Serenity turned to Tek. “You’re the god of technology?”

Tek held an absolutely enormous wrench. Serenity had no idea where she got it, but she held it as though it didn’t have any real weight. “Yep. More a concept really, but a lot of people do basically worship, so it’s not that different. I’m pretty strong here on Earth, but without Earth I’m nothing. So! Will you be my Champion? You can only be Champion for one god, and Rhea already has one. We tried to get other gods here so you’d get a choice but they said No. I’m not sure why the War gods said you weren’t theirs but they did.”

Did she ever stop for a breath?

“So what do you say? Will you?” Tek leaned the wrench against a chair then had to catch it as the chair started sliding across the floor. It was an overstuffed armchair, so Serenity knew the wrench had to be heavy. How did that even work?

Rhea’s voice stopped Serenity from answering the reflexive No that he’d almost said. “Whatever you say, Serenity, Earth will always be a home to you. And do have a cookie, they’re quite good. I’m afraid I don’t have time to chat, but I will see the two of you around, as usual.” Rhea waved at Serenity as she walked out the door.

There was a platter of cookies sitting on the chair next to him.

Oatmeal peanut butter chocolate chip.

Rhea was right, they were good.

The cookies didn’t help with the question from Tek. “Your Champion? What does that mean?” Serenity wasn’t interested; he didn’t trust the gods, and he didn’t know Tek at all. Technology wasn’t inherently good, after all; it was simply a tool.

Tek didn’t answer immediately. Instead, she plopped into one of the chairs.

She reminded Serenity of Echo, somehow. Perhaps it was simply that they were both energetically expressive young women? Tek did seem quite young, both younger and older than Echo. Echo seemed surprisingly old, sometimes.

“I’m not sure. I’ve never had one before. I think it’s just that I can talk to you and sometimes give you gifts when you do stuff I ask you to?”

Serenity nodded. More or less what he’d assumed. “I think I’ll say no, then. You can still ask, but I don’t want to be bound to do things I don’t want to do. I’ll still work to save Earth, but I’ll do it my way.”

“You don’t want rewards?” Tek started laughing. After a moment, she shook her head. “Now I know why Coyote was here.”

Tek bounced out of her seat and hurried over to one of the piles of stuff on the floor. She searched through it, then looked up at Serenity. “You know electronics, right?”

Serenity blinked. “I was - I am a network engineer, if that’s what you mean.” He’d dabbled a bit in robotics in college, too, but that was long enough ago that it probably didn’t count.

“Oh, even better.” Tek dropped what she was holding and hurried over to another pile.

Serenity was worried about what Tek was up to. He’d turned her down, why did she seem happy about it?

“Ah hah, perfect!” Tek held up a … cube? No, it wasn’t a cube; it was about an inch long but only half an inch on the other two sides. Serenity couldn’t tell what it was.

“Here you go! Just hold it to the back of your neck if you ever want to use it. It doesn’t count as a gift ‘cause it’s got some pretty big downsides, but I’m sure you’ll figure it out. It has to be what Coyote was hinting at, it probably counts as a curse, so it won’t make you stand out and let that door breaker guy find you so easily. It’s perfect for you.” Tek held the thing out to Serenity.

“What is it?” Serenity didn’t put his hand out. He didn’t want to touch it until he knew what it was.

“Didn’t I say?” Tek looked down at the rectangle then back up at Serenity. “I was trying to make a direct neural interface. And it does that, but… it does it with everything that’s nearby. Everything. So it’s kind of overwhelming. It’s supposed to be implanted, but you don’t need that, it can just meld with your-” Tek stopped.

“Come to think of it, you might have to remove the skin first, I’m not sure. Yeah, I think you’d have to. That’d probably hurt, and you don’t want that much of an injury, that’d be hard to handle out wherever. No, wait, I can fix that!” Tek disappeared through the other door

Serenity watched her go then decided to see if he could leave himself. Everyone else seemed to just come and go, maybe he could? He wasn’t entirely certain he wanted Tek’s gift. She was enthusiastic, and that was more terrifying than reassuring when she wanted to give him a malfunctioning direct neural interface device, whether or not she was “sure he could figure it out” and it was “perfect” for him.

He was glad he’d turned her offer down. He really didn’t want to end up being her guinea pig for whatever new devices she came up with.

Even if he had always wanted to be able to control computers with his brain.

Bad Serenity. No being tempted by the god of technology.

He wasn’t sure if he was more concerned because he was afraid he’d say yes or because he thought her devices were probably as dangerous as they were useful. It was probably the combination of the two that was scary.

Past the ruined door still looked like emptiness, but now that he was standing at it, he could tell there was a large object in the far distance. Whatever it was, he was sure he was only detecting it because there wasn’t anything at all between him and it.

