He flew in a straight line from Brixity for an hour, heading Northwest, approximate to the sun’s path, carefully avoiding the three towns he spotted. He didn’t get close enough to see the details, but none of them had the same reddish hue to the buildings, so he had to wonder if the largely brick construction was unique to Brixity, and what the cultural or economic factors were to cause that.
He came to a stop when he saw the sudden sharp cut off of the environment just a few miles away. The golden grasses and sparse wiry trees of the savannah immediately gave way to fields of deep purple grasses. Within a mile of the ruler-straight divide, a massive clump of trees as thick and tall as skyscrapers, with grey trunks and deep blue leaves, stuck out from the ground like an island of woods among the purple fields. Other clumps could be seen farther off, several of them widely separated, but standing like city-block sized monoliths among the planes.
An alien biome he didn’t recognize. He decided he wasn’t going to risk it until he had a few things ironed out first. He parked the Sky Shark a mile up and let it hover there as he let go of the console. First things first. He went to the chest and pulled out the magic hat.
The thing sagged in his hand, truly rumpled to hell, but there were no tears or frays over any of it, no cracks of the leather. He wondered if maybe he’d been wrong in his assumption, but no, there was a feeling deep in his gut as he stared at the thing that he knew this was a character of his. He knew it with the certainty that he knew he was the Author’s Avatar. And, he presumed, that fact came a certain intuition of recognizing his characters when he saw them.
“Dogoro?” he said. He shook the hat a bit. “Hey. Wake up!”
Nothing happened.
He put the hat on his head and gave it a few moments, then said, “Hey! Dogoro! Awaken Sesame!” He tugged the brim up and down, then gave it a light smack. “Oy! Nap time’s over, old man!”
Nothing.
Sharkerbob let out a puff of air as he went over to his bed and sat on the edge of it, taking the hat off and holding it in his hands. “Come on, help me out here.” He sat and stared at the supposed-to-be-living hat, willing it to suddenly spring to life. But nothing happened even after several minutes of intense mental insistence.
Sharkerbob shook his head, frowning in thought. “Great. So, what’s become of you here? Are you dead? Did you literally lose your mind? Or are you in some kind of coma?” He got back up and went to the workstation chamber in the starboard wing, setting Dogoro gently on top of one of the Stasis Chests. He tried to remember how exactly Dogoro was supposed to have initially been “activated”, for lack of a better word.
Dogoro the Hat had once been a vastly powerful wizard, his name feared and revered across an entire continent, and spoken of in legend for centuries after his passing. But that had been in another age, on a world now forgotten to time. In that distant past, Dogoro had met his end in a terrible battle, but somehow, before he’d died, he had transferred his consciousness, and a great amount of his raw magical energy, into his own hat, which had functioned as a powerful grimoire. Presumably, he’d managed to transfer his soul into the magical headpiece, binding himself to the grimoire in a last ditch effort to save himself from death. The more harrowing possibility was that the Hat still was just a grimoire, and it had simply imprinted Dogoro’s personality onto its interface at some point, or Dogoro had deliberately used a spell of simulation to program it thusly. Dogoro the Hat couldn’t quite remember which, nor did he care to fret over the semantics of it.
In either case, his next memory after that final battle was of waking up in a crumbling ruin as another of Sharkerbob’s adventure characters, Sustra, was plundering it. He and Sustra became instant partners that day, Dogoro aiding her ever since.
So, the supplemental question here was where was Sustra? Sharkerbob remembered that, perhaps not-coincidentally, the initial storyline where Sustra first met Dogoro had been set in the Endless Frontier, so he wasn’t surprised either of them would already be here. But why weren’t they together? Was this Dogoro from before he met her? Or had something happened to separate the two?
Sharkerbob knew the basics of the Endless Frontier’s gimmick, of course, a reality where millions of worlds had been stitched together. But aside from not knowing where precisely any given World Shard was, he also realized he didn’t know how old the Frontier was supposed to be right now. Most versions of the story he’d made featured it being only a decade or two old at most, just enough time for the civilizations within to have gotten settled, but also new enough that most of the dangers within the Shards were still unpredictable and unknown to most of the inhabitants. A reality of truly endless adventure potential.
