Thoughts on troubles

I don't know what was kept in the bag before it had been put over my head, but I counted myself lucky it hadn't been anything too stenchful. The ropes around my wrists and the manner I was being transported were both relatively comfortable, too. The Sig Nomad might have not been sure they could trust me, but at least they weren't making the experience of being taken to see their local commander more painful than it had to be. I sat, eyes blinded and wrists bound, in what, from the sound, seemed to be a horse drawn conveyance, listening to the men guarding me chat companionably about this and that, sprinkling insults on the Epsilon Soldiers liberally through their discourse.

The Epsilon Soldiers of the Boundless Realm, known colloquially as 'Jump Cops', didn't control individual dimensions or worlds, for the most part. What they did control was the means of traveling from one place to another, through their stranglehold on trans-dimensional gates. They were the only ones allowed to manufacture or operate the gates, and they were the only ones who had sensors that let them track any movement across dimensions, be it psychic, magic, or scientific in nature. If you wanted to trade with the world next door and you were in the Jump Cop's territory, you had to pay them, and you had to agree to enforce their rules. If you didn't pay, or enforce the rules, or kowtow to whatever their whims might be, your access to trade and travel could be cut off like wheat under the scythe. If you tried to trade without paying their tithe anyway, the Epsilon Soldiers would declare your world to be forfeit, which would mean invasion and destruction of a scale most places had never known. When the dust settled, the world you used to own would be theirs to use as they saw fit, and so would you. And no one would some to your aid, because no one else wanted to be next on the list for invasion.

They didn't trust magic, and they didn't trust psychics, and they had a habit of doing things to the ones they caught to keep these 'messy' forms of travel in check. If you were going to travel, you went through their gates, and if you went through their gates, they wanted to know why, and the reason had better be one they liked. Stepping under my own steam, I wouldn't have made enough progress to make it worth the energy it would have taken, or worth the beating I would have gotten once the Jump Cops got their hands on me. Trying to move through their gates would have seen me detained the first time I tried to cross, and held until they figured out what I was up to.

Which, given that Cobo Landing, where I was, had the whole of the Boundless Realm between it and Grindlebone's, where I wanted to be, meant I was in a bit of a pickle. It was theoretically possible I could have traveled by deep ship, or under my own power, around the outer edge of the Realm, but I didn't have the years it would have taken to spare.

Sachiko, the new friend I had made after dropping onto the deck of her deep ship in mid transit, had suggested I attempt to contact the Sig Nomad, who she said were dedicated to wresting free movement from the Realm. Doing so was what had led me to being in the back of this vehicle, blind and bound.

With this time on my hands, and very little to occupy my mind, I couldn't help but wonder if I'd ever make it home. There was a lot of distance and any number of obstacles between where I was and where I wanted to be, and there was nothing to say I'd ever make it back. I felt more alone than I could ever remember, and lost. Even Sachiko had only been able to say that the Sig Nomad might be able to help. They were the only hope I had, right now.

I had considered, briefly, seeing if I could use the hand to tear away another hole, like the one I'd used to escape the beast that had captured me, the hole that had led me to land on the deck of the Void Dog. Even if I had known how to make the hand do that at will, it still seemed like ripping holes in the local fabric of reality would be a very bad idea. Unneighborly, to say the least.

Right now, more than anything, I wanted to be back at Grindlebone's bar, sipping a whiskey and listening to Jack and Van Zandt trade stories. My life had been only moderately interesting before this week, and I'd quite enjoyed it that way. I didn't need angels and demons and monsters coming after me for reasons I couldn't seem to grasp. I didn't want armed thugs ruining quiet drinks with friends. I did want quiet uncomplicatedness.

But that didn't seem to be up to me, right now.