Technomancer

Prologue

The deck lurched as the shields took another barrage of enemy fire. They wouldn't hold much longer. Red lights hummed faintly along the walls, adding an ominous warning of the impending danger.

I hit my shoulder against the bulkhead when I lost my footing and nearly fell, but didn't stop. I continued to stumble on, even through the shaking. There was no time to waste. I only had one hope left, and it was already slim. If this didn't work, not only me, but everything would be lost. There wasn't a single star that would survive what was coming.

Most of them were already gone.

A door slid open and I stumbled into engineering as the ship shook again, more violently this time. At this rate, I had only minutes before the shields would fail. The hull would be breached shortly after. Even the most advanced orichalcum mesh alloys wouldn't last long against what was coming.

The Venture wasn't a big ship. I was the only real engineer on board. Ensign Colins was a decent mechanic when I needed more hands, but he lacked the proficiency to do much on his own. As the sole engineer, this room was my domain.

I was breathing heavily as I went to my desk and started making preparations. While I worked, my eyes were continually drawn to the smooth blue orb the size of my fist that hovered in a containment field within arms reach. I had dedicated the last two centuries of my life to trying to figure out the strange piece of alien tech. I still couldn't understand most of it, but knew it was some sort of storage device. I was able to transmit data into it, though that wasn't what made it special.

The orb displayed many strange properties that were generally only observed in quantum physics. It didn't follow the usual laws of cause and effect, space, or most importantly, time. I was also fairly certain that it was capable of quantum entanglement. If I could use it to entangle two entities from different places in time, than my plan might be feasible.

I set all of the mana crystals in place around an intricate diagram and sent a trickle of my own mana to activate it. One of the most difficult aspects of my plan had been collecting enough high grade mana crystals. They were expensive, but necessary.

Most of my life, I had lacked a mana pool of my own. Most Elsharin were known for their powerful magic. Unfortunately, the mana I produced had no identifiable aspect, and without a mana pool, I had nowhere to store it. By the time I figured out a solution to my problems, it was already too late. As a result, all I could do now was rely on external power sources.

Once everything was arranged, I reached for the blue orb, only to fumble as the ship gave another mighty shake. I fell to the ground, my weak body sustaining several painful injuries as I was tossed around.

When the shaking stopped, I pulled myself painfully to my feat. My left arm was either broken or sprained. Unfortunately, I didn't have time to care. Glancing at my terminal readouts, I cursed under my breath. The shields were just above thirty percent.

Scrambling back to my project, I set the orb to hover over the diagram. Then, setting my pained left hand over a scanner, I used my right to punch in the activation codes. The scanner whirred to life. I felt a tingle as technology and magic worked together to take a snapshot of my intellect. Everything I had learned, and everything I had experienced, was being copied into the blue orb.

The coms beeped and captain Tagart's voice yelled from the speakers. "What the fuck are you doin' down there Talaris?! We're not gonna last much longer! Find a way to boost those fuckin' shields, or I'll make sure you're the first to get eaten!"

I could have complained about the captain's terrible treatment, but I was honestly used to it by now. There weren't many people who would treat a "failure" like me with respect. Besides, now was hardly the time.