I approach cautiously. The person they’ve anointed as their queen sits on the far end of the large room, her face buried in a tablet. She’s lost in her work in a way that shakes loose old memories, but I can’t believe what I’m seeing.
My palms become sweaty and I stagger. I feel dizzy. The woman rises from her chair and steps toward me to offer a hand, but I back away.
It’s my mom.
“No, get away from me,” I say, my voice cracking. “What is this?”
“Connor? Is that really you?” she asks.
I shake my head. “You can’t be my mother. My mother died ten years ago. This is a trick.”
A person pokes their head into the room to see what the commotion is about. The queen waves her away and cautiously approaches me. She holds up her hands to show she means no harm.
“I’m as confused as you are,” she says, tears welling up in her eyes. “How?”
“You first,” I say, unable to comprehend how this is possible.
She takes a deep breath and half a step backward.
“I don’t know where to start,” she says. “I can’t believe it’s you, Connor. I can’t believe you’re really here.”
“If you’re who you claim to be, tell me how you got here,” I demand.
“We never told you or your brother, but your father and I, we are—were metahumans. We kept it a secret to protect you.”
“I know that part. How did you get here?” I ask.
“If you know about our lives as metahumans, am I safe to assume you also know of our true origins?”
“From the future, yes.”
She sighs and sits down. “Another woman was dragged into the present along with us. Violet Jones.” She becomes momentarily distracted. “Simon … has Simon taken care of you?”
“In some ways, yes. In others, no.”
“I’m so sorry I wasn’t there for you.”
“I’m still not convinced you’re who you say you are. Tell me more about Violet Jones and how you got here.”
“Violet was a friend, or so I believed. We were unaware she possessed a pair of metabands. She hid them from us for years.”
“Why would she do that?”
“Because of the ability she possessed and the way she used it. Her metabands allowed her to control the minds of others in a way we’d never seen before. Her strength was unimaginable.”
“And she used the ability on others, I’m guessing?”
I need to play dumb to hear her version of this story. It’s the only way to know if she’s telling me the truth.
“No, not at first. There was a battle. A very big battle in Empire City. I’m sure you know of it. Your father, The Governor, fought a metahuman named Jones. The damage was massive. I arrived on the scene to help rescue as many survivors as I could while your father attempted to take down Jones once and for all.
“The fight was brutal, and I was being pulled in every direction by the screams of innocent bystanders. Other metahumans arrived, some looking to help, others looking to take advantage of the chaos to sow more destruction.”
“What does this have to do with Volaris?”
“She’s the reason Jones went on his rampage. Unbeknownst to us, she was the only one keeping Jones in check. She used her mind control ability to keep him sane, but like any metahuman, she eventually needed to power down to recharge. When she did, he would revert to his insane mental state. As his abilities grew stronger over time, she had a harder time keeping his insanity at bay.
“Eventually, she began looking for another source of energy to keep her metabands powered up indefinitely. She found that source of quantum energy here, on Volaris.”
“And that’s why she wanted to come here.”
“It wasn’t her first idea. I found out later that she had hoped to make the suggestions she planted in Jones’s head permanent. That way she wouldn’t have to stay powered up to keep them there. But doing so would have required an amount of energy she couldn’t summon. Unless, that is, she could access it all at once. This is what led to her attempts at opening metabands and altering the way they work.”
“The same thing Jones did that ripped the hole in space and time to send you back here.”
“Simon explained that to you, huh?”
“Only recently.”
“Violet’s experiments failed in the beginning, but they eventually led to magtonium, which I understand, from our scouts, you’re already familiar with.”
“I am.”
“How did you acquire it?”
“I want to hear the rest of your story first.”
She pauses. There’s pain in her eyes and I can tell she doesn’t take any pleasure in recounting the story.
“The experiments she performed on her metabands caused extensive damage. It meant she could no longer control Jones, and that led to the fight in Empire City. When she showed up we still knew none of this. All we knew was that Jones was stronger than ever and unstoppable. But as I watched your father take off into the sky with Jones, I knew what he was going to do. There had been too much destruction and too many lives lost. He would have done anything to stop him. I screamed for him to come back, but he didn’t listen.
“Violet saw the terror in my eyes and knew something bad was about to happen. She used the last remaining energy she had to take control of my mind and make me teleport us to Volaris.”
“Why didn’t you teleport yourself back?” I ask.
“I had no idea where I was, let alone how to get back. Soon after we arrived, the military captured us. They kept us separated and interrogated us for hours. I was exhausted, but after a day, my powers returned and I escaped.”
“But everyone’s powers on Earth vanished after The Battle,” I say.
“Is that what they call it?”
“Yeah.”
“I can’t explain why my powers continued to work. Maybe the quantum energy well this planet resides in kept them active. I’m not sure. I didn’t know that the other metabands failed.”
I’m still so confused. This person looks and sounds exactly like my mother. Could she be telling the truth?
