Beyond the Prison

Kane comes from an infinite universe. So, there are an infinite number of Kane's.

If you spot some differences between this story and the last, it may not be the fault of the author, it could be that this is a different Kane. Most of the Kane's have a similar back story. They were all geniuses that had multiple PHD's at a very young age. They were all Kane Steele. However, they have slightly different stories. These stories all have the same disclaimer. Any sex is between consenting adults of at least 18 years of age.

Beyond the Prison

The Marquis was deposed, and Rachel was put on the throne. I was still dodging the Kings guard. I'd been finding people that needed healing and every time someone was healed inevitably it would leak and there would be more guards looking for me. They didn't really look very hard. I guess when I left the palace, I had put the fear of God into them. Or perhaps the fear of Kane.

That's me, Kane. I guess the princess was still trying to find me. They put notifications up, asking me to come back to the palace, more like demanding. It was a royal decree that I should turn myself in.

I really didn't trust the king. I didn't really trust anyone on this world. I knew when I healed people, they would end up turning me in, but I did it anyway and just immediately went back into hiding.

I was hiding, waiting, sometime soon my time would be up, and I would leave this world. This was one world that I would be glad to leave. There was no technology allowed at all. This was purely a magical world. Thankfully my Nanite's were organic. I hadn't heard my AI's voice since I got here. She was still there; I could feel her but the laws in this universe wouldn't allow her to manifest. Like most purely magic universes.

I was using a hide spell. Tucked away in the crook of an alley. The guards just marched by. I had been betrayed by the 10-year-old son of the mother I had just healed. I couldn't really blame him. Coin was hard to come by. I would probably have to sleep in a whore house tonight.

I slipped out in the direction the guards didn't go and walked right into the arms of Shauna. Her arms were around me and she was burying her face in my chest. I shouldn't be surprised. I probably knew she was there. I've been using my sense life so much to avoid trouble, I guess I just knew she wouldn't be a threat. Being the Royal Princess, I shouldn't have let down my guard.

We were quickly surrounded. Shauna yelled at them to stay back. She was begging me not to teleport away.

I snapped my fingers, materializing a ring of fire around us. The flames were hot enough to keep the guards well away from us. I placed my hands on Shauna's shoulders and pushed her back far enough so that I could look her in the eyes.

I told Shauna that I didn't trust her. This only made her start to cry again. She said that her father had promised to reward me. I told her that I didn't trust her father. I told her that even though I cared for her, I can't trust anything your father told you. You saw firsthand the rewards your father gave me for bringing you back to him safe and sound. She said it was a mistake and I told her that I had waited an hour and a half in the dungeon for him to correct that mistake. Had it been a real mistake it would've been corrected within 10 minutes of your telling him that I had saved you.

I told her that her father had no respect for her. The men in this world have no respect for women at all. Even the Royal Princess.

My diatribe was cut short by a cold disorienting feeling that ran through my body. I quickly pushed the Princess away and told her that I was sorry that I couldn't help her, but my time was up.

Ravening energies surrounded me as the seal to this universe was sundered and my body was drawn into a maelstrom of chaos. Goodbye Princess.

***

I stumbled and went down to one knee. I was feeling sick to my stomach and my head was aching. My AI was yammering in my head that I had to move, someone was trying to track me.

I stood up and looked around. There were buildings all around me. I was in an alleyway. The amount of pollution in the air told me that this was an industrialized city. I told my AI to get some Nanite's out to start scouting. She told me she was already on it, as I started running down the alley. The Powercore buried deep in my chest extended a shield around me as I stumbled and bounced into the side of the building. I was not too steady on my feet.

I was starting to get a HUD materializing in my peripheral vision. It was an overview of the alleyway. Red points appeared on the HUD that looked like they were converging on me. I cast a concealment spell. My AI was telling me she was jamming several sensors.

I ran down an alley and emerged onto a crowded street. I quickly looked around. My clothing really wasn't too far away from everyone else's clothes. My concealment spell was working because no one was paying any attention to me.

