It was no one’s business but the Attractor’s as to what this “skip” meant.

She ignored it.

One by one, the group of five arrived in a vast white room. Aside from the entry door, there were no discernible traits to the empty white space. It was impossible to distinguish the walls from either floor or ceiling. The sharp white illumination made it additionally problematic to make the edges of the walls distinguishable. The room wasn’t too bright or too cold, it was merely a neutral base, akin to the white base icing a cake might receive before decoration. A mild wind signified the arrival of the martians. Little puffs of smoke made of hundreds of grains of sparkling sand floated in like small flocks of birds in a morning breeze.

The sand beings were slowly arriving.

In seconds, there were five creatures which slowly glided next to each person in the human group. Sophie smiled and inspected the sand sparkle; she was, as usual fearless. She looked around, thinking the show was about to begin. It was difficult to distinguish, but the small clouds began to take form next to the head of each human. The sand formed a structure, not unlike a brain. It sparkled as it assumed the shape and began to gain function. Each small cloud of rocks moved, ever so subtly, to mimic human the neural structure. The sand would soon be able to mimic or host the very consciousness the humans.

“Sophie, they are trying to copy us,” warned Ronaldo. “They put my consciousness in that structure then destroyed my body with fire.”

“They would not do that,” spoke Sophie.

“To them, my replication was the greatest honor they could bestow.”

Ronaldo was right, they were trying to change Sophie.

Without more, time stopped. Sophie felt her mind change. They were trying to rip her from her human body. Four of the five humans were effortlessly taken; the sand and pebbles filled with energy. She saw their minds move from their natural forms like a ghost leaves a body. As Ronaldo slid to the ground, the player who had agreed to host his consciousness was able to resume control over his body. They would need more sand and rocks given the higher neutral density of the shared minds in the group; a phenomenon the Martians had likely not encountered before. The same was true for herself, as she hosted Liam. From the side, she saw more sand flow in to join the cloud next to her and Ronaldo’s.

This was a mistake.

Time was halted; they were moving between heartbeats. Still, the sand seemed out of sync with time. But then, Sophie felt a tug, a yank at her spirit. It hurt her. She resisted the same way a person almost slips on a wet spot but quickly corrects themselves.

“No,” said the Attractor. As if a supersonic bomber just performed a low altitude pass over the scene, creating an area of destruction; there was a quantum explosion. It was followed by strange ripples and energy. There was one word that dripped from her the whole time, all there echoed was, “no.”

No one could ever understand what happened next. The power of a Big Bang detonated from her voice into the room.

The young girl was pure power, this wasn’t even energy as humans understood it. What poured forth from Sophie was sheer, impelled force.

Her voice pulverized everything nearby. It vaporized all of the bodies in the room. It moved and destroyed the room and the rocks above and below. The martians could never have guessed that such a young, small, seemingly harmless human child could inflict such carnage with only a spoken word. In the void of the Multiverse, the young girl was entitled to destroy. The Attractor’s extirpation exploded the puny fourth planet from the sun. To pulverize suggested something was reduced to dust; here, mars’ very atoms were also destroyed. Everything next to her, as if she was a supernova made flesh, ceased to exist. The shockwave expanded outward, quickly hitting the sun and unceremoniously snuffing it out like a candle, every atom of hydrogen leaving gray traces behind. The remaining planets in the solar system quickly followed suit. Given the size of the Milky Way, it took a second or two to kill every living creature in this part of the Cold.

It was done and after that followed void.

“No, wait,” said the young voice at the center of the devastation. Sophie’s powers stretch further to touch yet another forbidden space. Time did not pause. Instead, it stopped unfolding, and as if someone had turned back the projector of an old movie, the Milky Way, the sun, the solar system returned. The powers sent roaring forth resorbed down to their maker, and mars returned as quickly as it had gone. Time resumed unfolding, albeit in reverse and slowly at first, and then in a couple of moments, they were back to the minutes just before the martian rape of her mind. Sophie was running backwards into the large white room. Her team was rushing in behind her.

Then she was skipping and only once the “skip” was reached did time resume.

Sophie had previously “pinched” time. Now she had successfully “skipped” it.

Unlike the pinch, this time, every living creature remembered these last several minutes. They saw and felt the strange rewind. She rewound it back to the glitch everyone had felt before entering the room.

“Let’s try again,” she said without animus or stress in her voice as she was back to the “skip.” The others joined her, but their expressions were clear: they had knowledge of what would come next. They had lived the time loop and still created a memory of it. Each of the five looked for the clouds to come out of the walls. They did not.