Serenity looked for the ground outside the door and there simply wasn’t any. He couldn’t bring himself to actually step outside.

When Serenity turned around, Tek was standing next to him. “It’s a great view, isn’t it? I love looking at Luna. Not as pretty as Earth, but still beautiful. One day there will be cities there. I’ve started sketching out some plans. They’ll start underground first, underground is a lot easier than dome cities and solves most of the same problems. That’s still years away, though, and I’m pretty sure it’ll be delayed by the invasions, though magic should help. Hey, you understand magic; I want to figure out how to make it work with my tech, do you think you can help?”

Serenity blinked. “We’re really in space? No, that doesn’t matter. What matters is - can you send me home? And do you know where Raz and Katya are? They were supposed to be right behind me.”

“Yeah, but I need to show you how this thing works first, I fixed the application problem. All you have to do is put any of the long sides against your spine - I recommend near the top, that should be more comfortable - up here maybe?” Serenity felt Tek’s hand against the back of his neck for a moment.

When he turned to her, she smiled widely. “Coyote would growl at me for not putting it on you, but that’s not who I am. Here. It’s your choice.” Serenity felt the cool rectangular object in his hand - a hand he hadn’t held out to take it.

[Technology Affinity initiated]

“If you do use it, would you be willing to come back and run some tests for me? You’re not exactly the target population, but you’re close and all since you’re blind and that’s one of the things I’m hoping to fix. Plus, it’ll probably find lots of use in people who aren’t human anyway, once I can get it to limit the signal intake.”

Did Tek ever stop talking?

“I’ve been debating making a purely wired interface, but who really wants a wire coming out of their neck? No, wireless is better. Maybe a limiter on what it can communicate with, but then that would have to be made to transmit. Or I’d have to design some kind of handshake, and that defeats the point. Or maybe not? Maybe it depends on what you’re using it for? Maybe I should try both ways.” While Tek talked, she’d wandered over to another pile and seemed to be working on something small. Serenity couldn’t tell what she was working on.

No, she clearly didn’t ever stop talking.

Serenity looked down at the device in his hand. A neural interface, and that small? How was that possible? He could feel some texture to the surface, even though he couldn’t see it.

Serenity didn’t feel any pull to eat it, which was good. If it had smelled good, Serenity was certain he’d have already eaten it. Did that mean it wasn’t safe to use?

No, it probably didn’t mean anything either way. It just meant that his body didn’t recognize it as food. Well, technology usually wasn’t. Other than many medicines and maybe some plants, anyway.

Serenity looked over at Tek and listened for a moment. She was still talking - something about how she’d managed to reinforce the windows on her space station and how they “weren’t really glass”, but she’d wanted something that acted like glass and could be used in large sections.

Serenity stopped paying attention. He couldn’t see out the “window-walls” anyway.

His attention went back to the device in his hand. If he was going to even consider using it, there was a question he had to have answered. He was a mage. “Tek? How does this thing interact with magic?”

Tek looked up. “I don’t know. I don’t have any personal magic, at least not that I know of, so I haven’t been able to do any tests. Are you going to?”

It was hard to turn down a new ability, especially when the downside is “you’ll have to learn to use it”. He was sure it’d be rough, but rough hadn’t stopped him before. If it interfered with magic, though, it wouldn’t be worth it. “Yes. Yes, I should check it out.”

He did have the Technology affinity now, after all. It’d be interesting to see what that could tell him about the device.

Reaching out with his Technology affinity didn’t quite feel like his other Affinities. They were all different, of course, but Technology felt both more rigid and more flexible at the same time. Serenity was surrounded by technology; almost anything man-made or even man-shaped fell into it, including the armor he wore. Serenity was surrounded by technology.

He directed his attention at the device and spread Technology-tinged mana across it to feel it. It was a thing of metal and silicon, entirely mechanical yet there was something familiar about it. The metal pattern in the silicon felt a lot like a rune.

It wasn’t See and it wasn’t Hear and it wasn’t Know, but it took a piece of each of them. It was closer to Connect, perhaps?

Yet something about it still didn’t look like a rune. Serenity tugged on his Technology affinity and spun some Essence into the device instead of the mana. Suddenly, it wasn’t a rune at all. It was an antenna and the supporting electronics, designed to interpret the signals of other electronics.

It was interesting how different the same thing looked with mana and essence, while still clearly serving the same purpose. What would happen if he used both?

Serenity wound mana and essence around each other and pushed them into the device with his Technology. All he could see now was the Intent of the device. It was to Connect. He’d been right about the primary rune.

The Intent was to Connect.

Suddenly, Serenity’s mind was overwhelmed with random noise. He could hear the watch Tek wore tell the time. He could hear his axe ask for magic to eat and feel his armor wait to protect. He could sense each device Tek wore, and there were many.

All at once.