The Ascension Myth Box Set

by Ell Leigh Clark

  She felt the presence of Arlene and Anne next to her. They were in awe of what they were experiencing too.

  The ARs hovered before them, majestic and wise, but at the same time kind and gentle. And she felt enveloped in a peace and… was it? Could it possibly be love? That sense of complete acceptance for who and what she was? Was that even possible?

  She felt them pull her awareness out of her own thoughts where she was getting stuck. They reassured her: This is real. This is possible. And there is nothing wrong with you that you cannot fully accept this love.

  We have no intention of harming you, or anyone else. We have waited millennia for you to be ready. For you to work together to solve our puzzles and be able to contact us. And you’ve managed it. You and your family… you have brought us to you and we are grateful for this. We wish to bring everything you have seen to the rest of your people. You are our family. Our people. And we want to end your suffering.

  Molly felt herself being released from their grasp and given the opportunity to process her thoughts and feelings lucidly.

  “Our people aren’t ready for another race,” she told them. “They are scared. They want to fight everyone that is not them. They are afraid you’re too powerful and you will subjugate them. Or destroy them.”

  This is why we have been waiting here. For you to come and collect the message: so that you can return to them and show them that we mean them no harm.

  “But how am I supposed to convince them of that? Why would they listen to me?”

  Because you are Molly Bates. You have helped them. You are known to them.

  “I’m supposed to be dead.”

  You’re supposed to be resurrected. You’re supposed to lead them to a higher plane where they will one day be ready to receive us. You need to prepare them.

  “Ok?” Molly felt her down-to-earth humor returning. She imagined her teammates around her as a comfort, wise-cracking and being flippant in the face of the enormity.

  Yes. Use your team, the ARs told her. She looked to her right and saw Arlene. She reached out her hand and she took it. Arlene nodded, letting her know that somehow it was all going to be ok.

  Then Anne reached out and took her other hand. She displayed a look of sheer determination. For a moment Molly questioned how she could ever doubt herself, or the team. Of course, they could do this. Of course, they could make it happen.

  We will wait for one hundred of your Estarian days. Then we will follow. You have until then to make them ready.

  “Oooohhhhh, hell no!” Molly cried out in her mind, her courage evaporated. “It’s too soon! We can’t possibly.”

  You can. Because now you have to. Good luck Molly Bates. The ability is within you.

  And with that the envelope of complete peace and comfort started to evaporate away. Molly felt the beings leaving. Withdrawing. She looked at her sides and Arlene and Anne were slipping from her again. She was truly alone.

  Everything was becoming harsher and darker, but albeit more familiar.

  She felt herself returning to wherever she had come from, her memory of the science and technology and everything she had seen, slipping away with the feeling of warmth that was going away, and leaving her behind.

  Cockpit, Aboard The Empress, Outer Sark System

  “What about Oz?” Joel suddenly blurted out.

  Pieter tapped furiously onto his holo.

  “Yes, I’m here,” Oz reported in over the cockpit holo. “I was trying to reach her, but I can’t. It’s like I’m blocked out of her synapses. I’m operating only on mechanical pieces at the moment I think… although I’m collecting readings.”

  Giles’s agitation turned to excitement. “Can you share them on screen?”

  “Sure.” Oz brought up some graphs and telemetries as well as an image of Molly’s brain, color-coded and lit up in various areas.

  Joel peeled his eyes from her standing body in order to look at the information on the screen. “What does any of this mean?” he asked.

  Giles stepped in, peering closely at the data Oz had displayed on the main screen where the image of the alien ships had been just a moment before. “Well, as I understand it,” he explained carefully, “Molly, Anne, and Arlene all have some part of their brain developed in such a way that they are ready to communicate with the ARs.”

  Joel frowned. “How do you mean? Ready?”

  Giles took his glasses off cleaning them as if he were a doctor trying to deliver bad news. “As if they had the right hardware, almost. I suppose.” He replaced his glasses. “Preprogrammed even.”