He regretted he hadn’t been able to really take his time in Brixity, perhaps make some more local contacts, learn more about the history of the place, and what they might know about the Frontier. Perhaps with the Bookseller could have pointed him to the right resources to research some history on it.
Thinking about her, he had to wonder if the Migree were going to end up wrapped up in his life later on, whether by way of being the only people he could go to for help, or coincidental circumstances forcing them to cross paths. If this were a planned out fantasy novel, then already, the seeds would be in place that he was likely going to encounter the Bookseller, the Old Relic Tinkerer, the Condor Man, the Blindfold Woman, and even the Invisible Electric Thryth Man again in some capacity within the next week or month, either as adversaries or allies on some quest or side story. Hey, maybe he’d actually learn any of their names in the process!
But maybe not. How much of his life’s path was actively being bent by narrative forces, versus how much of it was the Author just completely pulling random shit out of his ass as he wrote off the cuff? He suspected very little planning was going into all of this, if any at all. Knowing how he used to write, overplanning just lead to flaming out before the first chapters could get written. But by the same token, fully improvising off the cuff often meant running out of novel ideas and fizzling out just a few chapters in.
Was that his ultimate fate? To get three episodes in, and then left to his own devices in perpetuity? He supposed, ultimately, that was probably for the best. The implications of the narrative mechanics here were that, if the Author decided to drop this series, then his Avatar really would be free to do whatever he wanted, until his story got picked back up again. Even if all he wanted was to settle down and live a life of leisure, avoiding all trouble. Which, of course, would make for a boring as hell story.
Then again, there were such a thing as slice-of-life fantasy series, about people just doing their daily routines and getting up to the occasional mundane shenanigan. Maybe all Sharkerbob had to do was wake up Dogoro and they’d go find a cozy English speaking city and become librarians at a magic book keep.
He glanced over to the hat. If he could wake up Dogoro. Something else he wished he could have stuck around Brixity for, to find some help in that. But then again, if Old Jaim, who seemed to be a seasoned Relicsmith, hadn’t been able to figure the thing out, and any of the previous owners hadn’t, Sharkerbob wasn’t sure what he could do.
Find some way to shock it with magic energy? Try and find a psychic to nudge the consciousness awake? Find another actual wizard to try and wake it up, and be trusted not to just steal the thing for their own Relic stash? Find a supercomputer that could interface with magic and analyze the problem? For all Sharkerbob even knew, the hat could just be the grimoire it had originally been, in which case, no amount of cajoling was going to “wake it up”. Hell, it was possible this thing was even a non-living replica. Deep in his bones, he felt that couldn’t possibly be the case, that this was absolutely the real deal, but he didn’t want to just assume this intuition was totally fool-proof.
Alright, think again. What was the circumstances Sustra had found him in? In their initial encounter, Sustra had discovered the hat buried in the catacomb levels of a ruined castle. She’d taken the hat, and as she held it, the thing had sputtered to life, demanding to know who she was and what was going on. Sustra had taken him the surface of the ruin, and Dogoro hadn’t been able to tell if the castle was even his, though he had confirmed he’d lived in one at some point. He had also been shocked to learn of the Endless Frontier, implying he’d been buried in the castle before his World Shard had joined the plane.
And that was it. They started traveling together from there. What precisely was it about those circumstances that could have triggered something? Sustra knew magic, but she hadn’t used it to wake him up. He’d only woken up after she’d held him for a minute.
Sharkerbob wracked his brains. See, this was one of those situations where he hadn’t cared about the details, because that had not even been a fleshed out story idea, that had just been backstory for the pair, and thus glossed over. A lot of his characters had backstories, summaries of adventures past, but no actual fully written stories they had participated in yet. And so many of his adventures were just these seasoned travelers who had vaguely done pretty much all the generic things you’d think a fantasy adventurer would do. Such “filler episode” content had always been too difficult for him to write, despite how easy it should have been. Some fundamental aspect of generic adventure tales, be they fantasy warriors or superheroes, was too boring and predictable for him to sink his creative teeth into. And so, he ended up with backlogs of dozens of wandering hero concepts, who had each supposedly done hundreds of great deeds over their careers, and not a single short story to show for it.