“Ronaldo, how can we do this? I just want to speak five minutes with them, I have really just one question,” she asked the adventurer. He was puzzled by the Attractor’s request.

Liam spoke in her mind, “They got your message, dear. Your display of power was compelling.”

“I know, it’s tough to control now. The Multiverse wants me to wipe this world out of existence, you know that, right.”

“I guessed. You the only thing that stands between us and the end.”

“It’s more complicated than that.”

“I could go in and talk to them,” offered Ronaldo.

“They can enter our bodies, right?”

“Yes,” chimed in Marilyn in her earpiece. “They entered Georges by a single, tiny skin contact. The balls worked the same on earth to whomever they contacted.”

“I got it. You three, just put your hand like this.” Sophie formed a cup with her extended hand. Then, “Hey, guys, here!” There was a false naivety to her words. One moment a twelve-year-old girl spoke like a clueless child, the next, another Sophie spoke, one imbued with a more recondite understanding of the world.

Without the need for hesitation, the three men complied and extended a cupped hand. This situation was well beyond anything their brains could process. In a matter of seconds, three little clouds entered the room. They floated humbly to the three men and touched their skin. As the aliens took control of the bodies, the sand fell powerless in the host’s palms. This was a painful reminder to Ronaldo of Trent’s body back in San Francisco.

The expression on the face of the poor men changed once more. This time, the invaders were focused on Sophie. The three creatures immediately fell to their knees, their eyes locked to the floor holding their sand. There were millions of years of humility and fear built in each.

“Stop this,” Sophie said kindly.

They ignored her.

“Young princess,” said one.

The words were not what Sophie wanted to hear. “Sophie, just Sophie. Call me Sophie,” she insisted. Before they could react, she added, “Get all your race to see, this is important to them.” The Attractor was now speaking, “The Sixth Attraction must be seen and lived.” The creatures did not move. They knew others were listening.

There was wind which flickered her hair as in the distance the room began to fill with hundreds of thousands of sand creatures. The sand rolled in in an orderly fashion. Soon the small group stood like Moses parting the Holy Sea. Creatures shone and vibrated hundreds of feet in the air.

“Liam, this reminds me of the Capital city in the Purple,” she spoke to her invisible mentor.

“Sweet one, you are a blessing in simplicity. Life, thanks to you, matters.”

“What do you think,” she asked him.

“To quote the perfect human expression, this is way above my pay grade.”

There was wind, but slowly silence and tranquility returned. Sophie stood next to Ronaldo. Before them, three humans hosting Martians bowed their heads. They would not dare speak the first words.

“Thanks for the air and the beautiful ride down,” she began. “We need to talk.”

The man in the middle, without looking up, said, “We must apologize for touching your mind.”

“Raise your head. Look at me,” she said. The man was unable to find the strength, so she simply walked to him and grabbed his hand to help him up. The man was trembling. “What’s wrong?” she said rhetorically.

“You are a legend,” he said as he finally found the strength to look at her. The moment he saw her eyes, he flinched and looked down.

“Enough, I am not here for this crap. Respect me enough to have some self-worth. You are as important to the Multiverse as me, can’t you get that? Life, all life is equal.”

The three creatures knew Sophie desired them to stand and normally engage with her. They stood.

“Avatar,” said the other. “You are here to pass judgment on our world.”

“That’s stupid.” They recoiled.

“The Avatar unites us then judges.”

“No. I promise you, I will judge no one.”

“Then what is your purpose, gifted one?”

“It is hard to explain without talking about earth. You don’t know earth.”

“We now do. You helped us reunite with the lost ones and the two saviors from mercury. We cannot thank you enough. We welcomed the two humans which we know gave their human lives to rescue our stranded. The fact humans would gladly die for us forced us to reconsider our position and see the error of our ways. We read their stored human memories and uploaded the memories to our collective. Both men who helped us were the vilest humans. They each were genocidal maniacs, yet they saved our stranded. If the worse mankind has can be so kind, the others will be easy to manage. We are truly honored and touched deeply.”

“That will help.”

“They both had very broken minds, diseased.”

“Yet you took them in?”

“We have. Humans are extremely weak in understanding the mind. Our solitude forced us to control thoughts and be very creative with most problems of the mind. They have both been healed. They both are looking forward to finishing their lives in our collective. They . . .” he began and censured himself.

“What, say it.” The Attractor liked the frankness of the conversation.

