The Kriseel Temple

By Michael McCloskey

The Kriseel Temple is the 20th book in the PIT series.

The PIT team travels to a forbidden planet they believe was the Imperian homeworld and once a Trilisk seat of government. The team’s allies, the Embeez, have promised many answers to their questions about the Trilisks—if the team can survive long enough to uncover them.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Michael McCloskey
• Release date: Jul 19, 2023
• ISBN: 9780991052486

Michael McCloskey

I am a software engineer in Silicon Valley who dreams of otherworldly creatures, mysterious alien planets, and fantastic adventures. I am also an indie author with over 140K paid sales plus another 118K free downloads.

Book preview

The Kriseel Temple

(Book 20 of the PIT series)

by Michael McCloskey

Copyright 2023 Michael McCloskey

ISBN: 978-0991052486

Learn more about Michael McCloskey’s works at

www.squidlord.us

Cover art by Stephan Martiniere

Chapter 1

Telisa waited as the Synergy approached Blackhab. She had already prepared herself for departure, having put a stealth orb and breaker claw in her Veer suit and a laser pistol at her hip as concessions to eternal paranoia. The scientists might note her obvious weapon, but likely they would not be put off by such on a PIT team member; in fact many would expect it. Magnus in particular was famous for wearing a blade on his thigh and was expected to be in his Veer suit with numerous weapons at hand even in civilian areas.

I wonder how much of Momma Veer’s advertising budget goes to the mountains of free Veer suits they keep sending the various PIT teams.

She had several items on her agenda. The first was a solo stop at the column room. Though through sheer luck they did not have anyone to reconstitute this time, Telisa wanted to see if she could learn what Shiny had done to the team. She suspected that if tampering had occurred, the column would have a record of it, which meant maybe it could be undone.

"I’ve published a leave schedule. Two of us should be on Synergy on any given shift. Imanol and Adair, sorry, but you’re on the first watch."

Sounds like a wise precaution, Adair said enthusiastically.

Imanol sent only a nonverbal ack. Telisa interpreted that as false grumpitude. Historically, he had not cherished time at Blackhab. Telisa wondered if he simply found the Celarans to be much too cheerful, or if there was something else going on.

Their starship received on-station coordinates just a few kilometers from the Celaran base. Telisa strode into a shuttle bay to get started as soon as they came to rest relative to Blackhab. Though Synergy could dock directly with the massive station, it was much cleaner and easier to keep some distance between all the gravity spinners involved, especially for capital ships. Magnus climbed into the same shuttle without a word, though he knew she would be visiting the column room alone.

Three-sixty black and red, Magnus said.

What’s that? A code phrase?

The first of a series of one time codes I’ve sent you. See that ship? It’s another PIT team. So there may be another Magnus there, and this way, we can be sure who’s who.

Telisa smiled. Most likely she would be able to discern the other Magnus using a link discriminator. When Shiny had duplicated the teams early on, their duplicate links had extended their IDs so that the Core World government could track them separately—standard procedure for when criminals introduced illegal link copies into the system. If the PIT team members had not achieved such exalted status, they likely would have run into many problems, but as it was, various records and assets had automatically been duplicated to accommodate them. The system was not perfect, though, and could perhaps be hacked by certain parties such as Shiny.

You know, somewhere one of us probably has a house or a spaceport locker or something that works for all their duplicates, she said idly.

Magnus nodded. I guess none of us really care much about our old material possessions. Especially after we got used to having that AI on the Clacker.

Ah, the good old days, she said. But I think it has more to do with losing most of our personal stuff in various ship explosions.

Soon their shuttle was underway. Other team members got onto two other shuttles at a more leisurely pace behind them.

We don’t have to go, you know, Magnus said.

You mean, to the Imperian homeworld.

Right. I wonder what happens if we stop cooperating with the Embeez? Will they accept it? If not, that tells us something about them.

Telisa nodded and thought for a moment.

I suspect they’ll recruit other teams if they feel the need.