I moved into the thick of the crowd keeping from bumping into people and moving with the flow. My AI was scanning all the people around us. She was giving me a running account of what she was finding. The humans were well within the norm of my DNA. That meant that the food here wouldn't poison me. She was telling me that she had identified half a dozen demi-humans meaning that there were multiple races here. There was plenty of technology, but also an abundance of magic. Most of the people around me were carrying a magic tech credit card like device as well as copper, brass, silver and gold coins. She was saying that she could help me model some of my existing coins to match what she scanned.

She told me that she had broken the lock of the sensors that had been placed on me when I emerged into this reality. Someone knew that I was here, but they were not going to be able to find me just yet.

The crowd had worked for me to escape, but now it was just bothersome. I spotted what looked like a café or restaurant or something. I began making my way there as I dropped my concealment spell. To the people around me, it seemed like I just appeared, but they quickly dismissed it as not noticing me.

I walked up to the restaurant and the doors opened to allow me entrance. A beautiful cat girl in a maid's costume asked me if I wanted a table for one. I told her yes and she took me back into the restaurant. It was rather busy, and the girl finally asked if I wouldn't mind sitting in a booth, it was the only table open. I quickly agreed, and she sat me there with a menu.

I began to catch my breath. In the back of my mind, Jeannie, my AI, was still filling me in with the information that she was gathering. It was all really seeping into my subconscious, but I knew that if something was important it would be brought to my full attention. I sub vocally told Jeannie that it was good to have her back again. She replied that it was wonderful to be back in existence. She began to complain about purely magical universes where she couldn't manifest herself. She said that she was grateful that technology worked here. I told her I wasn't so sure because they had certainly tagged me rather quickly.

Jeannie said that it was probably an automated system. She also thought that it was primarily set to tag demonic incursions. That was why she was able to break the lock so quickly. I wasn't a demon, so the lock didn't have a firm hold.

With Jeannie's help I was finally able to decipher the menu. That meant I didn't have to cast any spells that might draw attention to myself. There were dozens of magical artifacts around me, however I didn't see or sense anyone casting spells openly. Casting spells in public may be frowned upon.

Some of the information seeping into my subconscious came to the fore. Only 60% of human beings in this world have magic talent. 98% of the nonhuman or demi-human races had magic talent. The most magical demi-humans were of course elves, followed by gnomes, goblins, Were races, and dwarves. The beast races either had magic or they didn't. That is if they had magic, they had the whole realm of magic available to them like the elves. If they didn't, they were the same as non-magical humans. The other demi-humans mentioned above, could have full range magic or they could just have magical knacks or a single element that they could master.

Jeannie said that she would be silent for a while because she just found what in this world was the magical Internet. She was going to devote her entire CPU to gathering whatever information she could.

Cat girl waitress was back, and I ordered chicken fried steak with mashed potatoes and gravy, a cherry fizz (whatever that was) and the house vegetables. She set a glass of water in front of me and told me the order would be up in three minutes. She smiled, and she took my menu. She wiggled her hips with her tail swishing as she walked away. I quickly cast a spell that would dampen my pheromones. I didn't need every woman I met hitting on me. I began to realize that there were many more women than men in all of the population I had seen so far.

I pulled my sack of coins out of my storage. I concentrated on the images of the local coinage. Happily, they were not sequentially minted. They didn't have dates or numbers. That meant that the amount of gold or silver or copper in a coin was its value. That meant that you couldn't counterfeit. Gold is gold and silver is silver as long as it was the same purity, my coins would be as good as anyone else's. I quickly modeled all of my coins into the same size, weight and shape as what they used here. I ended up having to pull some extra gold, silver and copper from my storage but that's what I had it there for.

The cat girl brought my food out. The plate was a platter, and the fizz was cherry soda in a quart glass mug. She saw I had my bag of coins in my hand, and I took out the cost of the meal plus a generous tip and laid it on the table. Her smile was dazzling as she scooped the coins up and deposited them in her cleavage. She asked if I wanted anything else.