Sustra and Dogoro were among those number, and it was only their being slightly more creative conceptually than his previous such characters that had gotten them to stick in his mind. At least enough for him to draw them a few times, and write a few small stories featuring them. In fact, had he actually managed to write the full story of SalQuest, Sustra and Dogoro would have been part of “his” companion crew to help him on his journey. Tragic as that might have turned out.
Sharkerbob blinked. Was that why he’d even found Dogoro in the first place? Was the Author lining things up to salvage some of the ideas of his lost and canceled epic? God, he hoped not. Sharkerbob was well and truly fed up with being chronically miserable.
Well, okay, he was pretty sure he’d stumble upon some good old fashioned misery again sooner or later, but he prayed it would not be the kind that would result in the seething cataclysm SalQuest had been set to devolved into.
He frowned at Dogoro, shaking his head to clear the churning thoughts. Ruminating on would-haves and should-haves and could-haves and never-wases wasn’t helping the situation. Getting lost in the minutiae of his writing history, or lack thereof, served only to distract him from actually figuring out the real problem before him.
The problem was he just didn’t have any options, really. Kicked out of Brixity, he couldn’t rely on them for resources. He was essentially banned from the surrounding Migree settlements, so he couldn’t try camping down near one for a while to ease into their good graces. Even if he did intend to just enter one for help, he wouldn’t know where to start looking, and had no idea if wandering around another town would trigger the Troubleshooters to deal with him more strictly. He wasn’t ready to piss them off without even some leverage to keep things civil.
Meanwhile, there was nothing in or about the Sky Shark that would help him in this situation. It only had the most practical of appliances for basic living. There was nothing fantastically magical he had access to. He hadn’t even learned any spells of his own yet.
He paused. Sustra hadn’t used magic to revive Dogoro in their story. He remembered that much. Dogoro had just woken up when she’d held him. So what was it about Sustra that could have triggered that? She was magical yes, but what else?
Welll, Sustra had been a Beast Demigoddess. Originally an ordinary skunk on Earth, when her world came under attack from an incursion of apocalyptic monsters, she was among hundreds of mortals chosen by the Higher Beings to be elevated into a demigod champion. In the case of animals like herself, she was selected by the Beast Gods, given humanoid form and blessed with general “were creature” powers, as well as superhuman physical capabilities, capable of growing her powers until she could potentially ascend to minor godhood herself.
In the end, however, other heroes beat her and her team to the punch on that, winning the God Trials and Ascending to face off against Nemesis, the Dark Star whom had brought the Apocalypse to Earth. In the aftermath of their great battle, all the chosen champions who had failed their God Trials, or who like Sustra’s team had not even made it to them, were left to mop up the remains of the monster infestations. Once that was done, the lesser champions were destined to remain mortal and fade into obscurity. Sustra, with nothing left to give her life a higher purpose, had used one of the Bleed Spaces, the dimensional tears the monsters had been entering from, to leave Earth for the wider Multiverse. Since then, she had traveled in search of new discoveries, hoping to perhaps find another heroic purpose. In some versions of that origin, she had ended up in the Endless Frontier rather than the Multiverse.
Okay, so, what about that explained anything? Gods, this is why just pantsing through his stories just ended up smacking hard into dead ends!
He paused. “Gods”. Sustra had been a demigod. Was that it? Was that the difference? It wasn’t just magic, Dogoro had to be awakened by someone with a certain type of divine insight?
Sharkerbob scowled and ran his fingers through his hair. No. No, honestly, there hadn’t been a reason any more complicated than that Sustra was simply the first person to stumble upon him. If it had been another character, he would have woken up to them, too, as the plot would have demanded.
