Ox

X involves the three scientists attempting to return to Earth from another dimension inhabited by hostile machines. Interlopers from other realities (using technology similar to that of the scientists' government) guide and hamper the explorers. A secondary story tells of a multidimensional cellular automaton energy being named 0x and its attempts to share living space with an infant human male, a fledgling creature of Orn's species, and one of the manta-carnivores; their developing relationship leads to attempts to learn the reasons for their strange isolation from others of their kind, which eventually ties in to the story of Cal, Veg, and Aquilon.