Walker ran a quick hand against the wall as they continuously walked in the darkness. Slime and smells better left unsaid came away on the tips of his fingers, an almost gritty feeling to the material. No thought had run through his head before the action. It’d been practically instinctive to do so, a bucket list item from when he was six that he quickly wished he hadn’t done.

  But how often could you say you walked down a sewer tunnel? One that was on a different planet, in an alternate fucking universe?

  Every turn and movement that came brought up odd feelings from his childhood. He kept expecting to see a bat fighting a crocodile, or a spider fighting a lizard. Hell, he’d go for a wise rat and his four teenage sons. Instead, it was mostly slime, darkness, and his own mind he had to be content with.

  As for why he was walking down the tunnel, that was a different story.

  After Walker had released the two teenagers he’d found, many people with blood already on their minds had decided to take aim at him. But, his long years within the time rings had paid off. With a quick targeting of gravity, each weapon had been directed towards the ground, impossible to lift except by the strongest of those in the area.

  After briefly explaining his identity, everything had been right as rain since. Naturally, proving he was who he said he was had required him to send them a message through the Lottery system, but that was enough to get him into the tunnels with the rest of the crew. An eclectic group made up of people whose only goal was to escape the tyranny of the Evolvers.

  The Liberated Ones.

  It was an unusually solid name in this particular Multiverse. He’d have expected them to be called the Rebels on the Edge or The Awakened Part Two. But none of them gave him the feeling of having an activated soul. Just desperation and comradery, as evidenced by the fact that the youngest in the group was placed in the center of the train of people.

  Following several minutes of pacing through the tunnels and Walker painfully burning the gunk off his fingers with a borrowed torch, a light appeared after a soft turn. The leader, a large man going by the name Jim, stepped in front of the group and called out a passphrase. A few exchanges passed between Jim and the people on the other side, and then they were called forward.

  A blinding spotlight struck Walker when they entered, stepping over a small blockade of material to keep the sewage out. As his eyes adjusted, an angry voice spoke up, “Whose this?”

  “This,” Big Jim said in a deep timbre, “Is Lord Dante.”

  “What do you mean?” A different voice called out, sounding almost childlike in its pitch, setting off one of his theories for who he’d thrown his lot in with.

  “What do you mean, what do I mean? He’s the one with the Lottery system. You know, the owner of Luck’s Haven and Symphony?”

  “I don’t get it?” A third voice said.

  The spotlight cut off, allowing Walker to finally see the room. It was as he’d expected. For every one or two adults, there were ten children. Big Jim stepped forward to further explain who Walker was, but he had a better idea. Every person in the room was lit up due to his modifications to the Communication system. Since he knew they were all connected to the Lottery system, what he did next was an easy way to tell them who he was in a direct and unmistakable manner.

  Message from the Lottery system:

  I prefer to go by Dante or even Walker if you want. I’m no Lord.

  “Whoa!”

  “Did you see that!”

  “Everyone saw it you idjit.”

  The room was a former sewer processing center, now scrubbed clean, though the smell of the area still burned his nostrils. On one side was a large number of ratty-looking bunkbeds stretching into the near distance. Walker’s eyes spotted even more children, a few bent over coughing, with the odd adult or two tending to them. On the other side was a wall of weapons, one in which his traveling companions now placed their instruments after returning from their successful mission. Walker’s eyes traveled around as they further remarked on his identity, and a few things stood out to him as a potential problem.

  Rather than comment on it, he stepped over to a nearby chair. It was almost too small for him, but with great bravery, he angled his hips and sat down. He couldn’t stop the sigh from leaving his mouth as a few muscles in his back finally untensed.

  The diminutive figure of Sky stepped over to him as Big Jim spent even more time explaining to the kids with small guns that he wasn’t a threat.

  “Are you feeling okay, Lord Dante?”

  “I’m not a Lord,” Walker said, repeating the system’s message, “I’m just a man who's trying to help others in need.”

  She leaned up against the wall beside him, seemingly unaffected by the smell, “So, why us? Why did you pick Luck’s Haven?”

  Walker scratched his chin as he thought about how to respond to that without sounding insensitive to their plight. In the end, he went with honesty, “I won it in a bet, if you can believe it. It wasn’t something I was planning on happening, but it did, and now I apparently own the place.”

  “Uh-huh,” She stretched out before sitting on the ground beside him and crossing her legs, “So what’s the plan now, great leader?”

  Walker looked at the few people not highlighted in green to his eyes, then back at Sky, “What do you want it to be?”

  “I want to go to Symphony.”

  “I want you to go there too, but unfortunately, the people I am beholden to will not allow me to do that at this time.”

  She stood up quickly, “You’re going back on your word?”

  “Never,” Walker said with a shake of his head, “Especially not for a group of freedom fighters like you guys. No, there’s just going to be a detour before I can get you there. Unfortunately, it’s I have to send you to a rather dangerous place at the moment.”

