Gradus Ascensionis XXXI

In the quiet of Newtonian6's study, Tenza sat surrounded by the blueprints and simulation results of the railgun. The glow of its holographic representation cast a soft light over her contemplative face. She sifted through the complex diagrams and data, her fingers tracing the intricate lines and annotations. Though much of the technical details eluded her, she felt a deep conviction that the gamma-ray burst held potential beyond sheer destruction—it could be a bridge to new horizons of communication and energy generation.

Her thoughts drifted to her daughter, imagining a conversation where she could speak in the language Camilla speaks so fluently: science. She envisioned discussing the gamma-ray burst not just as a force of power, but as a beacon of connection, a way to reach out across the cosmos. The railgun's schematics depicted a formidable weapon, yet she saw beyond its immediate application. To her, these designs represented raw materials for something greater—the possibility of bridging the gap between herself and her daughter. The metaphorical billions of light-years separating them in understanding could be crossed in the span of a millisecond.

Her mind began to weave threads of her research on the quantum sensor, a tool to detect and decode light as a form of communication. Interstellar communication took shape in her imagination, not fully realized but full of potential. She remembered Sky's words, and they resonated deeply: "Science levels the battlefield for everyone."

Tenza smiled softly, thinking about how Sky had sent her to this tech guild. He had said she would find more than just answers for the heist—she would discover something for her own research. He had been right. While working on the railgun project, she had come to see the gamma-ray burst as a tool for understanding, for connecting, for illuminating the vast unknown.

She activated her interface and sent a message to Sky. "I've decided," she typed. "I'm not helping you create true invisibility. I'm going to focus on creating the means for communication when we go to the stars."

The reply came quickly, Sky's voice resonating with warmth and thoughtfulness. "Thank you, Tenza," he said. "You've chosen the harder path, but the one that matters. Understanding always trumps hiding. Invisibility might shield us temporarily, but communication builds bridges that last."

He paused before adding, "Do you know, the gamma-ray burst also holds untapped potential for energy generation? I once used it to reignite Arcturus in the Boötes Void, a star so far removed that its loneliness seemed palpable. From that experiment, I discovered a new way to reignite stars. Perhaps, in the future, I'll share it with you."

Tenza's heart swelled with gratitude and determination. Sky's trust in her wasn't just empowering—it was transformative. She didn't need to understand everything yet. Her curiosity and relentless spirit would guide her forward.

Across the room, Eretz swept up papers and adjusted equipment, his movements steady but his attention divided. As he moved closer to Tenza, a set of her hand-drawn notes slipped to the floor. He bent to retrieve them and paused, noticing the meticulous diagrams and equations she had scrawled. There was something raw and earnest in her sketches that struck him deeply.

"These look... complicated," Eretz said, handing them back to her. His voice was casual, but his eyes lingered on the pages, an echo of something personal flickering within them.

Tenza accepted them with a polite smile. "They are. Sometimes I wonder if I'll ever fully understand. But then I think about Camilla, and it reminds me why I have to try."

Eretz's expression softened. "Your daughter?"

"Yes," Tenza replied, her voice steady but tinged with emotion. "She's the reason I'm here. If I can build something meaningful, something that speaks her language, maybe we can find our way back to each other."

Eretz nodded, his usual energetic demeanor subdued. "That's a strong reason," he murmured. His mind drifted to thoughts of his own brother, far away and unreachable, fighting in a war that felt endless. He turned back to his task, but the weight of Tenza's words stayed with him, mingling with his own hidden resolve.

Tenza returned to her studies, the quiet hum of the lab filling the room. She was no longer working on a railgun or a mere heist tool. She was building a bridge—to her daughter, to the stars, to the vast unknown that beckoned just beyond her reach. And in the corner, as Eretz continued to clean, a new layer of tension hung in the air—a shared understanding, and secrets yet to be revealed.

A labyrinth of blueprints and mathematical equations spread out before her. Her focus was on developing a method to encode and decode messages in light—a concept both simple and infinitely complex.

She grappled with the intricacies of collapsar and merger models, trying to understand how gravitational anomalies could accelerate light and how the merging of two massive celestial bodies could generate powerful bursts. Her goal was clear: to create a system that could send and receive messages across the vastness of space. But the path was strewn with challenges.

The phenomenon of redshift loomed large in her mind, threatening to distort and corrupt any message transmitted over such immense distances. She tried to unravel the mysteries of light travel and stability with her basic algebra, but the equations she faced were far more advanced. She felt insignificant, a mere novice in the presence of giants, luminaries that outshined her, reducing her ignorance, her darkness to a speck of dust in their light. How did Lagrange achieve such extraordinary feats with his self-taught knowledge?

Frustration welled up within her. She stood abruptly, pacing the room in an effort to clear her mind. As she walked, she rested her head against the cool surface of the wall, her eyes brimming with unshed tears. The advanced concepts and mathematics seemed to mock her efforts, whispering that she should give up, that she is just a single mother, a weak human against the enormity and might of the cosmos.