“Dad never came back,” I say.
“I knew he didn’t survive. If he had, he would have found me. He would have never stopped looking.”
My gut is telling me this is my mother. I know it. But it doesn’t make sense, and my brain won’t be convinced otherwise.
“How were you able to reprogram the magtonium?” she asks.
“That’s a long story. Why do these people call you their queen?”
“When I first came here, my metabands were more powerful than ever before. I found my strength had increased to levels I couldn’t imagine. I could move at near light speed with little effort. Over time, other abilities unlocked themselves. I soon realized there wasn’t a power imaginable that I couldn’t conjure up.
“I’m sure you can imagine how the Volarians saw me. Their biology is incredibly similar to our own so I was quite out of the ordinary. Some saw me as a god, and others feared me. I didn’t want either. I just wanted to go home.
“But the more time I spent here, the less I could ignore the gross injustices around me. Despite their technological advancements, many Volarians were still steadfast believers in magic and wary of science. It took me a while to understand. The upper classes prevented the lower classes from learning how the world around them works. As long as they believed in magic, the idea of working their way up the social ladder remained a hopeless dream.
“The upper classes worked tirelessly to make them believe in magic and leaving their destinies up to fate. Meanwhile, the elites used scientific advancements to increase their own luxury and wealth.
“I quickly corrected those who sought to worship me as a god by teaching them the science behind my abilities while endeavoring to learn more about it myself. I discovered the tie that metabands had to Volaris all along. This is where they came from.”
“Huh?” I ask, hop
elessly confused.
“Well, maybe not the metabands themselves, but the material they are made from. The element powers nearly everything. Volaris lies in a section of the galaxy that is essentially a deep well of dark matter and quantum energy. The natural properties of the material has allowed it to soak up this energy like a sponge over eons and eons. The energy rests inside this element until it can be released in one of two ways—that I know of. The first is through conversion via magtonium. It’s how they can generate massive amounts of power. The other is through metabands.”
“But you’re sure this isn’t where metabands originally came from?” I ask.
“Yes, I’m sure,” she says. “As far as I can tell, it is not their place of origin. Volarian biology is different enough from our own that metabands won’t work for them. They’ve evolved to survive within this pool of dark matter, and you must understand that dark matter does not obey the laws of physics as they are understood.”
“I’m at an advantage, then, because I don’t have all that baggage of common understanding,” I say.
She chuckles. “You have your father’s sense of humor. Metabands are connected to the dark matter present in this solar system through quantum entanglement. That means that even though metabands and this energy are light-years apart, there is a direct and immediate connection between them. It’s as though they are physically touching each other. This is where metabands pull their energy from. It’s the same with your magtonium as well. It’s simply transferring the atoms connected to that dark matter through quantum entanglement and using it as its own energy supply.”
I sit there with a dumbfounded look on my face. She smiles at me, tears still welling up in her eyes. Suddenly, I feel the same thing happening to mine. The shock of seeing her is starting to wear off, and my guard falls down by the wayside.
It’s her. It’s really her. I’ve spent most of my life thinking she was gone forever, and now here she is. I can’t hold back any longer. I throw my arms around her and hug her so tightly I’m afraid I might crack a rib.
She begins sobbing. I do too.
“I’m so, so sorry, Connor.”
“Don’t be, Mom. I’m just happy you’re alive. I’ve missed you so much.”
Forty-Six
My mom looks sad. She stares into my eyes like she’s trying to catch up on the last ten years of my life by searching my face.
“I can’t believe you’re here, Connor. I can’t tell you how much I’ve missed you and Derrick. I think about you every single day.”
“We think about you every day too, Mom.”
“What you did today, it was so brave. If your father were here, he would be so proud of you. But you shouldn’t be here. You’re not supposed to be here.”
“I know, but I couldn’t turn my back on the people here, and now that I know you’re here too, I’m more certain that I did the right thing.”
“You did do the right thing, Connor. Derrick did a better job of raising you than your father and I could have ever hoped for.”
“There was a six-month stretch when I was eleven where I didn’t have a single vegetable.”
She laughs. “Well, maybe he didn’t do everything exactly the way we would have, but I couldn’t be any prouder of how you turned out. I hope you can understand why I had to remain here. It was my fault Violet Jones was able to get here. I couldn’t leave without doing everything I could to stop her from hurting anyone else. I failed at that.”
“I don’t think so. If you hadn’t been here, fighting against her every step of the way, just think of what other horrible things she might have accomplished.”
“I thought about leaving this place and coming back home, but I didn’t know if it was possible. I had no idea where Earth was in relation to Volaris. We knew the general direction of Earth—it’s how we were able to receive broadcasts—but trying to determine exactly where Earth was? It was just too difficult. Even if I’d made it, my powers might have failed once I was near Earth again, leaving me with no protection. Still, I thought about it constantly. Every day I considered taking the risk on the infinitesimally small chance that I might see you and Derrick again.”
