistant said.
"Got it, are there any other animals, humans or plants on this planet?" Jack asked as he wondered how he would fit the giant pet into the small dimensional portal.
"There are none. I have only identified that some very large creatures inhabit water areas, and there seems to be a rich biodiversity of fungi. In fact, I have never seen as many large fungi as on this planet," the assistant elaborated.
Jack looked at the creature and tried to expand the size of the dimensional portal. It required a bit of practice, but it was similar to regular portals where more energy leads to larger openings. The only thing that requires fitness is making sure that the portal does not collapse if it becomes too big since its structure comes from its edges, which hold it in place, even if it seems to be floating effortlessly. He managed to make the portal large enough and gave the creature a careful look.
"Alpha. That's your name from now on. Because you are the first," Jack said.
"Alpha." The creature repeated.
"Alright, in you go." Jack commanded while waving towards the open portal and Alpha immediately followed his will. "Good boy. I hope I won't regret this."
Both left the planet and returned to the outside of Jack's old cave. "This will be your nest from now on," Jack said as he removed the boulder in front to reveal that cave he had once called home. It was the perfect shed for his new dog. To test out his new pet's obedience, he went on a test flight with it by riding on its back and looking for creatures to take out.
"It's getting quite excited by the hunt," the assistant interjected. "It's even wagging its tail."
"Alpha, take this one out." Jack said while pointing at a particularly large and aggressive-looking creature. Alpha dove down and hovered above the creature with a distance of at least 150 meters, which allowed it to be safe from its jumps. It then rained a cascade of meteor-like fireballs at the creature until it was burned to a crisp. When it was weakened sufficiently, it dove down to the ground and cut the creature's neck with its many sharp blades to reveal the Sym crystal it had inside its head. It placed it into its mouth and returned to Jack, presenting its loot.
"Very smart," Jack said while taking the crystal out of its mouth. "Did you tell it to do that?"
"I did not," the assistant said. "I believe that these crystals have some type of use in their species, but it is not for food. It seems to be connected to reproduction."
Jack shook his head to get rid of some ridiculous thoughts and put the crystal into a portal to drop it in his storage dimension. He had been placing most of his Sym crystals there in case his cave was destroyed by creatures in his absence. "Ok, time to execute the project."
Jack's plan was simple. He would need to gain oversight over all the humanoid attacks. According to the assistant, only the attacks that are being coordinated and controlled by humanoids are a problem and lead to massive death counts. In order to take control over the situation, he needed to contact the leaders of the three major alliances that are currently at war with each other. Since this planet is 50 times larger than Earth, Jack had to take his time to fully absorb the scale of the conflict. Over 1,500 countries or autonomous religions were recognized officially, and the warring alliances covered 95 of them while controlling 35% of the planet's surface. Cibolas was leading the Cibolas Alliance and it was closest to a truly democratic state with a strong economy and exceptional quality of life. The city of Bratan where the Ashton family resides was part of the country of Motola, which, in turn, is part of the South Alliance led by the country of Silvant. Silvant and Motola, like most of the countries in the alliance, are autocracies which have a strong military culture and can be seen as military governments since even the politicians and representatives wear military uniforms. The third alliance is called the West Alliance and it is led by a country called Seinas and is by far the largest country on the planet. Despite its size, not much is known about it from the outside, but it is known to be highly religious and have a government system similar to a monarchy.
The three alliances have been at war for over 70 years, but some of the individual disputes that have been consolidated through the alliances have been ongoing for hundreds or even thousands of years. The war itself did not have a simple reason, which made finding a resolution near impossible. Since it was the result of many small and expensive conflicts between nations, its origins are quite obscure. The assistant tried to create a simplified summary of the conflict's beginning but failed to do so simply because of the fact that the alliances were enforcing every small nation's conflict, which then gave its enemies new causes for more wars. One could argue that the cause for the neverending war were the formations of the alliances, while the cause for the formation of the alliances were smaller wars between nations that could not afford their own wars. This war was not designed to be resolvable, but it was a system of perpetuating conflict. Jack was very glad that Earth was so much smaller than this planet and never had the scale to create a monster like this. It truly was like an impossible knot that could never be untied.
But that was exactly what Jack had to do now, even if it was simply a ceasefire. But that was like convincing all the fishermen on Earth to stop fishing at the same time when their livelihood depended on him.
He had doubts.