Quantum: The Complete Series

Chapter 2: Vara-5

Mario walked along a dried river bed, feet crunching on the alien soil beneath him. He was wearing his full spacesuit as he wandered along the winding strip carved into the ground. He kept looking around like he was lost, but kept walking. No one was visible beside him, not for hundreds of yards. He then came upon a land formation that towered over him by at least a hundred feet. It had to be made up completely of Phosphorus or some sort of soft substance. Mario was easily able to scratch off a chunk of the tall structure with his gloved hand. He dug a little further into the formation and he felt his hand catch on something smooth after digging for at least nine inches. It almost felt metallic. He removed his hand from the hole he had dug and looked down to his feet where piles of the dusty substance had gathered, burying his legs up to his ankles in the pale yellow material. Looking up into the hole he had dug, he saw what looked like part of a wall, and he backed up another few steps, letting the dust settle off his feet and onto the ground. The tower then suddenly began to rumble, including the second one behind him, and the phosphate-Like substance began to fall off the two towers. It was a strange sight. There was no rumbling by his feet, so it wasn't an earthquake, but something was definitely not naturally formed to be causing such an event. Something was moving beneath all that material, and it was starting to reveal itself, piece by piece. When enough had already fallen off, it was made clear that the two formations were actually some sort of towers looming over him. They had a slight bend near the top and the two towers seemed to bend toward each other like they were reaching out for one another from their fixed positions. The sight baffled him to even see as the remaining dust fell off of the towers. The towers then lit up, causing Mario to jump back in fear. They each made a strange, metallic grinding noise in unison. Almost like something was powering up from within the structures. He backed up to get a better look at the two towers as they started bending toward each other, slowly bending downwards as they neared each other. Mario stared in disbelief at the scene unfolding before him. The towers reached and bent with no sound or struggle, they just bent and stretched until they intertwined in the center, creating a large archway at the end of the river bed. Mario stumbled backwards a little further before stepping over a deposit of Magnetite, a small chunk of it breaking with his footstep and rolling down a shallow hill before resting in a small hole. Mario went up it and picked it up to examine it, but when he turned to face the archway, the Magnetite began to let off a soft orange glow. It wasn't warm or cold in his hand, it just glowed. He took a small step towards the archway and the stone in his hands shone brighter and he continued to get closer, watching the stone begin to shine brighter and brighter. It wasn't long until he started to feel some heat coming from the Magnetite and he stopped inching and dropped the stone. The stone didn't hit the ground at all when he dropped it. In fact, it actually hovered at eye level and started trailing towards the archway without him even holding it. He watched, mesmerized by the graceful turns of the stone like it was falling through the air, but still being suspended as it moved closer and closer to the archway. When it reached within three feet of it, the stone immediately ignited and burst, sending a barrage of shrapnel in all directions and Mario ducked low to the ground and covered his helmet to hopefully not have anything pierce the glass protecting his head. He felt some small shards impact his back and legs, but nothing cut through his suit. It only harmlessly bounced off, leaving only small marks of dust on him. He slowly looked towards the archway again to see that there was some sort of aura coming from it, like how a portal works. Was that what it was? A portal? But to where? He got up slowly and began to walk towards it, every step making him feel more drawn to it, like it was calling out to him to come through. Alarm bells kept going off in his head, screaming for him to stop, but he ignored the mental warnings and pressed on towards the activated portal. When he was within eight feet of it, he started being able to see through to the other side, and he saw something that would terrify him for life. Traviere was standing on the other side, doing the exact thing he was, slowly inching towards the portal, a look of curiosity in his face, but when they locked eyes, a look of evil glee crossed his face and he dashed through the portal and grabbed Mario by the neck. The suit he was wearing began to shrivel and burn with his grasp. Traviere now had the ability to burn things with the touch of his hand? What about the Spark? Was that something he couldn't do anymore?