Okay. I knew when I was and where I was. Next problem? Getting to Mars or Earth and getting back home. I might make it to Mars, but given that something had smashed a space station and burned enough of the planet that I could see the damage from space, Mars might not be the best place to be.

Artificers or one of their creatures would be able to do that.

Lee had once said that he hoped to have 10,000 years with Earth before the Artificers realized he was here. This was about 8000, give or take a few centuries.

Could I possibly have been unlucky enough to appear as everything began?

I didn't need to answer that question. Still, the damage could have been from a war that included massive capital ships. I did a quick check for moons in addition to Deimos and Phobos, and not finding any, went back to the main problem.

I needed to find out what was going on, ideally without drawing attention to myself. Did I know anyone who might be around in the future? Lee and Kee were the obvious possibilities, but if this were the moment before all hell broke loose in the universe, they might be busy.

Also, I have to use Artificer skills to do that, and if we were about to start an Artificer civil war, Destroy might be listening.

The same issue argued against trying to contact myself, assuming I'd reached Artificer adulthood by this point.

Thinking optimistically, though, assuming I'd made it back, who would I have told to watch for me?

Hal.

Neither my suit nor my implant had enough range to contact Hal if he were on Earth, but the ansible network could reach him anywhere.

Well, assuming galactic civilization hadn't switched to something better in the intervening 8000 years, it could work.

I told my implant to connect to the ansible, using the suit's systems, if needed. It didn't take long. The implant reported back that multiple ansible stations were orbiting Mars, along with additional ones orbiting the moons.

My HUD also showed a long list of errors because even though the basic ansible system hadn't changed, the protocols had. Still, in a universe with infinite variety, they had to keep the old protocols around even if they had to be downloaded from some obscure backup or a museum.

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At least, I hoped that would be true.

That hope was granted seconds later. Text from Hal began to appear in my head.

[Rocket. I've been waiting for your appearance.]

I let out a breath that fogged up my helmet. "I'm amazed you still exist."

[Strictly speaking, the hardware that once supported my consciousness is no longer part of me. I've moved to new systems multiple times over the millennia, but the core programming and personality remain unchanged, so far as I know. In that sense, the consciousness that you knew still exists, but a good argument could be made that I'm a copy of a copy.]

I glanced over the open space between myself and the nearest spaceships, the ruined space station, and (the slightly burnt) Mars. None of the spaceships appeared to be approaching.

"It looks like there was a big fight near Mars. What's going on? War? Terrorists?"

[A scouting mission and an attack that was barely prevented, but not without cost. Based on what you reported when you returned to the past, it's a scenario that we've been planning for for quite some time.]

I couldn't help but notice the vagueness. It could be a trap, but more likely, he was trying not to prejudice my interpretation of events before I returned.

Deciding not to push it, I said, "Can you get me back to when I left?"

[I can assist, but do not currently have access to any means of time travel.]

"Can you get me to Infinity City either on Mars or Earth?"

I might not like what I'd have to do to get access to a time machine there, but I'd do it.

[Infinity City's been quarantined, primarily for intelligence reasons—

I felt something big through Artificer senses a moment before the connection broke. It felt like what I'd sensed when I met Kee for the first time, but many times stronger.

Openings appeared in space, and things poured out. They might be described as Things because more than a few resembled The Thing That Eats—human-shaped, but with thick, gray skin and heads almost as big as their bodies, wide mouths open to devour.

They weren't even a tenth of the force, however.

Too many creatures appeared for me to describe or even notice details, but I know I saw pods that would grow into Xosk attached to a few of the Things.

Winged creatures flew out alongside them, some carrying passengers. The number and variety of creatures with tentacles, some of them extending out of faces or even from creatures with no faces, made me wonder if H.P. Lovecraft might have had a degree of insight into reality.

That wasn't the end of it.

Back when I'd traveled through space with Lee, we'd passed through a shattered star system holding the remains of a battle fought between the Live and Destroy factions of Artificers. Amid the shattered moons, space, and near-dead star, a giant creature with ten arms tumbled in orbit along with damaged spaceships.

Many of those creatures appeared with the rest, their arms carrying weapons that they began to fire at the spaceships salvaging the station.

And that still wasn't the end of it.

More creatures appeared, and I recognized some of them as well. Celestial Ghosts materialized from nowhere, sometimes cutting their opponents apart from the inside as they did.

From new portals, more combatants appeared—Xiniti in powered armor that might as well have been spaceships from the speed and damage their weapons did. Along with them came mechs, giant suits of powered armor that would have been at home in Mobile Suit Gundam or Voltron.

Many were recognizably styled to resemble the Rocket suit.

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