But she wouldn't. With a quiet, fierce determination, she whispered to herself punching the wall, "You can't tell me it's not worth trying." The sadness and anger mingled within her—at herself, at the indifferent universe that held the answers just out of reach. All the knowledge she sought felt so close, yet so unattainable.

She took a deep breath, gathering her resolve. Science had always been a battlefield, and she was determined to level it. She wiped her eyes and returned to the desk, ready to dive back into the tangled web of equations. She knew she was not alone in her struggle; great minds before her had faced similar challenges. Sky didn't just admire imaginary heroes but real, in-the-flesh heroes of science. They have left the breadcrumbs she and anyone else can follow. With patience and persistence, she believed she could find her way.

Eretz, standing silently nearby, noticed her renewed determination. He watched her struggle and rise again, feeling a pang of something unnameable—respect, perhaps, or a stirring of his own doubts. As he turned back to his task, he wondered if anyone had ever looked at him with the same fire in their eyes, the same defiant hope against the odds. And for the first time, he questioned the choices he'd already made.

With a heart full of longing, Tenza began to break down the complex problem into simpler components. She started by contemplating the fundamental forces of nature: gravity and electromagnetism.

She envisioned a black hole as a cosmic vacuum cleaner, pulling in matter from its surroundings. As this matter spiraled into the black hole, it accelerated and released enormous amounts of energy. She hypothesized that this energy could be harnessed and directed to manipulate the trajectory of the gamma-ray burst.

She turned her attention to magnetic fields and their role in shaping the behavior of matter and energy. By understanding how magnetic fields influenced the flow of charged particles, she believed it might be possible to steer the direction of the GRB's jet.

To simplify these daunting concepts, she relied on basic algebra, the only sword she could wield correctly. She started with simple equations, like those describing the relationship between force, mass, and acceleration. Gradually, she introduced more complex equations, tackling the curvature of spacetime and the behavior of electromagnetic waves.

As she delved deeper into her calculations, she realized the immense challenge ahead. Controlling a GRB required a level of precision and control far beyond current capabilities. Yet, she remained undeterred, driven by a belief that with enough time, effort, and ingenuity, she could unlock the universe's secrets. Her longing to mend her relationship with her daughter fueled her, making the betterment of humanity a secondary but significant goal.

She fought against the paper, against the equations, and against her ignorance. Her pen became a sword, and math was her formidable opponent. She erased her clumsy attempts and started over, again and again. When a pen broke, she grabbed another. When she ran out of paper, she was ready to use any surface she could find. Her longing rivaled the most massive black holes in the universe.

Eretz watched from across the room, frozen in place, a broom in hand. His task forgotten, he stared at Tenza as she toiled. Her resolve was unlike anything he had ever seen. The glow of the holographic displays cast shadows that danced around her, but the true brilliance was her unyielding determination. To him, it was as though she were shining—not with light, but with an indomitable force of will.

She sobbed quietly as she worked, her fingers aching and trembling from the effort. Her body betrayed her exhaustion, but her mind pushed forward. Eretz could see it—if she ran out of pens, she would use her own blood to write. If she ran out of paper, she would carve her equations into the world itself. The thought both awed and unsettled him.

The room felt charged, not with electricity but with something deeper, more primal. Even as the universe seemed to conspire against her, she stood defiant. "I can't help it," she whispered, her voice breaking with emotion. "There's nothing I want more."

Tears pooled in her eyes but never fell. She refused to surrender to despair. She erased yet another failed calculation and began anew, her resolve as infinite as the cosmos she sought to understand. Unconsciously, her anima flared—not as a weapon, but as a beacon of understanding and creation. It fueled her, not with destructive force but with the quiet strength of a single mother who would not be stopped.

Eretz's grip tightened on the broom. He had come into this space expecting equations and experiments, but he found something else entirely. He found a person whose determination defied logic, whose heart burned with a purpose so profound it made the rest of the world feel small. He couldn't shake the image of her—tears in her eyes, trembling fingers clutching a pen, a force of nature refusing to yield.

For a fleeting moment, he considered speaking, offering her some comfort or encouragement. But what could he possibly say to someone who had already decided to rewrite the universe in her favor? Instead, he stood silently, watching her as she continued her duel with the cosmos, humbled and captivated by her resolve.

Exhausted and out of paper and pens, Tenza found herself at the limits of her resources but far from the limits of her determination. Her fingers, raw and trembling, began to carve equations and formulas into the floor. Her body emanated an otherworldly purple light, her brilliance shining as brightly as the stars she sought to understand. She was a sight to behold—her fervor and desperation painting a picture of raw intellect and undying resolve. A single mother versus the universe.

Eretz, drawn by a mixture of curiosity and concern, noticed her struggle. As he quietly swept the room, a stack of forgotten books toppled to the ground. As he bent to pick them up, his gaze fell upon her handwritten notes scattered across the floor. The sight struck a chord deep within him, the meticulous scrawl reminding him painfully of his brother—the soldier with a brilliant mind who had once scribbled plans and dreams on scraps of paper before being swallowed by a war that seemed destined to consume him.

