Chapter 325: ERROR
He was definitely Jace. But she could already tell that he was not her Jace. Everything was beginning to click into place. Her double, the Xenoarcheologist, the odd mental defenses, outlawed weapons, and the faulty classified gear. Then there were the things the bandits mentioned. Getting too far away from the ’thing’ caused them to slowly lose their minds. While the Xenoarcheologist seemed to have spent too much time near the ’thing’ and lost his mind.
Salem jolted to the side as she was suddenly hit in the face by the butt of an assault rifle. "Don’t address the commander by his name you lowborn pond scum!" One of the soldiers yelled before spitting on her.
She took a moment and blinked in surprise. She reached out with her mind and realized they all had minds that were undefended. They were physically stronger than normal but that was because of a chemical compound. Not because of the nanosystem. It seems that there was a clear difference in technological knowledge. Especially since they were wearing the same flawed shielding units.
Salem stood up and wiped the spit off her face. The soldier went to hit her again but he froze in place. "That was completely unnecessary." Salem told them as she realized her new hat had been lost. She looked around for a moment before finding it closer to the mirror-like liquid anomaly. "Now would you like to talk like people or would you like me to beat you all into submission?" She walked over and picked up her hat, putting it on while she discretely checked the rest of her gear.
"You are not Salem." Jace grunted as the other soldiers prepared themselves for a fight. But Jace seemed more annoyed than suspicious. "But just because you are not suspicious does not mean you can deny Faction. So I am going to take you to a debriefing zone and if your story checks out I might release you."
"No you are not," Salem chuckled as she waved her hand and the rest of the soldiers froze in place. But they could quickly hear muffled screaming as they tried to speak and move. Salem ignored them as she focused on Jace.
He looked around at them and one of his fingers twitched. An indicator that both this Jace and her Jace shared as a habit before drawing their weapon. So she saw it clearly as he pulled out his sidearm and went to fire at her from the hip.
Bang!
His gun went flying through the air while a spurt of blood raced out of his hand. Jace grimaced in pain and grabbed at his hand. "Damn!" He cursed as he pulled out a bandage and began wrapping it in a cloth.
"Would you like to talk now or do you want to fight some more?" Salem asked as she spun her revolver before holstering it. She was feeling a lot better but there was one thing that was bothering her. A message that kept appearing from the system repeatedly just out the corner of her eye.
[ERROR: Connection Lost.]
[ERROR: Connection Lost.]
[ERROR: Connection Lost.]
[ERROR: Connection Lost.]
[ERROR: Connection Lost.]
[ERROR: Connection Lost.]
It seems that the nanosystem was contained at least to their universe. It was not able to reach across to this alternate reality. Which was an interesting bit of information. It meant that the system did not have a limitless reach. It might even be limited to the galaxy it originated in and that was it.
In an amusing twist of fate this wayward mission was very informative. But she needed to focus on reality so she did not get clocked while she was distracted. She looked at the Mirror Jace to wait for his response. He seemed to be in the midst of a personal crisis. After a few more minutes he sighed.
"Okay, please explain to me what is going on?" Jace asked as he looked at his men. "And maybe release my people."
"I will explain but your people are too trigger happy for me to release them." Salem chuckled as she walked over to the one that hit her in the face with his gun and pulled his assault rifle out of his hand. The rifle itself was not a design she had seen before. "If I released them they would just get themselves killed while trying to shoot me." She informed him.
The assault rifle is a burst action gun. It has a magazine with around fifty bullets inside of it. But the bullets were smaller caliber than anything she had seen before. While the weapon itself was made out of some less than stellar metals and plastics. But the design was made to not jam.
She would have to keep it for later. Maybe she could get the design to her Jace. "For one thing do you see that?" She nodded at the liquid mirror.
Mirror Jace looked at the liquid mirror and frowned. "What the hell is that?" He then seemed to think of something. "Actually... why did we not notice that before?"
"I do not know. But it might be sentient or semi-sentient. So unless you are specifically looking at it you would fail to notice it." Salem reasoned as she grabbed a few more magazines from the soldier. "Tell me, has the headache and disorientation hit yet-" She cut herself off as she could feel their minds begin to slip and waver.
A few she let just drop to the ground unconscious when they stopped resisting against her combined telekinesis and mind control suggestion. It would put too much strain on their mind. She was waiting a few minutes as they recovered, or more specifically until Jace recovered.
Now that she had a moment she took a look at the reflection again. But this time instead of seeing herself she saw her reflection scarred face. She would have to write down everything about this experience. Because this type of thing was not really her purview or something she understood. But everything about this experience will probably have to be sealed so word about what happened does not spread.