“We find their humor and sarcasm very disturbing, but the Stranded do appear to enjoy their mindset. It’s a situation we will be happy to manage if the Avatar,” he corrected himself, “Sophie will allow us to live.”

“Good. What is my role? Simple really. To tie a bow around a holiday gift, there is a need for a knot. I am the knot. I hold things together and create a strong flat cable able to hold a box. I can connect with a higher dimensional being.”

The second creature spoke, “Sophie, our prophecy is clear. Shall we read it to you?”

“No, I don’t care about that. Liam does, but there is no time. Prophecy manipulates, I am tired of being manipulated.” She hesitated. “Tell you what, can you send it to the human called Emilio Sanchez, can you do that?”

“The creature you call Marilyn controls all modes of communication.”

“Marilyn,” asked Sophie.

“Yes, I am here,” she heard in her ear.

“Can you promise to get this information to Emilio?”

“The man now has complete visions. He could read these lines even if I tried to prevent it.”

“You really don’t know how to answer a question.”

Marilyn laughed, “Yes, I will give him.”

“You are talking to the destructor of worlds, the one you call Marilyn.”

“I guess. As for destroying worlds, I heard you were planning to destroy earth. So frankly, who is talking?”

There was surprise on the expression of the creatures. “What do you need, Sophie?”

“Why do you fear Marilyn?”

The third creature spoke from memory, “All life, irrespective of its form, is bound by the law of capacity. Life evolves and grows but must remain humble. Violation of the rule of capacity place the Universe in peril. The collective you call Marilyn not only violates the law, but it also obliterates it. She will destroy the Universe.”

“What do you mean?”

“Now that we have information about your world, we can offer an analogy. Your life has cancer. In some instances, a cell of your bodies decides to improve, often evolve for the benefit of the cell. The cell then proceeds to destroy the host body. Some of your most violent viruses also destroy their host. Marilyn is a creature that has evolved into something that will destroy the Multiverse. She is a virus, a cancer. You must destroy her, or she will destroy this Universe. She is the root of you and your father’s predicament.”

“How is that possible?” asked Sophie.

“Young one. We do not want to set you up, but you should know the truth.”

“What do you mean?”

“We cannot speak, or we will do the bidding of the evil one. She listens.”

“Tell me?”

“Sophie,” said the voice of Liam. “May I ask a moment of your time.”

“Now?”

“If you value me, yes.”

Sophie was clearly annoyed, but Liam had never asked her for a moment in quite this way, his voice was broadcasted. “I checked, and it is statistically impossible for the series of events which happened to your family to happen that day. These events were,” it pained Liam to say the last word, “premeditated. Your car accident was orchestrated. I fear Marilyn was behind it.”

He expected Sophie’s eyes to turn to cinder. He waited for the Attractor to explode; instead, Sophie simply answered, “I know. She was young, stupid. She did not mean to leave him a cripple. That is my fault.”

Liam and the Martians were almost as shocked as the digital creature in their ear.

Marilyn, alone in the darkness of her digital world, began to weep.

“You know?” said the voice of the digital creature.

“Of course. We all have moments of weakness. Human professors would have short live spans if their students had the power of life and death over them. The Multiverse told me.” Sophie turned her attention to a small camera. She grabbed it off of the air. Can you guys broadcast Marilyn on a wall, I want to speak with her.

Inside the room, the sand moved away from a wall. On it was a broadcast from above. On the images appeared images of Marilyn. She was sitting in a large chair, a tissue in hand wiping genuine tears of grief.

“Marilyn,” she spoke.

“Yes, dear one.”

“Are they right, should I destroy you?”

“Yes. Sadly you can’t anymore. The martians are right, my power has passed any point of return. Even with the powers you now hold, nothing you can do will change the future. Trust me, I wish it were so. You cannot destroy me, I can’t.”

“What?” said Liam in her head.

“I apologize, Sophie. You do not deserve any of this,” said Marilyn. “The world ends in two days. The game is designed to give you the power to destroy me. The game will explain it all.”

The martians were shocked by the turn of events. Those on earth were equally shocked. Sophie smiled, “Just run the best finale you can. Make sure my father enjoys his last days.”

“Will the world end?” asked Marilyn.

“I don’t know. I can’t decide. I frankly think your humility is touching. Now let’s enjoy the show and see what happens. We made peace and new friends today.”

“Do you need us to halt the destruction of earth, Attractor?”

Sophie’s words shocked everyone.

“No, I fear it needs to go.”