the next day, as he was working Daniel noticed something else, Tickles's ability was charging at the same speed, but the vessel or better the tiny nanite shape became bigger, it would take 12 days now to fill it up again, exactly three times more, than before, just as the data gathered, also three times was the increase in size with 0.015 more, tickles became a total of 1.020 kg
daniel was talking to Tickles and asked "is it based on how much data is gathered? or will each one have a bigger impact? if I use the badge how much time will it take to charge? a couple of years?"
Tickles elaborated then said "there's still the option, that every technology consumed as a different cooldown, or maybe if we consume something equal or lesser it stays the same, if we consume something better it grows"
Daniel nodded and said "but what does it mean for me, if we go further in one jump will mine grow too? nevermind, we will cross that bridge in the future"
he had no way to verify that now, so it was useless to think about it, and Daniel went back to work on the geneticists' toybox 2.0
Tickles abilities did wonders, Daniel was almost at a stalling point, but with all the new data he gathered, the efficiency of the 2.0 version went up 20%, the precision 30% also its dimensions went down by 10%, and Daniel was on fire
he felt that if he could use Tickles ability without restraint, he would probably build one of those intergalactic spaceships in Sophia's history books before he was 10, that's how broken this ability was in Daniel's eyes
and now after another 3 days, he was in front of a 2 cubic meters green box with a big DNA helix drawn on it, with a thought Daniel ordered Tickles to activate it, and different looking instruments started to emerge from the box, it was basically a portable genetics laboratory
Daniel was happy and decided to wait for sister chaos to return before starting to use it, and with his newfound free time, he went to work on the communication system
if successful he could give sister chaos a communication device, to stay in contact when he left, she was a genetics expert and could be considered Daniel's first friend, he looked forward to it
the problem he had to solve to be able to achieve those goals, was a software one, the hardware was Tickles, but even he couldn't access that stream of data, he could feel the nanites far away, but he couldn't communicate with them, and they were working independently with a copy of Tickles, or maybe better a subroutine
what Daniel didn't know, was that the ability just brought to the surface one of the nanite's innate functions, that the AI used to order them around, at that time they weren't able to do it at such a distance, but the evolution into a lifeform made possible for the nanites to evolve and become stronger, and now if it was a part of tickles it didn't seem to matter how far it was or maybe they will discover the limit in the future
the way daniel confirmed that the signal could be used, was because for a moment during the usage of the ability, all of Tickles nanites were connected, and everything that happened was shared, not only the new data about the machine, Daniel who had this theory from the last time, used it to try to send a message home
since his disappearance, Daniel's lab was silent, the machines and maru's without orders stood still, they booted for a moment a couple of hours after Daniel disappeared, but turned silent since then
but six days later the scout v2 flew out of the lab, and went looking for someone, it found a sad Phoebe that was looking after her trees, she noticed the scout and looked at it with hope
the scout approached her and said "I have a message from master for his family, do you want me to play it?"
