But it is too late, they all feel the by now all too familiar thrumming sensation of a thermal oscillator warming up. Zaleria runs over and grabs the head of the despised creature, while Achi tries to grab Cheryn, who squeals and tries to attack him.
“Not now, Cheryn, we have to get out of this room, or we're all dead!” he yells at her.
The amplifying oscillations must've finally penetrated her senses to the point that she looks to the door and bolts. They all race down the hallway and turn around the first corner before slowing down. The light and heat flicker briefly, before decaying away to nothing.
Achi removes his hood to allow himself to be seen. She doesn't recognize him, in his guise of Vance Kelley. “Who are you?” she asks, abnormally calm, still holding the knife, while he walks back around the corner and confirms everything left in the room has been reduced to a fine, powdery ash.
“A friend. We need to get you out of here.”
“We?”
Zaleria materializes. “Yes, there are several more of us here. We are the galanen. This creature that held you, well it’s a long story. It is the antithesis of what we are, an enemy,” she says calmly, still holding its head.
“Not anymore, at least not this one,” Cheryn says, looking from the head to the still smoking ruins of her former prison. “What the hell was that?”
“Thermal oscillator. Designed to destroy any evidence. It failed,” Zaleria explains.
“Who is that?”
“We don't know. We will examine this unit, then destroy it, and cleanse this place of its symbiots, just as we freed you from them, but it can probably still hear everything we say, so let's save our story until we can get you someplace safe, and get you healed up.”
“Why should I go with you? What are you going to do if I refuse?” she asks, backing up, shifting the broken blade in her hand into an offensive posture.
“Nothing,” Zaleria says, “But I would advise you to consider carefully. I am Nils Hagen's friend; he sent us to get you out of here.”
“You're late.” she says.
“We know,” Achi says, trying not to choke up. Cheryn notices.
“I don't want to hear any more stories.” She says.
“You will get the full truth. Whatever you want to know, but not in its lair,” Achi tells her, gesturing at the mutilated head.
“I better,” She mumbles, as she tosses the knife aside, then collapses from the shock of all she has experienced and the sudden loss of adrenaline.
Chapter Twenty
Introspection
Cheryn awakes, bewildered, not knowing where she is. She feels…good. That's strange. She hasn't felt this way since that time her knee had been healed by…Nils. She remembers being held by Sklávoi Ashtoreth. Being tortured by that, bitch, for months. A bizarre fight between unseen assailants. She remembers killing 'her,' after she finally regained control of her body and yanked her hand through the manacle. Her hand? She raises her right hand in front of her face. Her thumb is nearly healed. It must be Nils. That would mean there are probably those machines inside her. What where they called? Why does she feel so fuzzy headed? Drugged? Symbiots, that's right. That means… She calls out to him in her head, “Nils? Hello, are you here?”
She hears movement, someone approaching her…room? It seems more like she is in some kind of white container, almost a perfect oval in shape, but she can't tell where the light comes from. She lies upon a padded bed that is in the middle; she can't tell what it's made of. A person walks in, average height and heavily muscled. He looks vaguely familiar…
“You're awake? Good. You've been asleep for the better part of two days.” It is the guy who was there, the one who freed her. He comes over to her side and helps her sit up. She is wearing some kind of snug-fitting, light pajamas, although they keep her very warm. She wonders who put them on…
“Zaleria and I tended to you.”
She realizes he can hear her thoughts through the symbiots they've injected her with, to help her heal.
“You must have a lot of questions. They will all be answered. Full truth, just as I promised. But perhaps we should get you freshened up a bit first, hmm?”
“I have to pee,” Cheryn says.
“Good, that means you're hydrated. Come this way.”
He helps her get to her feet, but she is surprisingly steady. He takes her by the hand and leads her outside into a corridor similar to the room she was just in. He lets go of her hand and leads her down the hallway until they reach an intersection, where he turns right. It leads to a dead end. Suddenly, a hole opens in the wall, silently. A chair rises up out of the floor, taking on the familiar shape of a toilet.