“I know you would have, Mom. I can’t even—wait. How could you have teleported?”
Mom looks down and solemnly outstretches her arms. A pair of gleaming gold metabands materialize around her wrists.
“Oh my … You’ve had your metabands this entire time?”
She nods. “Yes. I’m not sure why if you’re telling me that all the metabands on Earth failed. Perhaps the sheer amount of quantum energy on Volaris acted like a shield and protected them. I used these to fight Violet, and she used hers against me. I kept her in check for some time, but ultimately, she ensured I couldn’t use them again. She spread lies about me and told the people here that I intended to rule over them as some type of actual queen. The people who knew me laughed at the notion, but many believed it.”
“Why didn’t you use the metabands against her this time?”
“It would have been useless. After years of fighting to a stalemate, Violet needed a different tactic. Instead of using her might against me, she used her brain. She gathered a group of this world’s top scientists to continue her research into metabands. Violet was determined to find a way to open them up and explore what was inside, regardless of the risks. That research eventually led to the invention of the magtonium-based nanobots you are already familiar with. Violet seeded them throughout Volaris. She was determined to destroy me once and for all. Magtonium was the only way to do that.
“Activating my metabands was like ringing a dinner bell. If I powered them up, the magtonium would find them within minutes. I was able to outrun them at first, but they learned quickly. Each time I encountered them, they were smarter than the last time and quicker. Eventually, they became too fast. Each time I powered up my metabands, I risked my life. I had to stop using them. I shifted them into a pocket dimension for safekeeping. The hope was that one day I would find a way around the magtonium defense system.”
“A ship full of magtonium crashed on Earth years ago, but a message on board said it was sent by the queen. That wasn’t you?”
“Of course not, but I’m not surprised. Violet wanted to ruin my name and reputation by any means possible. She’d hoped to spread the idea that she and the passengers on her ship were refugees instead of what they really are—a group who doomed their home world to obliteration just to save themselves.”
I’m jolted back into thinking about Earth. The shock of finding my mother still alive and living on an alien planet was understandably distracting.
“I need to find a way back home. I need to stop Violet.”
Mom is quiet, her expression stoic as she contemplates what to do. It’s a face I remember from when Derrick or I would do something so monumentally bad that she had to calm herself down before she doled out the inevitable punishment.
She’s staring into the middle distance, deep in thought. Her eyes snap back to mine. She’s decided what we need to do.
She slides her golden metabands from her wrists and holds them out for me to take.
“What? I don’t understand.”
“I want you to take my metabands, Connor. They’re tied to my DNA, but you share half of that with me. They should work for you.”
“I can’t take them. They’re yours.”
“They were mine, and now they’re yours. I want you to take them and return to Earth and stop Violet.”
“But how would I teleport back?”
“You’ve made the trip between the two planets three times now. Rely on your intuition to guide you back home. I know you can do it.”
“You should go. They’re your metabands. You can take down Violet.”
“It’s been far too long since I arrived here to remember the way back home. I didn’t even have full control of my mind when it happened. If I tried, I would get lost.”
“That doesn’t mean you shouldn’
t try.”
“No, I can’t risk that. I can’t risk stranding you here on Volaris. I’ve already abandoned you once. I won’t do it again.”
“You didn’t abandon me, Mom. You showed me how to be a hero.”
She chokes up and pulls me in for a hug.
I hug her back twice as hard.
“We don’t have much time. This is the only way.”
“I’ll come back for you. After this is over, after Violet is defeated, I’ll come back to take you home.”
Mom smiles. “I don’t want you risking your life for me.”
“Tough. That’s the only way I’m agreeing to take your metabands.”
She considers me. “Fine, but only if you find a way to do it safely. If you get hurt trying to rescue me, or worse, you know I’ll never forgive myself, right? I need you to promise me.”
“I promise.”
She holds out the metabands again, and I take them from her.
“These haven’t been activated in a very long time, but they should still work. I couldn’t have kept them hidden in a pocket dimension if they didn’t. I suspect they’ve built up quite a bit of charge during their hibernation.”
“Huh?”
“Remember, this planet is sitting inside of a gigantic well of quantum energy. Even inside the pocket dimension, they were able to tap into that energy to charge themselves. They certainly weren’t this color the last time I saw them. These things don’t exactly have a shut-off valve, so I imagine they’ve been charging this entire time. I’m not sure what will happen when you activate them, so be careful. It will be more energy than you’ve ever channeled before, but it might not last long, so you’ll have to move quickly.”
I slip the pair of bands over my wrists and they tighten. Mom looks down at them and smiles. They’re working.
“Gold looks good on you.”
I return the smile. Gold does look good on me. Who knew?
I take my communicator from my pocket and insert it into my ear, not wanting to forget to do it later, and take a couple of steps back from Mom. It’s been a while since I’ve done this.
Meta (Book 5): New Empire Page 19