  “So why did you pick it?”

  “Because I know it,” Walker replied with a slanted smile, “It’s where I’m originally from. But it’s going through something that I don’t fully understand, and that causes me to worry for anyone I might send there.”

  Sky paused at that, looking around at the people under the undercity. She looked down at two balled up fists in front of her, “Are a lot of people going to die?”

  “I hope not.”

  “But some w-will?” She coughed hard enough to have to bend over before straightening up.

  “Are you okay?”

  She waved him off.

  Walker nodded with a deathly solemn look, “Yes, I think more than a few will not survive. Your stay on Earth would be for about,” He checked his timer, “twenty plus hours. Then, I’d shuffle you all over to Symphony and a better future. But again, yes, I think some few will die.”

  Sky smiled then coughed, her face settling into a grimace, “has to be better than this place.” She waved at Big Jim, who waved back before pointing at Walker for what felt like the hundredth time, “You’ve certainly got Big Jim in your corner.”

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  Walker smiled at her, “I'm great at first impressions. It's the rest of them that cause me trouble.”

  “You and me both.” She tapped her foot as her eyes ran over the kids. Sky spoke without looking at him, “Well, you’ve got my vote. Anything that gets me and my friends outta here has to be chanced upon. For everyone who dreamed of escaping the Undercity, we always knew it would be a dangerous route to travel. Ma’ Gentry always said, great rewards only follow great risks.”

  “Are things really that bad here?” He waved her off when she gave him a dangerous glare, “I don’t mean to say you haven’t suffered, but unlike my assistants, I haven’t had as much time to go through the applications as they have. What’s so rough about living in Luck’s Haven?”

  “It’s not Luck’s Haven that’s the problem, it’s the Undercity.” Sky sighed, “There are stories told of what this planet used to be like. It was beautiful. Green trees, uncracked streets, smiles no matter where you looked. But when our planet was sold to the Ceruleans because our former Lord spent all of his money trying to save a sick member of his family, everything went to shit. The palace was built upon so high that it began to cover the sky overhead. The world's natural elements, treasures to behold, slowly died, smothered by new attractions and new businesses that had nothing to do with the people of our planet. The debtors came, the fog settled, choking the air from our lungs, and little by little, we lost any control we had over our lives. To even get up above, you have to take on a servant’s job, and those only come through the debtors.”

  “You have to go into debt to become a servant?”

  “Sadly, yes,” Sky said with a nod. “Do you know why I’m called Sky? Because I’ve never seen it before. I’ve heard about it; read of it in a few small books we still have around here. But I’ve never seen it. I grew up in an orphanage where more kids died than survived. All for what? To live on in a job my friends, friends, father did till he died? It’s why so many sign up to be servants and prostitutes. It gives you a longer life up above.”

  Walker chewed on that for a long moment. The lack of agency was likely more suffocating than the fog itself. He looked at the young woman in front of him, “How old are you?”

  “Sixteen.”

  Walker looked around the room, “And what’s your job here?”

  “Don’t have one,” She replied with a crooked smile, “I steal from the people who won’t notice anything missing.”

  “A thief?”

  “Thief extraordinaire,” She said with a bow, “I have very quick fingers.”

  “Hah!” Walker laughed, breaking from the solemn moment of before, “You’ll do fine on Symphony.”

  Big Jim finally got his point across to the kids with guns, then stomped over to Walker and Sky. Though they called him Big Jim, he still stood a foot shorter than Walker as he left his chair.

  “Sorry about all that. They’re very suspicious of anyone we bring here.’

  “And with good reason. Don’t worry about it Big Jim.”

  The broad-shouldered man grinned up at him, then shrugged, “Least we could do for you Lord Dante.”

  Walker chose to stop correcting them if only to save time, “So, this is the entirety of the Liberated Ones on Luck’s Haven?”

  “No, not in the slightest. This is only outpost three. There’s somewhere around a hundred of them scattered across the planet.”

  “Oh? I had no idea.”

  “Exactly.” Jim replied, “Though this is a small one. We only came out to take care of those debtors because we heard Sky here was in trouble. Alaran has a bit of a crush on the girl, and we figured we could do some good.”

  “Hey!” The boy yelled out as he marched over, “Why would you tell them that!”

  “Everyone already knows!” One of the children laughed, “All you’ve talked about since we got here was, I wonder what Sky’s doing, and I hope Sky’s okay.”

  “Yeah, it’s really annoying. Plus your face looks really dumb when you say it.” A second kid added.

  Walker rolled his eyes, Nothing like the cruelty of children while I’m on a hard deadline. He glanced at Big Jim who stood staring straight at him with a slightly open mouth.

  “What? Is there something on my face?”

  “You’re really going to do it? Take us all to Symphony?”

  The light in his eyes was so apparent that Walker didn’t have the heart to tell him what he’d told Sky. Pushing away his new branding of honesty, he said, “Yep. Everyone selected in the Lottery is going to go to Symphony.”