“These are the facilities. When you are done, stand by the wall there,” he points to the far side, “And a basin will appear. If you want to take a shower, disrobe, and it will become a shower. Take as much time as you like. When you're done, a change of clothes will be provided. Stand in front of here to exit. I'll find you and take you to get some food.”
“Uh, where the hell am I?”
“You are in a galanen base on Earth's moon. We could think of no place more secure, at least that we could take you to.”
“You keep saying 'we.' Who are you, and who else is here?”
“I am one of three humans on Luna at the moment; your brother Clive is here as well. The base is currently home to 157 galanen, most of whom work full time to keep tabs on human activities on Earth. As for me, I have been known by many names and have lived many different lives. But the first name I was given is Achi. You last knew me by the name Nils Hagen, and before that, I was Rolle Andersson, but please call me Achi. It is my true name.”
“So you did lie to me; you aren't human!” She immediately grows hostile, backing away from him.
“No Cheryn, I have never lied to you. I was born fully human in a place now called Sweden, over 10,000 years ago. It is a very long story, and I'll tell you all you wish to hear. But let's not keep nature waiting. Use the bathroom, take a shower if you wish, then eat some food. We'll talk while you eat.”
After about half an hour, she comes out of the bathroom, and Achi, Clive, and Zaleria meet her and guide her to a cafeteria. It is just the four of them.
“At least I recognize you, despite the dreds. What the hell is up with that?” she asks upon seeing Clive. He gives her a fierce embrace, rocking her gently, a mixture of emotions running through him feeling her pregnant belly against his.
“I'm sorry. I would have been there, should have, but they didn't want a 'mortal' with them. They'd apparently feel guilty making my life any shorter. Pissed me off. I'm so sorry!”
“Okay, okay! Don't kill me with your apology!” she gasps. He lets her go.
Zaleria fixes her a large meal. She doesn't recognize anything on it but tries a little bit of everything before clearing the plate and asking for seconds. “I don't know what the heck that stuff is, but it tastes good enough. So what the hell happened?!” she asks, signaling she is now ready to begin interrogating them.
“What do you want to know first?” Achi asks.
“Why was I kidnapped and tortured? We can start there.”
“I think there were several reasons. First, we believe the leader of Sklávoi Ashtoreth, which is the shell of a former galan, wanted to learn everything you knew. The reason we call it a shell is because, while it has the physical form of a galan, it does not have the soul of one within it. This should not be possible, but nonetheless, it exists. It is a biological machine—horribly corrupted and evil. It found out through a galan it'd compromised on Luna about your connection to Clive and me, and got to you before we became aware of its knowledge.”
“Well, it certainly succeeded. It put those things in me and just took it all. But why did it torture me? What purpose did that serve?”
“We don't think the person we killed in LA was actually the shell. We're not exactly sure who or what it was. I don't really know why it did what it did. I speculate
it was simply evil. Perhaps torturing you brought it pleasure, because it could do what it wanted with someone we valued.”
“And finally, I think the shell intended to use you as bait to draw me out and as many of the galanen as I would bring with me when it was ready, but I think we actually surprised it. We didn't know you were in that place until we showed up for a different reason. Whoever, whatever was there, its defenses were desperate, ad hoc.”
“So you weren't there looking for me?”
“We were constantly looking for you, but we couldn't find you,” Clive says.
Achi clarifies, “The galan that the shell is a copy of was over 200,000 years old; it has all of its memories. The shell itself has been on Earth for the last 75,000 years. It is an incredibly smart adversary. We got very lucky, but I'll take it.”
“So my only utility was for knowledge—which you'd kept very limited—entertainment, and bait? Do you know what that bitch did to me?!”
Achi turns his head aside. “We examined you thoroughly and could surmise. And I hate to think what it did with its symbiots that didn't leave physical traces. Anonymity was your only defense, and once that was gone…I'm sorry, we did what we could.”