  Joel frowned and looked back at Molly, crestfallen. “What does that mean?”

  Giles brightened a little, his intellect obviously taking over. “Well, it’s fascinating really. I think it means that they have the mutation or the evolution to be able to communicate psychically. Or Etherically. Or whatever it is. Like Anne has these traditionally Estarian abilities… like Arlene has developed hers deliberately over the decades… and Molly… well, the only thing I can think of is that it’s related to her pod upgrade and her housing Oz. We’ve known for some time that it affected her physiology in a different way, but we never imagined it would give her a direct link like this.”

  He peered more closely at the data on the screen. “It looks like they’re dreaming,” he observed. “See this here… this is REM activity - but this here is the cortex, which is lit up like a Christmas tree.”

  Joel shook his head. “What does that even mean? What’s a Christmas tree?”

  Giles snorted lightly. “Sorry. It means that they are seeing things. And here, they’re hearing things. And this here is the language center.”

  “You think the ARs are talking with them?”

  “I don’t doubt it,” Giles responded now with an air of authority he would pull out for the lecture theater.

  “Any way of telling what they’re saying?” Joel asked.

  “No more than if you were dreaming and we could see your dreams.”

  Brock looked panicked. He shifted around in his chair again. “Wait, that’s not possible is it?”

  “No, Brock. Not with any equipment we’re likely to have,” Giles assured with a smirk.

  “Well, that’s a relief.”

  Giles shook his head. “We’re in the middle of an historic alien encounter and that’s what you’re concerned about?”

  “But how are they controlling her?” Joel interjected.

  Giles took a deep breath. “I suspect it has something to do with the field their shields are producing. And the talismans. She only dropped into this state when we brought these pieces of programmed ethe up here.”

  Joel scowled at him. “When you brought them up here, you mean?”

  Giles put his hands up defensively and shuffled back half a step. “Hang on… slow down. She’s been around these pieces before. A lot. But it’s only now when we’re trying to reach the ARs and we’re in proximity to their ships, that this happens. It’s hardly an accident. Plus… for what it’s worth, I’m sure she’s perfectly safe.”

  He gestured back at the screen. “None of these readings look like her brain is being overwhelmed… only, it’s significantly more active in seemingly disparate areas. But remember, she has this altered physiology now.”

  “But you said it was lit up like a Chimney Tree?”

  “Christmas tree. Yes, but it’s ok. It’s not enough to over-stimulate her.”

  Joel’s expression softened from fury back to just worry as he turned his attention back to her suspended body.

  Pieter and Brock buried themselves in monitoring their various screens, searching for any detail that might suggest they needed to flee… Or anything that might give them more insight into what was happening.

  Giles glanced at the communications screens where Pieter was working. “I suspect the frequencies are what triggered the contact. We were trying to reach out to them, repeating back sequences o
f pulses we found stored on the talismans.” His voice trailed off.

  Joel frowned. “Frequencies of what? Not the Electromagnetic spectrum?”

  “No…” Giles said slowly. “I can only think it’s to do with whatever the spectrum is that carries the Etheric field. The same field that Bethany Anne and Michael and others have used with their enhancements. It’s really quite fascinating.”

  Joel narrowed his eyes, noticing a hint of delight in Giles’s voice as he relayed the information.

  Brock turned around in his console chair. “You think their powers are related to TAR then?”

  Giles shook his head. “No. But they’re tapping into similar technology. They have to be. Which was why it was one of the hurdles in the talisman quests. They needed us to have acquired some knowledge and use of the etheric before we were ready to meet them.”

  “Good theory,” Joel cut in, “but how does this help us now?”

  “I’ve no idea. How long have they been like this now?” he asked, looking over Pieter’s shoulder again.

  “Just a few minutes,” Oz reported. “Hang on… something’s changing…”

  Just then Molly’s posture changed as if she were released from the trance. Her eyelids started flickering and her posture returned to normal.