And yet, what else did he have to work with right now? He had to assume other Relics and Magic hadn’t done the trick for Old Jaim and whoever else got ahold of the hat. He paused and turned Dogoro over in his hands. It was as good a lead as any he had right now. Okay, so what, then? Find a demigod and get them to wear the hat?
He paused. Well, he was a demigod now, right? Barely one, but according to Tabitha, he technically qualified now, as the trace of ichor in his blood restored his body into its prime. He paused and looked at the hat, then glanced at his own hand. Dogoro hadn’t reacted to him, demigod status or no. But maybe a touch of that ichor could do something for him.
Sharkerbob got up and walked around the base to see if there was anything sharp he could use. Among the things the Sky Shark had definitively lacked, cutlery and dishware was among them. Another thing he could have tried to get from Brixity if he could have stayed long enough to find some odd jobs for cash. His food he’d simply had to eat with his hands, even the cooked fish. Thankfully, his healing factor had easily compensated for having to hold burning hot meat.
He went to the Stasis Chest, and put his hand on part of the metal frame. It wasn’t really that sharp, the corners rounded off. He glanced over the dent the Blindfolded Woman had made earlier. No part of the indent was overly sharp there, either. He wasn’t even sure how he was going to fix that, or if doing so would just cause more damage. The Loom didn’t have anything especially sharp in it, either. As he checked everything over, he found himself somewhat astonished at how smooth and safety-minded everything suddenly seemed. He managed to feel appreciative, yet somehow slightly insulted at the same time.
Finally, he had to resort to the old tried and true: chew the absolute fuck out of one of his fingernails until he’d peeled enough away to force some blood to seep out. His healing factor fought him the whole time, closing up the shredded quick before a drop could escape, until finally he got so fed up, he did one final rip at the nail and quickly smashed the still-healing finger against the metal edge of the Chest.
He grit his teeth at the pain, pretty sure he might have even cracked something, but already, the finger was healing itself at speed. He managed to get a few drops of blood out, which he promptly pressed into the material of the hat.
He waited a few moments, feeling stupider by the second, as the blood soaked into the old leather, to no apparent effect. Just when he was about to give up and return the hat to one of the chests, he thought he felt the thing shiver.
Suddenly, the hat was wriggling in his hands, threads of glowing light spreading like bioluminescent veins from the spot where Sharkerbob’s blood had soaked in. The folds on the front of the hat’s stocking began to contort and twist until the distinct impression of a face warped into view.
And then, Sharkerbob was blow off his feet as a burst of golden light and gale-force wind exploded from the hat! A booming voice shuddered through the Sky Shark as Sharkerbob skidded across the floor. “You’re not taking me down that easily, you pompous leech! I—uh—what? Where is—?”
The rushing wind and blinding light faded. Dogoro hovered in the air for a moment, tottering slightly in the air, before flopping down onto the floor. Sharkerbob rubbed his eyes and shook his head, trying to shake off the flashbang effect of Dogoro’s outburst.
The living magic hat, meanwhile, wriggled its face in a full circle, the upper part of the stocking swinging to the opposite side like a pony tail. The hat noticed Sharkerbob blinking at him, and his brim wriggled. Shuffling like a quick snail, Dogoro scuttled himself over to the man.
“You there! What is this place and how did I get here?”
Sharkerbob put a hand up. “Calm down, man. I just, uh… well, rescued is laying it on a bit thick, but I found you in some magic shop, knocked out or something. I just woke you up.”
“Oh. I see.” Dogoro flapped his brim, and with a puff of air, he leapt up, staying aloft on a little haze of mystical light. He turned around again, swinging back and forth as he took in the view from the Sky Shark’s all-around window. “Hell’s bells! What World Shard is this?”
“I’m not entirely sure,” said Sharkerbob. “I’m pretty new here myself.”
“Hrmph! Just my luck!” Dogoro turned to face Sharkerbob. “And you say you found me in some shop?”
“Yeah. Relic shop. Apparently, you’d been there a while. Do you know how you got there?”
“Not a clue!”
“Yeah, I figured,” said Sharkerbob. He almost held out a hand out of habit, but realized Dogoro wouldn’t be able to shake it. “Um, listen. I recognized you when I saw you, you’re Dogoro, right?”