“It made me feel how much it enjoyed hurting me! Showing me what it would do, then doing it, and there was nothing I could do to stop it! It wasn't going to stop. It wasn't going to let me die! It raped me, tortured me… it… it…,” she pauses. “It counteracted my birth control implant and impregnated me, just to…just to…!” She really wants to make them feel what she went through, make them understand what their failure to protect her led to. She can feel the healing symbiots trying to sooth her with sedatives, but that isn't what stops her accusations. Part of her, deep inside, knows it really wasn't their fault. Achi tried to keep her close, but she pushed him away, knowing—she thought—the risks she was taking. She glares at them and sees in Achi‘s and Clive's gazes that they are fully aware of what their lack of foresight caused her to suffer. Achi doesn't hide his frustration at failing to keep her safe. His pain…
Achi, sensing her turmoil, comforts her quietly. “I would like to tell you everything will be okay. That would be a lie. Some things in life cannot be undone, healed, or restored. They can only be endured. In time, the pain will lessen, but it will never go away. But you need not bear this alone.”
“Let me guess, you've been here before,” she says with more venom than she feels. “How'd you deal with it?”
“Mass murder. It didn't help ease the pain and only added guilt.”
“Oh come on, you expect me to believe that? So you're saying I shouldn't have killed that bitch?” She asks, angrily.
“No, that was just. I was about to put half a dozen bullets through its brain. I had no interest in chatting with it. I didn't li…”
“No! Don't say it.” She takes a deep breath and lets it out. “Look, I'm a wreck. I don't know what to do. I'm so angry at you, at Clive, at myself, but mostly at that bitch! I want to kill her again, and again. But I'm so thankful you pulled me out of there. Damn it all!” She starts to tear up, but not with tears of sorrow, tears of rage. “I want to lash out at something, someone. I'm so full of hate, it's tearing me up! I've got to let it out!!”
Zaleria sits down next to her and embraces her, angry tears running down her face, too.
“Why are you crying?” Cheryn asks her.
“Because I hate this thing, too. I hate what it did to you, and that we were too slow to act.” Then she connects to Cheryn through her medical symbiots and shares her feelings, her rage at all this mockery of her father has done, and at how it treats its own offspring.
Cheryn feels all of this, surprised by the depth of hatred in Zaleria. She looks over at Clive, who looks lost, not knowing how to deal with the emotions, misinterpreting them as deep sorrow—not understanding the rage they both possess.
But Cheryn also feels something else, another presence. Achi. He is here too, bonded with Zaleria, keeping her grounded. His mind is with Zaleria, helping soothe her psyche, understanding exactly how she feels, and keeping her from losing control. He reaches through her to Cheryn, too. She feels all her rage echoed in his memories, memories that span the entire course of human history, and more. He really has been in her shoes before, many times. But there is more.
So much more. Understanding, solace, affection, and beneath it all, there is love. He is doing what he can to help her as an act of love. He seeks nothing in return and is only worried she will not recover from this trauma. He is concerned about the life growing within her, a life she can't even face right now. She feels these emotions and thoughts echoed and amplified in Zaleria, cutting through her own recent pain and loss—her rage. They don't know what to do to help her, and they are worried. They react as one; it is hard to separate them. It is…bizarre, and…wonderful.
She slowly quiets down, dries her eyes, accepts a handkerchief to blow her nose, and begins to reflect. These three are the antithesis of the evil she has faced, the creature in LA, the shell it served, she realizes. That bitch entered into her brain to harm her, use her, pleasure itself. But they are here to help her heal, reassure her that she is not alone in the universe, that there are people who care about her, love her. She has never believed in love, but she can't deny what she has experienced in their mental embrace. If they had tried to tell her, she knows she would have rejected it out of hand. But now…?
“You are for real, aren't you? I never believed it before,” she states.