  Joel immediately held her arms to steady her.

  Then Arlene reacted similarly, as if also falling out of the trace. In an instant, Giles was at her side, asking her questions. “What did you see?” he demanded. “What happened? What can you remember?”

  Arlene took a few deep breaths and pushed him aside. “Give me a minute,” she scolded him.

  “Sorry.” His voice softened as he realized his faux pas. “Are you ok?”

  She nodded, steadying herself on him. He guided her to the nearest console chair and grabbed an antigrav water bottle from Crash’s console to give her.

  Molly was already relaying the information they had been given.

  “It’s ok,” she explained to Joel and the others. “They’re friendly. We need to call off the Zhyn ships. Tell them to head back to Gaitune. It’s all ok. But we do have work to do.”

  She looked anxious. Not like someone who’d had an out of this world experience. But rather like someone who had just had the weight of the world placed on her shoulders.

  Joel noticed her expression was similar to that of the last Estarian leader who had been appointed, not hours after the election. It was one of bewilderment and intense responsibility.

  Molly couldn’t respond. It took her a few moments to be able to hold her attention on what he was even asking her. Eventually she nodded. “I need to sit down in the quiet,” she told him.

  He nodded, holding her by the arm, and led her out to head back to the lounge while Brock, Crash, and Pieter tried to make sense of their next set of orders.

  Cargo Hold, Aboard The Empress, Outer Sark System

  Anne’s body suddenly relaxed and she stumbled back a step as if her consciousness was released. She blinked her eyes a few times and rubbed them.

  Karina, who hadn’t been more than a few feet from her lunged forward to help steady her.

  “She ok?” Sean gruffed from behind her.

  Anne opened her eyes to find herself in the dim lighting, with Sean and Karina looking at her like she had been shot or something.

  “What’s going on?” she asked. “Where am I?” she asked, surprised to be using her mouth to form words again.

  “It’s ok honey. We think you were in some sort of Estarian realm-walking trance or something, according to Emma.”

  Anne frowned, her eyes conveying a sadness. A loss. “Ok,” she said simply.

  “What’s wrong honey? Are you sad?”

  Sean had already started moving off toward the Little Empress.

  “I saw them. The ARs. They’re friendly. It was so… pleasant being there. It’s… just hard to come back. It’s like I was in a good dream.”

  Karina felt her compassion taking over. She wrapped her arms around the little Estarian and hugged her tightly. “It’s ok. You’re safe. You’re going to be fine. We’ll take care of you.”

  Anne pulled away. “You were trying to take me somewhere…” Her expression changed. “You were taking me off the ship.”

  Karina couldn’t find her words.

  “But why?” Anne demanded.

  Karina held her shoulders firmly. “We have reason to believe that the ARs may have locked onto you. This means that the whole crew and fleet are in danger. We were going to take you somewhere away from them, to protect them. But also, to keep you safe.”

  Anne’s stern confused expression turned to one of determination. “But they’re friendly. They’re not going to hurt us. They don’t want to hurt anyone. Not the Fleet, not the system…”

  Sean called from behind them, halfway up the steps to the Little Empress cockpit. “We just can’t take that chance, little one. Come on. We’ll keep you safe.”

  Karina had gripped Anne by the shoulders now and was poised ready to force her onto the ship.

  “NO!” Anne shouted as loudly as she could. The cargo bay vibrated.

  Sean glanced around nervously. “Uh oh,” he muttered. The loose weapons on the racks and boxes seemed to hum.

  “What’s happening?” Karina called to him over the rumbling.

  Sean exhaled forcefully, irritated but also more than a little anxiously now. “The kid’s got superpowers, remember. She can fry circuits and make things explode.” He started running down the steps to help Karina. “We’ve got to get her out of here before it’s too late.”

  “Too late? I’m telling you… they’re not going to hurt us!” Anne screamed.