“Yes, yes, that’s me.” He turned and floated towards the central chamber, turning to inspect the other wings.
Sharkerbob frowned and followed. “Okay, so, I know you, but you probably wouldn’t know me. My name is Sharkerbob.”
Dogoro quickly floated to and fro between the two wings, not looking at him. “Yes, I remember you. I’m not that forgetful. Although I did notice you’re wearing pants now. Times must have changed considerably.”
Sharkerbob blinked. “What?”
Dogoro suddenly flew right up to him. “Sharkerbob, the Pants-Fu warrior, right?” He tilted his gaze downwards a bit. “Hmm. Didn’t you also have a belt of swords?”
Sharkerbob paused for a long moment, his brow furrowed, trying to figure out what he meant. Then he smacked his forehead as it clicked. “Oh my god! I completely forgot about that!”
“Hmm?”
Sharkerbob made little handwave to the side. “That wasn’t me. It was a… it’s a long story. But I’m a different Sharkerbob. That guy was… let’s just say he was me from an alternate timeline.”
“Oh. Fine.” Dogoro spun around again, the crinkles contorting into a worried expression. He floated to the edges of the windows in the forward chamber, peering through them intently.
Sharkerbob watched him with a mixture of trepidation and annoyance that the living Relic he’d just freed from a coma was so quick to dismiss him. But then again, maybe the magic hat had good cause to prioritize something else. He cleared his throat. “So, uh, Dogoro, I’m guessing you were fighting someone? What happened? Where’s Sustra?”
“That’s what I’m trying to find out!” the floating hat said, worry creeping into his voice. “We were attacked by some kind of vampire creature, a horrible goblin bitch that drank magic like blood, and magic blood like blood.” He zipped up to Sharkerbob again, who jerked back a step. “How long was I out?”
Sharkerbob shook his head, giving him a concerned frown. “I don’t know, man. I wasn’t able to find out anything. I don’t even know how long the Endless Frontier has been around. I found you before I was able to do any research, and I didn’t really a chance to ask the guy who had you anything.”
“Hrmph!” Dogoro did another spin around the ship, pressing himself against the glass like a kid smooshing their face against a candy display. “God’s be damned!” he said when he’d done another full circuit, punctuating the curse by smacking himself against the forward window. He flew over to the bed and plopped himself down upon it, wriggling a bit to situate himself into a seething scowl.
“Um…” Sharkerbob said. “Listen, my vessel here can fly. I can help you look for her.”
“If we don’t know where we are, and we don’t know how long it’s been since I lost contact with her, then I haven’t a clue where to even start looking. The Endless Frontier is as good as its name! I should be able to sense her, even from hundreds of miles away. But that is barely a spec of the distance she could be, and if we don’t even know what direction to go, we could easily just increase the distance looking. And if it’s been truly long enough, the connection could have faded to where I might not even be able to sense her, even if she were close.” He sagged into himself, half-flattening against the mattress. “Ah, poor, poor girl. All she wanted was to save a world. I hope she was at least able to save herself this time.”
Sharkerbob wasn’t sure what to say to that other than, “I’m sorry.”
Dogoro was silent for a moment, then said, “Hrmph. I’m not totally out of options, I suppose. I can keep trying to scan for her. There are divination spells I can utilize. Let me ponder it.” He flattened a bit more, going fully limp.
“Okay,” said Sharkerbob. “I’ll just, um, putter around, I guess.”
***
The rest of the day passed. Sharkerbob busied himself with catching and cooking some fish, doing his after-meal business, showering, and then looking at the picture book of alien animals for a bit, before noticing the sun was going down. This World Shard at least had a day-night cycle similar to Earth’s, which was not always the case across the various Shards.
He went up to Dogoro and poked him. “Excuse me. You still with me?”
Dogoro uncrumpled himself enough to tilt the face part of his stocking top towards him. “Yes. What is it?”
Sharkerbob hooked a thumb towards the windows. “Night time. You’re on my bed.”