  Alaran looked around for someone to ask the next question. When nobody did, he shrugged and said, “How? We can’t get to the portals?”

  Walker tapped into his overlay. Within a second, a portal appeared beside the group, causing many to stumble back. “Like this.”

  “But…that’s not possible! All the portals have always been in the vaunted reaches.”

  “Bridges.” Someone corrected.

  “Shut up!”

  For the second time, Walker rolled his eyes. Better explain part of this.

  A second portal appeared beside the first as he said, “I can make as many of these as we need. Each is not only keyed to the location of my choice, but can also only be accessed by those selected by the lottery. So, I locate each winner on Luck’s Haven, create a portal, they go through, and everyone gets outta here. What do you think?”

  Someone loudly dropped a blaster to the ground as dozens of people stood still, staring at their hoped-for escape from the planet.

  Sky was the first to recover, “You can make a lot of these?”

  Walker shrugged, “As many as necessary. A perk from something I did years ago.”

  Big Jim started to shake, “We could save all of the Liberated Ones. Every single member across the multiverse.”

  “Uhh,” Walker replied with a finger raised, “I’m on a very, very short deadline here. I’ve gotta get everyone on Luck’s Haven into a portal so I can head back out. There are a few impending problems that need to be dealt with, and soon, or we’re all fucked.”

  “But-” Big Jim replied, “But what do I tell them?”

  “What do you mean?” Walker asked, curious to what he was talking about.

  “We have a chatroom, invite only. All the leaders of the Liberated Ones are in it.”

  “Really? Can you send it to me?”

  “Sure!”

  Big Jim and Walker exchanged contacts, Walker having to invite him first. After he’d originally taken over Luck’s Haven, the amount of people trying to add him had been insane. He’d locked it so only he could send, never receive.

  After gaining access to the Chatroom, Walker compared a few options within the Omniversal Communication system. When you think about it, the multiverse was extremely lucky that someone like him had become the next system administrator. A person like Mirail would’ve created a tyrannical dictatorship so excessive that, similar to those in the Undercity, breathing would cost you- only everywhere at once.

  Sacrificing a negligible amount of resources, he had everything he needed for a plan he hadn’t even known he’d come up with.

  Suddenly, Walker started to laugh. It wasn’t the nice kind of laugh, or one filled with joy. It was the kind that would cause the hair on the back of a person’s neck to rise.

  Tapping into his map and the Lottery system, another problem he expected popped up at him.

  He felt a small hand tapping his elbow, “Walker?” Sky said in a mystified voice, “Are you okay?”

  “This area is going to be attacked in just a few minutes.” Lifting a hand, he pointed out the people in the room without the green glow around them, “Those seven are not winners of the Lottery. I’m guessing they’ve been reporting to the nobles about what we’re doing here and gave away your location.”

  “What!” Big Jim said, looking at each of them. He glared at a tall man on the left, “Jordy! You’re my cousin! How could you?”

  “What do you mean! We don’t know anything about that man or Symphony! You’re just going by his word!”

  “It’s still better than living here! You know what they did to my Maggie! You can’t trust-”

  Walker pressed briefly on gravity to silence everyone, “We don’t have time. Those portals are already keyed into specific areas. If you get moving now, I can keep you safe until everyone's through.”

  Sky didn’t need to be told twice. She looked at Walker with big eyes as footsteps and cursing could be heard from the tunnels, “You’ll keep your promise, right? You’ll come get us?”

  Walker gave her a smile as he reached a hand out covered in blue, “Of course I will. I’ll see you in Symphony, Sky.”

  The small woman nodded, then jumped through first. As if a dam were breaking, everyone followed suit, diving after her. One of the traitors looked around as everyone got through and tried to jump in after them. A blue wall stopped them, breaking their nose in the process.

  “No, no. You made your decision.” Walker said with no malice in his voice. He looked at the hardened space blocking the tunnel as further lottery winners jumped through. Tapping his chin, he decided to follow through on one of his plans.

  A feral grin made its way across his face, “I wonder what they’ll say.”

  Before he forgot, Walker looked up Ma’ Gentry in the Lottery winners list. He made sure her portal ended up right next to Sky’s on Earth.

  Following the fourth battle, Walker owned dozens of planets across the Multiverse. More than that, his multiple titles had kicked in, granting him certain administrative authorities, or powers if you will, over a large grouping of galaxies spread across various renditions.

  As portals opened up across Luck’s Haven, granting a reprieve to those escaping the nobility on their pitstop to Symphony, other calamitous events occurred for the Evolvers in the multiverse.

  One by one, members of the Liberated Ones, leaders of a faction split across dozens of universes, suddenly found themselves owners of the planets they once sought to fight.

  The bloody dawn passed into memory, as a red sun, the symbol of the Liberated Ones, firmly entrenched itself in the annals of the future.

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