He watched as Tenza, undeterred by pain or fatigue, continued her relentless pursuit. Crimson marks stained the floor where her fingers pressed too hard, yet she persisted. Her desperation was evident, her resolve awe-inspiring. She would not stop.

Eretz couldn't remain a silent observer any longer. Summoning his courage, he stepped forward, setting down his broom with quiet resolve. "Here," he said softly, placing a fresh stack of paper and an assortment of pens beside her. His voice was gentle but carried the weight of unspoken understanding. "You don't have to do this alone."

Tenza paused, looking up at him with red-rimmed eyes that still burned with fierce determination. She blinked, as if registering his presence for the first time, and hesitated before accepting his offering. Her trembling hands reached for the paper, her resolve momentarily softened by his gesture.

Eretz knelt beside her, his expression one of quiet respect. "I don't know if I can help much," he admitted, "but I'll do what I can. My brother...he would have helped someone like you without hesitation. I think it's only right that I do the same."

The sincerity in his voice broke through her solitary focus. She nodded, her voice barely a whisper. "Thank you."

Together, they worked. Eretz didn't solve the equations for her—he wouldn't rob her of that triumph—but he offered insights where he could, guiding her through particularly challenging concepts and suggesting alternative approaches. His presence was a steady anchor in the storm of her thoughts, a calming force that allowed her to focus even as exhaustion clawed at her edges.

The room seemed to glow with their combined effort, the tension easing but the intensity never fading. Erest watched in awe as Tenza's brilliance unfolded before him, not as a fleeting moment of inspiration, but as an unstoppable force of will. For the first time in years, he felt a flicker of hope—not just for her, but for himself.

Her hands trembled from both exhaustion and exhilaration as she finally pieced together the elegant yet formidable puzzle of general relativity. The equations danced before her eyes, no longer an indecipherable tangle of symbols, but a cosmic symphony beginning to make sense. Her heart raced as understanding took root—a quiet explosion of clarity amidst the noise of her struggles.

Gravity, she realized, wasn't a force pulling objects together. It was the geometry of existence itself, a bending of spacetime under the weight of mass and energy. Her thoughts turned to the analogy she'd struggled with before: a heavy ball resting on a rubber sheet, creating a curvature into which smaller objects inevitably rolled. Yet now, the image wasn't just theoretical—it resonated deeply within her, mirroring the shape of her own heart. Her daughter's absence created a gravitational well, a distortion in the fabric of her soul, drawing her ever inward.

Her breakthroughs were hard-fought, each one a battle against the cosmos and her own self-doubt. She made mistakes—so many mistakes. She miscalculated the curvature tensor, stumbled over the Schwarzschild radius, and botched the equation for time dilation more times than she cared to admit. Yet with every error, she learned. Each failure was a tiny collapse of possibility, but never the end—a supernova of determination sparked anew within her each time she tried again.

She came to understand how time itself could bend, how moments could stretch infinitely near the crushing weight of a massive object. Her thoughts turned to her daughter, Camilla, the distant star she yearned to touch. Time, that cruel thief, seemed to conspire against her. Each day apart felt like an eternity, a cruel mockery of time dilation, where every second stretched unbearably long.

Black holes captivated her imagination—those enigmatic singularities where gravity reigns supreme, and light itself cannot escape. To her, they were a metaphor for her own struggles. The event horizon, the boundary beyond which nothing could return, seemed to loom in her life, threatening to separate her from her daughter forever. But she refused to surrender. The equations before her weren't just theoretical; they were tools, weapons in her fight against the vast distances of time and space that sought to keep them apart.

She yearned for a bridge, a way to traverse the cosmic gulf between them. Her pen moved with renewed purpose, carving out equations that felt less like calculations and more like acts of defiance. Each number, each variable, was a thread in the modern quipu she was weaving—a lifeline thrown across the infinite void. Her anima flared as a beacon of creation, illuminating her thoughts with clarity and hope.

She thought of her daughter's light, the memory of her smile, the laughter that once filled their home. That light, though distant, illuminated her path. She wished upon it, just as she had wished upon the stars as a child, her whispered hope carried through the cosmos: Let me fix this. Let me reach her.

The realization hit her like a celestial collision—she wasn't just learning general relativity to master equations or understand black holes. She was learning it to rewrite the story of her connection to her daughter. She wasn't bound by the constraints of time and space; she would find a way to defy them. Her heart, like a black hole, pulled her ever closer to the star that was Camilla, and she vowed to build the bridge that would bring them together again.

Through the haze of her exhaustion and the glimmer of her breakthroughs, she felt the cosmos shift slightly in her favor. The universe, vast and indifferent, hadn't defeated her. Not yet. She smiled faintly, her fingers brushing the edge of another blank page, ready to fill it with the next equation, the next step in her journey. She would not stop until her daughter's light was no longer a distant memory, but a guiding presence once more.