“Oh.”
“Here.” Sharkerbob slid his hands under Dogoro, who allowed him to lift him up. He set the hat on top of one of the Stasis Chests. “Sorry I don’t have more comfortable accommodations.”
“I hardly need much. I shall endeavor not to wake you as I meditate.”
“Okay. Um. Goodnight.”
“Hrmph.” Dogoro was already sagged back into his resting state.
Sharkerbob slid onto the mattress, not bothering to undress or pull the sheet over himself yet. He didn’t seem to need that much sleep anymore anyway, three or four hours at most, but he’d gotten into a routine of going to bed early, if only to be ready in case some nocturnal threat decided to swarm his base in the wee-hours of the morning.
He hoped this wouldn’t be a day that would prove his caution right.
***
Two hours later, a booming shout slapped him straight out of sleep.
“HUZZAH! I’ve got it!”
Sharkerbob crashed out of his bed. “Got what?” he grumbled. “Your off switch?”
Dogoro burst off the Stasis Chest and zipped over to him, floating at his eye level. “No, you feckless flop! I was able to track down her location!”
Sharkerbob took a controlled breath to get his heartbeat under control, then got back up to sit on the bed. “That’s good! Pretty quick, too. Guess we’re not that far away?”
“Three hundred seventy-five thousand miles east-by-north-east!” he said. “Let’s go!”
Sharkerbob blinked. “Three hun—how did you even locate her from that distance?”
“Called in a few favors in the Diviner Network. Barely managed it even then, but once a trace was established, we were able to pin-point her.”
“Diviner Network?”
“Yes, yes, Diviners can help locate things, and there’s a whole network of them, a branch in every World Shard they can reach. It’s very useful, provided you know exactly who or what you’re looking for.”
“Okay,” said Sharkerbob. He got up and went to the console. “Well, to be honest, I haven’t stress tested this thing for speed, but the meter only goes up to 300 miles per hour. Plus, well, now that I think about it, I don’t even know how it’s powered. If I just fly in a straight continuous shot, I might deplete the batteries or whatever well before I get there.”
“Hrmph! What kind of Relic-user doesn’t know the basics of his own devices?”
“You’d be surprised,” Sharkerbob muttered. “But this thing was built for living in as a mobile base you can park in the air. It’s much more a house boat than a space ship.”
“I can boost the capabilities of your vessel to get us there post-haste!”
“Well, true, I guess, but then what? Do we know what state she’s in?”
“Still imprisoned by that vampire, it seems like.” Dogoro ruffled himself in a huff of anger. “According to the Diviners, she’s been stuck in the thing’s keep for eighteen months.”
“How do they figure that?”
“They’re Diviners! It’s their job to figure such things out!”
“Okay, okay, jeez! So what do we do about the vampire?”
Dogoro scoffed. “Burst in and rescue my girl, then we book it out of there!”
Sharkerbob shook his head. “Dogoro, we’re going to need help! If the vampire can drink magic, she’ll probably just zap you and drain you again. Lord knows how you even escaped her in the first place, if Sustra got captured.”
“Pah! I wasn’t ready for the bitch before, but I can shield myself well enough if I go in prepared! I’m sure of it! Between your Pants-Fu and my superior spell-casting, we ought to be able to smash her down!”
Sharkerbob furrowed his brow. “Dogoro, I can’t.”
“What do you mean?”
“I’m not a fighter. At all.”
“What about your Pants-Fu? Or your Eight of the Way technique or whatever the hell your swords were for?”
“Way of the Eight Daggers. And I don’t know either of those styles! I told you, I’m not the same guy.”
“You said you’re a version of Sharkerbob! I could taste the ichor in your blood! Surely you have to have some kind of abilities!”
The demigod-by-the-barest-of-metrics gave him a helpless shrug. “I’m, uh, jeez, it’s a long story. But listen to me! The only thing I got going for me is basically just an accelerated healing ability. Otherwise, I’m just a normal person! I won’t be able to help you in a fight!”
“What kind of a Sharkerbob are you?!”