“I really am a very simple man.”
“I'm not sure I believe that…,“ she trails off, realizing that he really has never lied to her, despite her constantly thinking he would. He just smiles modestly at her. She decides to change the subject, if nothing else to keep from thinking about recent events.
“So, are you and Zaleria like married or something? You seem to share a great deal apparently; what's up with that?”
“That, is a very long story. I promised you the whole truth; are you ready to hear it? If you get bored, please let me know and I can summarize. Clive, can you bring everyone some drinks? Thank you.” Clive goes off to grab some water and fruit juice.
“Where do I start? Hmm… Well, I guess it all began after an ordinary hunt, during a bitterly cold winter, over 10,000 years ago…”
She listens to his retelling of all that has transpired, stunned. He tells her everything about how he came to be, the kind of man he was, the places he wandered, much of the history he's seen, and what he's evolved into. She doesn't ask him to skip anything. She learns all he knows about the galanen, how he met Clive, and how he discovered he and Cheryn were related. She learns about symbiots; Gravis and the shell, and its attack on Juruele; the gatekeepers; her biological kinship to Zaleria. Finally, she hears how he and Zaleria became a couple. She sits there for a long time digesting the information.
“So what does that make me?” she finally asks. “Shouldn't I be part of the galanen, part of the collective?”
“I don't believe anyone knows,” Zaleria answers, quietly. “You ask questions only a few of the galanen are beginning to ask themselves. Your question cuts to the core of a very difficult issue. Why shouldn't all of humanity be like the galanen? Genetically, we are the same species. However, we have two vastly different cultures. Mankind is still a primitive race, exceedingly violent and selfish. Do you disagree? Although the galanen are not immune to such feelings, they are largely controlled through our culture. There is a reason galan aren't considered 'adults' for a span of 1,000 years, even though we physically mature as fast as you. But more importantly, the gatekeepers are unlikely to let many humans pass through their dimension; it is they, not the galanen, who judge who is evolved, and who is not. But as Clive and Achi have proven, some of you can pass under the right circumstances. So I doubt any of my kind can answer your question. Who you are today is not who you were five years ago when we first met. You have grown so much. Where will you be in a decade? I can't say
; nor do I feel it is my place to presume to judge.”
“So why don't you make me like Achi?”
“I can't. As much as I adore him now; he is an accident. In some ways just as much a freak of our technology as the shell is, although luckily one who evolved to an advanced stage of benevolence. Would a different person have evolved differently? Undoubtedly. But once we discovered the flaw in our technology that resulted in Achi's transformation, we corrected our systems. And frankly, we debated what we should do about him. While we ultimately decided to leave him as is, to avoid an even greater injustice, if he were evil, you can bet that decision would have been different. Thankfully, he is who he is,” Zaleria says, still uncomfortable with her role in this.
“I think several of my galanen colleagues initially hoped I'd be destroyed combating the shell, and thus end their moral dilemma,” Achi says. “But since the gatekeepers know me, I think they are more comfortable with maintaining the status quo.”
She thinks about this, conflicted. She has never believed in a god, or any superior being, but she is now faced with people who not only believe but have met this 'Being of Light.' She has too, she realizes. She doesn't know what to think, so decides to change the subject again. “But isn't Achi still considered a human, Zaleria? Not to sound disrespectful, but since he is a freak, how can you be married to him?”
She laughs. “Well, it's not like we've had a formal engagement or wedding. We are bonded to each other in a way difficult to describe. We reached a joint realization through our deep bond that we are absolutely committed to the other, forever. Only a few know the degree to which I've paired with Achi, and I dare them to judge me for it. Some may want to cast me out of the collective for the offense; I don't care. We are unique, so we'll just be who we are, and the rest can think what they will. Just as you are; just as Clive is. It should inspire us to help mankind navigate the singularity, so these distinctions will no longer matter. You are my people too and not just because genetically we are related.”
Through the Singularity Page 47