The tiny noises in the shuttle were loud to her sensitive host body senses. It maneuvered them toward the massive space habitat.

Is it that you don’t want to go, or more that you think we should negotiate more with the Embeez before doing their bidding?

I’ll go without complaint. Yes, it’s more about the Embeez and how they treat us.

Okay. Makes sense, Telisa said.

The shuttle pulled into a hangar of Blackhab. Telisa and Magnus left their shuttle and moved through the very familiar locks that brought them into the interior surface of the space habitat. Within, a night phase was just ending. A weak glow from the center of the interior started to rise, signaling the start of a new artificial day.

Magnus put his arm around her.

Don’t be a stranger, he said.

Never, she said, embracing him. Then they launched off the inner surface at the same moment, taking slightly different lines. They flew at an angle away from each other into the brightening sky, watching each other as the distance between them slowly grew. Finally Telisa looked away and landed on the nearest house, vaulting off of it on a course to the column chamber.

She did not worry about her problems while hopping from building to building within the interior spaces of the habitat. That was exactly what made it so enjoyable, she decided. Moving through Blackhab was a pure physical joy, one that took just enough conscious attention that one tended to focus only on the exertion and course calculations of each jump while more cerebral activity was set aside. Of course she could have left the course corrections to her attendants, but as Siobhan would say, what fun was that?

Telisa landed on the column building. She sent a message to Cynan to announce her intent to use the column. She walked slowly on the outside of the building for a few moments until receiving an all clear from the Cyleran. Then she hopped through a trap door with practiced ease and walked to the large chamber holding the ancient Trilisk artifact.

Telisa stood for a moment before the pillar. She missed Taishi’s cheerful guidance, but given what the dragon-bodied AI had done, it was probably best that her once-friend was gone.

She closed her eyes and imagined the pillar before her, thinking of the device as a vast repository of patterns of living beings. Very quickly, the image in her mind transformed from one she had imagined to one supplied from the outside. From the column.

Vague white objects in darkness clarified into bundles she knew represented entire beings. With a turn of thought, she selected her own bundles. Instantly, hundreds of bundles zipped off into darkness, leaving a straight line of dozens of white packets of energy.

There they are! My snapshots.

Telisa thought about Shiny. How had the bundles been changed by the Vovokan? The answer came into her mind’s eye: several bundles pulsed and glowed differently than the others. Telisa wanted time context: she got it.

The first changes were made a long time ago. If I go directly back, I lose my own natural changes since then. Grrrrr.

Telisa saw that the latest change had indeed been in the time frame of when Shiny’s last ambassador had arrived, while she had been out on mission. She took a new snapshot, then told the column she did not want the elements of Shiny’s latest artificial change, she wanted them edited out. She carefully distinguished that from going back to an old copy.

Fragments of the last snapshot moved aside, extracted from her pattern. Then she asked to become her new, less-altered self.

She felt nothing, but the images in her mind told her it was done.

Does that mean it could truly isolate and remove all tampering from the start? Or will it just... take its best shot?

Telisa felt a sudden nervousness. Dare she make more changes on the fly? The new her would be different... which version was the most ‘herself’? It could even be that if the changes could be fully analyzed and understood, the Telisa of the moment would prefer her current version, and other versions would prefer their own selves... which feeling would be right? What if her older self would prefer to live in a non-host body?

I need guidance. But who could provide it? The Embeez?

She decided to take an incremental approach. The older changes would have to remain for now.

Telisa opened her eyes and sighed.

At least I’ve learned something. The tampering is real. And I got rid of the latest one.

Telisa clung to the good news she had found: her original self still existed, untouched since the very first time she had been interred in a Trilisk column. Though how could she ever go back to that state after everything she had lived through?

Chapter 2

Marcant walked and jumped through a twisty Celaran building with Adair floating along beside him. His tiny friend had left behind its limbed body and instead floated in a cluster of three attendants. Given the wide-open flying environs of Blackhab, the switch made perfect sense.