“The one who isn’t some super-powered knight errant!” He sighed. “Look, I want to help you! I do! You’re—” He paused, unsure of how to confess his true relationship to them.
“We’re what?”
“You’re important to me.”
The hat’s “eyefolds” quirked quizzically at him.
Sharkerbob shook his head. “It’s complicated, and like I said, a long story. I will help you how I can, but right now, that just means giving you a transport.”
“If that’s all you can do for me, then it’s best you just stay out of it,” said Dogoro. “You’ll just end up as a snack for her.” He paused and tilted himself to the side a bit in thought. “Although, I suppose I could use that as a distraction, while I freed Sustra.” Sharkerbob gave him a look of hurt wariness, and Dogoro glanced over to him. “Oh, don’t worry, we’d come back for you.”
Sharkerbob grimaced. “I don’t think I’d last very long as a distraction.”
“Yes, you seem the type to give in quick,” said Dogoro. “Fine then. I will handle this myself, if I must.” He turned and resolutely started flying towards the balcony door.
“Wait! If this vampire is powering herself on the blood of demigods, then you might not be able to beat her, even if you prep for it.”
Dogoro spun back to face him. “Hrmph! Mighty as my power is, I acknowledge your concerns. But I must rescue her as soon as possible!”
Sharkerbob held up a hand in calming gesture. “Then we need to find help! What about the Drifter Network? Does that reach out where we’re going?”
“Can you afford them?” asked Dogoro.
“Er… no.”
“Well, alchemical gold isn’t accepted for services, I’m not registered with the regional credit system, and most Drifters don’t just trade favors,” said Dogoro.
“You just cashed in some with the Diviners,” Sharkerbob pointed out.
Dogoro flapped part of his brim dismissively. “Wizard business. You wouldn’t understand.”
“If you say so. Do you have contacts with any superhero teams?”
“Pah! It’s been decades since superhero teams were allowed such free reign to go wherever they will, at least in this super cluster of World Shards. Any super powered beings operating in a given Region either do so under government order, or they are the government. Depending on the situation, no one is going to risk troops on some random rescue mission, not unless doing so had some political, military, or economic benefit for them. Otherwise, random groups of champions storming across borders could risk an inter-Shard incident. We’d have an easier time trying to trick Drifters into helping us with promises of loot we haven’t acquired yet!”
Sharkerbob sighed heavily. He hated faction war bullshit. “Great. Just great.” He turned and looked out the window, crossing his arms. He briefly considered flying back to Brixity to see if he could parlay with the Troubleshooters for some kind of help. Negotiate something, somehow, maybe offer to trade more of his appliance-Relics in exchange for some kind of combat-worthy resource. Hell, let the Troubleshooters even keep the Sky Shark if they helped him rescue Sustra. He was probably going to end up having to figure out a regular domicile at some point.
He shook his head. No, no, that was all panic-induced flailing. He was even less capable of a strategist or businessman than he was a fighter. Now was not the time to throw all his chips right into the bin on a desperate gamble.
“If you’re out of ideas, then I’m going to go,” said Dogoro. “I will not let her suffer any longer than necessary!”
“I can still get you there, at least,” said Sharkerbob. “And if you do rescue her, depending on the situation, you might need a getaway vehicle to escape on the quick.” He stepped back up to the console and activated it. “We can work out a better strategy on the way.”
“Hrmph. Fine.” Dogoro ruffled himself in mid-air, then flew over and dropped on top of the small console. His brim was suddenly alight with a white glow that whirled around the edge at speed, spinning faster as a pale aura surrounded him. The light funneled through the console like glowing lines of circuits, and the entire Sky Shark was suddenly lit up with similar effects, mystic lines running over the outer surface. The speedometer on the console went screwy for a second, the numbers spinning, until 3000 miles per hour registered.
“Best I can manage,” said Dogoro. “Faster than I could fly on my own, I’ll admit. Your vessel is quite easy to interface with. I can set the course and create an auto-pilot spell.”
“Is that going to be safe?” said Sharkerbob, thoughts of the Sky Shark accidentally slamming into a mountain or a giant flying creature or another vessel while he was asleep.