I could hear a gentle purring from her, and her tail was giving away the fact that she was quite happy. I told her I was new in town and asked if she knew of a safe place to rent a room. She said that she would be getting off in a half hour and I could crash at her place until I found a room. There might be a vacancy in her apartment building. I told her that I couldn't impose on her, and she told me I was the first customer she'd had in a week that looked her in the eye instead of staring at her chest. She was a good judge of character, and she knew she could trust me.

She took my hand and asked me what she could do to convince me? With her touch I could suddenly feel the dark taint in her. I subtly cast a diagnostic spell that told me I was correct. She had vestiges of lung cancer forming in her. With the amount of pollution in the air, I was not surprised. I could feel her lungs and the cancer wasn't self-inflicted. She didn't smoke cigarettes, if they had cigarettes in this world. There was no tar in her lungs or other foreign substances.

I told her that she had convinced me. I told her that she could pick me up once I finished my meal. She said OKAY. I would have to use Nanite's to fix her cancer. That would mean that I would need to be close to her long enough for my Nanite's to spread to her. A few kisses, some hugging and it would be done.

The chicken fried steak was delicious. Everything was delicious. It was almost more than I could eat. The cherry soda was good but almost too sweet. The cat girl came and sat with me as I finished. Her name was Sonia. I told her I was Kane. We talked as I finished my meal. She had come to this country as an indentured slave. She had worked five years to pay off her contract. She had a degree as a medical technician, but it would be another year before she could work in a hospital again since she had left employment of her last firm before her contract was up. They had been trying to get her to indenture herself for another five years. She decided that she would rather wait tables than be indentured again.

I asked why she wasn't using her magic and she told me that she didn't have the money to go to a mage school. Without a license, she could not cast magic. I told her that we were in the same boat. She said she thought she sensed my magic. Jeannie quickly told me that I would need to go to an Academy to get a license for magic. We had the finances to be able to pay Sonia's tuition as well. I silently told Jeannie to cut it out and she told me that she knew my penchant for cat girls. I told Jeannie to get some Nanite's built so that they could start a harvesting plant on the moon. Jeannie told me she was already on it. This was normal procedure for any New World that had technology.

Sonia took me to her apartment. It was a fourth-floor walk-up brownstone a few blocks from the restaurant. She told me that the neighborhood wasn't as bad as it could've been. There were a couple of security agencies in the area that helped police the gang activity.

The apartment was clean and comfortable. Nice size kitchen across from the living area. Two bedrooms shared a bath between them. One bedroom was empty and had the traces of someone having cleared out recently. She told me that her roommate had left last week. She had met a boy and moved in with him.

I told her about finding a magic Academy and she said there was a small one across the street. She said that she'd been thinking about taking night classes, but she could never come up with the money. I told her that I had the money to be able to spot her for tuition if she would allow me to move in to her other bedroom.

She had been fiddling with something behind her back. She told me if I moved in, I wouldn't need the other bedroom. She shrugged her shoulders and her dress dropped to the ground. She slipped into my embrace and kissed me. I should've cast that spell that dampened my pheromones a lot sooner.

Sonia was lying in her bed sleeping contentedly. The Nanite's were busily working on her cancer and hopefully she would never know that she had contracted it. I was picking up my clothes and putting them back on. I cast a cleaning spell to get rid of the smell of sex. It would probably clear out my pheromones as well. I hope she didn't wake up regretting what we've done. I would deal with whatever happened.

I sat down on the couch and decided to start inventorying my magical storage. I still had a bunch of cooked meat that I should probably pull out. I had a bunch of different weapons. I checked to see if I still had modern weapons because Jeannie's information said that they used guns here as well as swords and bows. I pulled out a long leather trench coat that would work well in this society. I began to fill its pockets with items that I could use without having to pull them out of my magical storage.