Phoebe was happy, daniel was alive, the spacetime storms inside the wormhole didn't kill him, and she said "wait, come with me" she grabbed the scout and run to the living room while calling the rest of the family,
Joseph was sitting on a frozen lake while listening to the sound of the wind, as he received Phoebe's message he flickered away in purple light
Sophia was refining a pill, as she received the message she let the cauldron explode and flew away
Vincent was in reunion with Obelix and Andrea, as he received the message he told them too, and all three of them teleported to specter castle
everyone arrived in less than 5 minutes and looked at the scout
phoebe said "you can play it now" the scout connected to the holographic screen in the living room and a video started
in the video giant water tanks were surrounding a square platform, who had many machines on it, Daniel was sitting there looking straight at the camera and said "hi everyone, i'm fine and healthy as you all can see, i found out that when tickles uses his ability, all the nanites are connected so i hope you can receive this message"
Daniel smiled and continued "as my soul started to breakthrough on his own like before, I reached blue soul level, and a cyan drop appeared in the center of my soul like it was an instinct I felt the need to throw it out resulting in the opening of some sort of portal, after some milliseconds i found myself on this planet called retak, the atmosphere is poisonous but not for me, so don't worry, in 14 or 15 days my drop should fill up again, i will than try to use it to come home, in the meantime i'm fishing, and trying to save this world fishes, i also made a friend who is not from this planet, i call her sister chaos and she knows a lot about genetics, and taught me a lot of useful knowledge, anyway i will send a new message when Tickles ability is ready again, if i can't find a way to use this connection sooner, don't worry about me and I'll bring some souvenirs back when I can"
the group of people was happy that he was fine, but also shocked he had the ability to open wormholes, every single spatial cultivator would give everything for it
but there were 3 people shocked for a different reason, and they were Andrea, Obelix, and Vincent, when daniel talked about sister chaos a picture was shown of the woman and they suddenly had a worried frown on them
they were worried because she was the thing that tried to pass as a woman in the neighboring galaxies, the empress of chaos, and Daniel said she was a friend
Vincent looked at the scout and said "do you have any more footage about this sister chaos"
from the scout a voice said "affirmative, everything is from master's own eyes, they chatted, worked together a little, and had dinner before she went to do something on a neighboring planet, you have full access as master authorized the members of the specter family, what do you want to see?"
Vincent thought about it, then seeing Andrea's and Obelix's expressions, he nodded and said "show us everything from the start"
the video started with daniel fishing and meeting her on the beach, and after several hours ended with sister chaos exiting the lab
the first to talk was Andrea, who said "did he really not feel the pressure of her aura, even I had difficulties talking to her face to face"
Phoebe, Joseph, and Sophia were full of questions, the happy occasion suddenly turned, and the tension was so thick it could be cut with a knife
Phoebe couldn't keep quiet anymore and asked "what's the problem?"
Andrea looked at her and said "do you remember the thing I talked about when I denied your request to hunt the Teddorians? that woman is that thing, daniel must be in one of the galaxies in her territory"
Joseph said "this means that he is closer than we thought, shouldn't it be easier to reach him"
Obelix shook his head and said "not really, we don't know why but she seems to like Daniel, it's obvious that she has no hostile intentions, but that could change if we invade her territory looking for him, she has a beast-like line of thought, and could think of Daniel as bait we used to lure her out, and in that case, her actions would be unpredictable, we can only wait here"
Vincent nodded and said "there's no problem, she even offered him precious spiritual vegetables, when a beast shares its food with someone else it's a sign of friendship, we just have to hope that when he uses his ability again, he doesn't finish further away or worst on a dangerous planet"
Andrea nodded and Obelix said "indeed, but the question still remains, she's called empress chaos for a reason, how can he be immune to her aura, normally people would fight or flight in front of her cultivators included, but he instead just talks normally, like there's nothing wrong"
Sophia was curious, she knew about her, but it was the first time putting a face to the stories, and asked "how strong is she?"
Andrea made a false laugh, then said "I hate to admit it, but she's far stronger than me, I can't fight her 1 on 1" shocking everybody
in the milky way galaxy, sister chaos was looking at a blue and green planet called earth, and she was shocked so much by what she found that she started talking to herself again
"none died, how is it possible, instead of dying the people inoculated became stronger and more resilient to diseases"
"There are even two humans with 80% of the necessary genetic purity, if their offspring reaches 95% my experiment will succeed, it's so true that a fresh perspective can change everything, thankfully I met Daniel, and the answer was to inoculate a prehistoric planet, now that they are at the post-industrial stage I'm close to success like never before, I must make sure that those two meet and reproduce together and also that they are protected, I'll send some of my pets"
4 red shadows appeared, and 4 male humanoids with red hair and eyebrows walked out of it, they then turned into red rabbits and flew toward earth, to take care off the protection of the empress specimens
"you will take care of this matter for now bunnies, send a signal when something changes, in the meantime proceed according to plan, time to go back"