“Nothing is truly safe in the Endless Frontier!” said Dogoro with enthusiasm. “But combined with divination, the auto-pilot should be able to avoid the obvious dangers. In the meantime, I’m going to have my hands full maintaining this, so I leave you to think of something.”
“Okay,” said Sharkerbob. The Sky Shark suddenly shot several more miles up into the sky, and just as suddenly, bolted forward like a meteor. It was only then he realized that the vessel didn’t seem effected by the inertia of fast movement. He wasn’t sure if that was part of Dogoro’s spell, or if the Sky Shark had some kind of kinetic damper to keep everything inside from flying around. He hadn’t felt much resistance when he’d flown it himself, come to think.
With nothing else to do, and Dogoro going silent, he was left to spend the trip wracking his brains on how to pull off a more efficient rescue.
“Hey, Author,” he muttered towards the fourth wall. “This would be a great time for some narrative contrivance to come along, wouldn’t it?”
“Ugh, don’t even get me started on narrative contrivances!” came a female voice from the side.
Sharkerbob leaped out of his chair, getting into a semblance of a defensive stance in front of Dogoro and the console. He gawked as he saw who had spoken. A teenaged girl with long purple hair, wearing grey shirt and shorts, topped with a black hoodie styled like a certain dragon from a very familiar video game. She was glancing around the Sky Shark, an expression of dawning recognition crossing her face.
“Woah! Is this my old satellite base?” She looked to Sharkerbob and grinned, cocking a thumb to the side to indicate the Sky Shark. “See what I mean? Contrivances all over the… place…” Her expression shifted to confusion and even more dawning recognition. She gawked at him in disbelief. “Holy shit…”
“Bobbi?” said Sharkerbob.
The girl squinted at him to reassure herself of what she was seeing, then her eyes widened in shock. “Salvador?”
Dogoro popped up next to Sharkerbob, having halted the Sky Shark to address the intruder. “And who is this now?”
Sharkerbob glanced to him, then to Bobbi, then back to him. “Uh… she’s, uh… cripes how do I explain this?”
Bobbi beat him to it, pointing at him and loudly proclaiming. “You’re my Player!”
Dogoro cocked an eyefold at him. Sharkerbob gave another of his trademark sighs. “Don’t suppose you’ll be able to listen to my long story as we go?”
“You’re going to turn out to be a right pain in the arse, aren’t you?” huffed Dogoro.
“You don’t even have an arse,” said Bobbi, pointing at him.
“Zip it, you little gremlin!” Dogoro huffed with a flap of his brim. “We’re on an important mission here!”
“Oh yeah? To do what? Find the perfect hat rack?”
Sharkerbob held up a hand to cut off Dogoro’s response, and gave the girl a stern look. “Bobbi. Drop the sass for a minute. I’ll explain what I can, alright? But right now, we’re on our way to try and rescue someone.”
Bobbi pouted at him, opened her mouth to retort, but something in his expression got her to pause. She shrugged, made a sigh just like Sharkerbob, then plopped onto the edge of the bed. “Alright, then. Spill it. This can’t be much crazier than any of the other shit I’ve been through.”
“That reminds to be seen, little miss,” said Dogoro, reigning in his own sass. “I am Dogoro, by the way.”
“Oh, right, hi!” said Bobbi, popping up out of her seat. She made a bow. “I’m Bobbi, Miner and Crafter Extraordinaire! Technically Bobbi is short for Sharkerbob, but that name doesn’t really role off the tongue.”
Dogoro’s expression crumpled into a blanch. He turned to the other Sharkerbob standing next to him. “How many of you are there?”
Sharkerbob put his hands to his head. “Okay. Alright. This is going to sound absolutely ridiculous.”
“Hrmph. This is the Endless Frontier! Ridiculous is the standard around here.”
Sharkerbob couldn’t help but give a bemused smirk as he accepted the point. He looked to his two companions. “Okay, then get ready for a completely ordinary story with no absolutely no crazy twists or turns whatsoever.”
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