I heard some stirring in the bedroom and went to confront Sonia. Her smile at seeing me was welcome. I sat on the edge of the bed and asked how she was feeling.

She asked if I had used magic on her because she felt rather good. I explained that I naturally exuded sex pheromones and I hadn't suppressed them very well. She said that wasn't a problem, but it did make her feel better about jumping into bed with me right off the bat. She said that she had been noticing a back ache that had been nagging her for a week or more and it was suddenly gone. I told her that I hadn't cast a spell, but people close to me were usually healthier and less likely to get sick.

I really didn't want to try to explain Nanite's. They weren't magical they were technological. I had two forms, biological Nanite's that looked after my body and mechanical Nanite's that were carried in an electromagnetic field around me. The mechanical Nanite's would scout, and affect mechanical devices in Whatever Way, Jeannie decided to use them. The biological Nanite's would transfer to people around me if I had physical contact with them. They would scour their host body, repairing any problems they found. Once the host was found to be healthy, the Nanite's would eventually die off. My Nanite's would not multiply in someone else's body longer than 24 hours.

She asked if I was serious about the magic Academy? I told her that I was. We talked about the fact that I was from a different world. She had taken it well in stride. It wasn't something that was totally unknown here. In fact, this world is having a demon issue. Demons from another dimension were transitioning into this world and causing problems quite often. That was one of the reasons there were two security agencies so close together. There was a major need for magical enforcement people, and mages were in demand.

She told me that we should probably go get me a bank account. I could use her address for my home. It would be easier to pay for tuition and things with a bank card. She said she needed to make a deposit, so we might as well get dressed and go do it.

She started getting dressed and I went and pulled all of the cooked meat out of my inventory. I found a storage container and put it in and placed it all in the fridge. She was straightening up her shirt when she came into the kitchen asking what she had smelled. I told her that I had put some meat in the fridge that we could eat for dinner. She said it smelled fabulous and I told her that it was tasty. I had brought it from the last world I had been in.

She put on a jacket and then grabbed her purse. She pulled an automatic pistol from her purse and checked it. I asked if she needed a license for that and she said no. The city had tried at one point to license weapons, but they finally gave up because no one liked it, and they finally voted it down. Instead, everyone was taught to use weapons in school. If you use a weapon, you are responsible for the consequences. If you can prove self-defense, you will never be brought up on charges. Those who couldn't use weapons or defend themselves hired someone who could.

The bank was a fun experience. Fully automated weapons were mounted high on the walls and ceiling. Everyone walking into the bank had a weapon trained on them at all times. Sonia made her deposit and then took us over to help me open an account. I decided to open it with 5000 gold. Sonia was shocked that I was carrying around that much money. Tuition would only be 250 gold each. Sonia made an average of 10 gold a week. The apartment cost 20 gold a month. Utilities and food took a lion share of what was left. After expenses she hardly had enough money left to buy shoes or new clothes.

That was why she could hardly save up any money for anything. I wasn't going to say anything about the closet full of clothes and shoes that I had seen in her apartment. I figured women were women regardless of the universe they came from.

I got my bank card, and it was DNA matched to me. That meant that bank cards were of no use to anyone except the original owner. A pretty nifty magic tech device. If my card was lost or stolen the bank would just reissue it.

I'd seen a pawn shop on the way to the bank and I had Sonia stop there on the way home. I prowled around the store looking at everything. I finally found a bracelet that I haggled with the owner about. I finally paid him five gold coins and a bronze sword I had gotten on a world several years ago. The sword was the height of that world's technology and was considered a treasure. To the pawn shop owner, it was a valuable antique. He had one like it on display, so I had thought that it might sway him.

I gave Sonia the bracelet and told her that I'd enchant it for her once we got home. I didn't want her gun to be her only defense. She told me that just because we had fooled around once didn't mean that I owned her. That didn't stop her from putting the bracelet on and her tail gave away the fact that she was quite pleased. I ignored her reaction, and we headed back towards the apartment so that we could go to the Academy.