When they had departed the Synergy, Marcant had been full of complaints about attending an incarnate meeting instead of simply connecting in a virtual one. However, after leaping through the bright starlight of Blackhab’s simulated day and putting his host body through its paces, he was back in a good mood and might even secretly admit to himself that going to the meeting was enjoyable. Being at the meeting itself would likely prove less stimulating...

The two PIT members came to a small room where two Terrans and a Celaran awaited them. Three circular Celaran windows flooded the simple space with light. Marcant oriented himself to the local gravity and sat down on a Terran chair that folded up from the floor. A table floated in from another room and situated itself in the center.

The Terrans smiled and the Celaran flashed bright colors across its body briefly.

Hello, hello, Marcant replied. His link notified him that before him sat Keya, the engineering and science leader of the alien technology integration teams at the habitat. On his left sat Celeste, a Vovokan specialist.

Celeste looked slightly younger than Keya and Marcant, and had brown skin one shade darker than the average Core Worlder. Marcant knew his own skin was perhaps uncomfortably pale to others, yet he never remembered to take a pill to alter it toward the current style before meeting people on Blackhab or Earth. If there had ever been a year when the current style was to be as white as a ghost, he had missed it. At least that fad for green skin had come and gone.

The Celaran flitted about rapidly, then floated over a roost as if considering it carefully. This was Onda, a lead scientist in charge of the Imperian technology team.

Welcome, Keya said. I think we have good news to share with you today.

Marcant sat down. Adair hovered lower near the surface of the table between them. Keya looked toward Celeste.

"The Iridar refit is complete, Celeste announced. It’s quite a ship. You may not even recognize it, but I think you’ll all be pleased." The spiral braids of her hair repositioned themselves as she spoke.

Celeste passed along a pointer to the ship specs. Marcant nodded and forwarded it to the rest of the PIT team. By every measure, the Iridar was twice the ship it had been before.

That’s great. I imagine we’ll be taking it on our next... trip, he said, almost having said ‘mission’. For some reason using the word ‘mission’ made him feel tacky, like a bad action VR.

It’s had a shakedown cruise, but if there are any issues let us know, Celeste said. Though honestly, in an emergency it should be capable of fixing itself with minimal direction.

Marcant nodded.

Onda flashed zher skin and spoke through their links.

"We’ve adapted Imperian flying technology to Terran-sized packs. There are ten on the Iridar, and we’ll have ten more delivered to the Synergy. You’ll find them superior to anything you’ve flown with before, I’m certain. I meant to have one here to show you, but some vines got tangled. In any case, the packs provide agile flight for Terrans, almost on the level of rod-enhanced Celaran flight. I note, however, that the considerable mass of the Rovan shield packs is probably incompatible with these new flight devices."

I’m sure we will find them most useful, thank you, Marcant said. The fast turnaround time on these devices is impressive.

I would like to take the credit for this juicy vine, however, a lot of this comes from the help of our Rovan scientists. They send their regards, but were too busy to attend this meeting. Please don’t be offended.

They made it known in typical painfully-honest-Rovan fashion that they were tired of meeting PIT team members because... well, there are so many of you, Keya added.

Hrmm. Famous, yet commonplace. A strange dichotomy.

I’ll send them our thanks, Adair said.

Marcant already felt elated about the amazing gifts offered, but Celeste continued.

There’s another breakthrough that the teams have been asking for. We have stealthed attendants in widespread production, but the cloaking only lasts for five minutes and it comes at the cost of some of the other features. I recommend you only replace a conservative percentage of your attendant fleet with these new models to act as scouts.

Amazing! You accomplished the impossible. To be expected that there would be tradeoffs when it comes to such a polished and compact piece of technology, Marcant said.

The last item we have is less important, but I understand quite useful, Celeste said.

Wait, still more? Marcant said privately to Adair.

Isn’t it wonderful? Adair replied.

We have stealth orbs for you that can erase footprints on sand, snow, and soft soil,