  Karina held up her hand as Sean approached. He stopped dead in his tracks, and the vibrations and rattling subsided. “Ok honey. Let’s talk about this. Tell us what happened. Help us understand…”

  Chapter 15

  Aboard The Empress, Outer Sark System

  Brock finished up his call with the Admiral’s lead ship. “I know man, it was nuts. But it seems like we’re in the clear. Ok. Let them know and give me a shout when you’re on your way. Thanks, Trev’or.” He disconnected their holo line and sat back in his console chair his eyes resting in the distance for a moment as he took a deep breath.

  Crash flicked a few more switches, holding the ship in a stationary position as they watched their Zhyn allies reform and head back into the inner system.

  “You ok?” he asked quietly watching Brock in his peripheral vision.

  Brock let out a low whistle. “Yeah,” he said slowly. “Just getting used to my mind being blown. I mean, aliens, man… This is… trippy. And did you see that look in Molly’s eye when she was under their thrall?” He glanced over at Pieter who was listening now.

  Pieter was nodding but suddenly stopped. “I wouldn’t say it was a thrall as such. I mean… it was more like she just wasn’t there.”

  Brock tilted his head, conceding the point. “Yeah. I guess that’s what the G-man was saying.”

  Crash quietly turned around and looked at where she had been standing. “The way Giles was describing it, it sounded more like she was in some kind of dream-state.”

  Brock’s eyes widened as he sighed again, his focus softening as if he were replaying it in his mind’s eye. “Yeah… I wonder what it would have been like. Not that I want to know about any of that shit. Scary enough just knowing about it now…”

  Pieter smiled. “I’m sure it’s not that creepy. It just feels odd because it’s new to us. We’re not used to communicating with each other psychically, and because she was unable to move around and talk to us we obviously perceive that as a lack of control.”

  Brock frowned at him. “Hey, when did you get all insightful and stuff?”

  Pieter ruffled his hair, embarrassed, and turned his eyes back to his holoscreens. “Oh, you know… You can pick up a lot just from watching people. You know�
�”

  Brock grinned, a glimmer of humor and camaraderie in his eye. He glanced at Crash who winked back at him.

  “Well,” Crash announced almost deadpan again, “we’ll be hovering here another hour or so before we gate back. So we have time for a break. Who wants first shift?”

  “I’ll take it,” Pieter said without missing a beat. “You guys go and stretch your legs. Chill out for a bit.”

  Crash didn’t need telling twice. “Thanks, man,” he said, standing up stiffly and stretching his back out. “Love the flying but sitting still isn’t my idea of a good time.” He ambled toward the door, and Brock followed a moment later.

  “Thanks, Pieter,” Brock responded. “Hey, can I get you anything from the cabin?”

  Pieter shook his head. “Not unless a Yollin brandy is on the cards,” he teased.

  Brock sniggered. “I think we can do some of that when we get back for sure. It’s been one hell of a few days…”

  He disappeared through the door after Crash, leaving Pieter to man the monitors and controls.

  On Board Glock’stor Ship # 597

  The pilot and the navigator kept glancing over their shoulders to the command chair. The engineer on shift, rather than working, was instead simply prodding harmlessly at his workstation and listening to the conversation happening behind him.

  The entire bridge was tense, as if the entire crew was waiting anxiously for the other shoe to drop and put them out of their misery.

  Admiral Clor paced back and forth across the bridge, until he returned to his seat at the center and dropped into it. Only for a moment, though, before he levered himself right back to his feet and kept pacing. He said nothing, simply holding his communicator to his ear in silence. Any actual contribution from him was evidently unnecessary.

  The look on his face suggested he would rather chew his own eyes out than listen to much more of the conversation that he was only nominally participating in. Whether he objected to what he was being told or was simply bored, that was harder to tell. Either one could be potentially alarming, considering a bored Admiral could be just as concerning as an angry one.