There is no evidence of the ‘abdeakka gift’ that was spoken of in previous records during the first excavation. There is talks within the colonies of a research team being put together to survey the indigenous response to the burning of their sacred forest. This is immoral. This is wrong. I won’t be a part of it.
Please, please reconsider.
*Footnote – Thalmi-Oka is recorded to have been removed from her position two days later in the OSC
Medical Annals. It is recorded in the Ophal-III obituaries that she died two seasons later under mysterious circumstances.
***
AS NIGHT FELL, THE TEMPERATURE BEGAN TO PLUMMET. I found a low-lying area with a lone, petrified bush that was suitable for Laith to stay. She was visibly traumatized; whenever her limbs moved they trembled, and she said nothing the rest of the night. When we could see our breath I removed my jacket and draped it across her shoulders, ordering her to rest. She responded by curling her knees to her chest, using the satchel as a pillow, burrowing into my jacket. Her eyes remained open, staring at nothing.
I left to surveil the desert from the top of the incline. Crouched in the sand, elbows on my knees, I stroked my chin while watching the black spear of smoke still visible, even from five miles away. It was likely whoever was in the vehicles figured out we weren’t among the passengers. Unless it was a random stroke of misfortune that we happened to crash within hostile territory. But why burn the ship without stripping it? It wouldn’t have been hit and forced to land here, only to get destroyed randomly by savages. No, whoever was behind all of this wouldn’t have let something like that happen. They would be looking for us. And so I would stay here all night.
I passed the time sifting through the queries Aela had sent so far, somewhat worried the luminance of my visor might attract attention. Because of that, I kept my head down. The last thread she’d sent piqued my interest.
Aela, could you add a sub-query for the term ‘abdeakkan gift’? I asked.
No response.
I counted to ten. Still nothing.
Aela, come in.
—She’s not here.
It was Pariah. Had shift change happened already? Is Aela on-contract?
—Yes, but she briefed me before leaving. Should the sub-query request be added as a ref-2 for your cinder-lung query?
Yes.
—Ref-2 added. Your thread’s latest update shows you are currently ship-wrecked on Ophal-II. Prior to that you requested any OSC transmissions regarding the cruise ship. We’ve found two.
There’s more to the story. I haven’t had time to update it further. I’ll do that soon.
—So far it sounds exciting. Keep the updates coming; they’re my only form of entertainment right now. Everyone else is on boring diplomatic or tech-advancement mentorship contracts.
I sighed in mourning of Aela’s business-only demeanor. Please send the transmissions.
—Incoming.
Something glinted off the sand in the distance. My heart sank into my stomach and I clenched my fists, easing the instinctual ache. Some kind of large luminescent insect lifted off from two dunes over. My shoulders sagged with relief. It was nothing; I needed to settle down.
Pariah loaded a transmitted audio message sent from Jabron only an hour after we’d departed. It was received from a communications tower on … Ophal-II. Here. So much for settling down. The second message was a transmission from the same communications tower to an area with coordinates in the vicinity of where we’d been hit.
Just as I’d thought. This was organized.
Pariah, give me the exact location of the tower.
—One moment.
A geographical map blanketed my vision, growing transparent enough that I could still keep watch on the landscape. A flashing beacon identified the tower—southwest of our location, the same direction from which the vehicles had come.
I sighed pensively, lowering back into a crouch. The easiest thing to do was head to that tower and kill everyone even remotely involved, but…
I glanced below at Laith, now in fitful slumber.
Conflict.
Her safety couldn’t be guaranteed on that route, and that was the whole point of this contract. I looked back over the landscape, rubbing my jaw.
Pariah, send me a location of the closest OSC outpost.
—The closest one is a hundred miles northeast. I’ll warn you that the last transmission it sent was twenty-six years ago.
The beacon flickered onto the map. I hesitated, thinking again.
—Attica is picking up transmissions from a trading hub three hundred miles north. The transmissions are frequent and from multiple towers.
Is there an aerial port? I asked.
—I can’t confirm yet. Let me query some historical information and get back to you.
He severed the link, and I was left staring at the hub’s beacon blinking slowly on the map. A gust of biting wind jolted me out of thought, and I hugged my arms and bowed my head as sand particles whipped against my face. It was going to be a long night.
But at least now I had some semblance of a plan.
***
I didn’t know where I was when I woke up.
My neck was stiff, and I winced trying to adjust to a more comfortable position. The clink of rattling cans in the satchel under my head brought everything back, and with my memories came the gnawing pain in my lower abdomen.
It was then when Zira ripped his coat off me and put it back on. The sky was pink with dawn, but it was still cold. I shivered, curling inward.
“Get up,” he said. There was a strange yellow light over his eyes, arcing across the bridge of his nose. A circle on the left side of it swirled continuously. It looked like incense smoke, formed into an object; large spectacles, or the protective shields some of the OSC soldiers used, except smaller. I only stared up at him in awe. What sort of magic was that?
He nudged me lightly with his boot. “Come on, we have to go.”
“Where?” I croaked. “Where is there to go? We’re stranded.”
“North.” His eyes lowered to the bottom half of my tunic. “You need to change.”
I followed his gaze, realizing I had bled through the ligar in the night. Such a little thing—a simple inconvenience—but it served as the last pebble crushing me under a pile of burden. I could not stop the tears from flowing this time and I sobbed silently, clenching my hands into fists, pressing them to my chest. Zira watched me, expressionless. He said nothing in the subsequent minutes as I unraveled.
“I want to go home,” I whispered. “I don’t want to do this anymore. I want to go home.”
I heard him laugh under his breath; a laugh of anger. “You want to go home? The home that marked you, that told whoever is doing this of your location?” He lowered into a crouch until we were eye level, and tilted his head. The swirling, arcing light over his eye was hypnotic. “Your real home was with your father, and he’s dead. Svissa will look like this place soon. You don’t want to go home.”
His words were like a knife’s edge, sharp and frigid. My tears had stopped. All I did was stare at him, completely numb. We held eyes for what seemed like forever, surrounded by the sounds of desert wind and the thrum of my pulse.
“Laith, do you want to die?”
“… No.”
“Good, then change. Do you remember how?”
I looked down. “I can manage.”
Zira hesitated, then asked, “Is this your first time?”
I nodded.
He stood, wearing a troubled frown. “You’re too old for this to be your first time.”
“Can you please just stop talking and turn around?” I shouted, and Zira actually flinched. “I know you think of me as some kind of animal, but I demand some dignity.”
“We’re all animals,” he said with an indifferent shrug. “But sure. Meet me at the top of the hill when you’re done.”
*
Walking across sand was something new
to me. It wasn’t like grass or gravel, and my feet sank into it, forcing me to maneuver in a way that left my calves sore by the morning’s end. Zira was unkind as ever, telling me to hurry up whenever I strayed too far behind or stumbled up a sandy hill.
The sun was blistering, and I felt my skin cooking beneath its rays. At high-noon it was unbearable, and I kept draping my head with the torn tunic, only to take it off minutes later because I struggled to breathe. I didn’t know how far we’d gone and Zira said very little along the way. He kept looking behind him, that vaporous visor never leaving his eyes.
The scenery never ended; it felt as if we were walking in place. My lips were cracked and my mouth was parched. Tiny specs drifted in front of my eyes. I begged him to stop.
“Soon,” he said. “We have to find shade.”
But we wouldn’t find shade, because there was none. I sank to my knees. “I-I can’t go any further.”
Zira stopped several paces ahead of me. His shoulders sagged dramatically as he sighed. “Okay, then.”
A moment later I was snatched off my feet and thrown over Zira’s shoulder, nearly dropping my satchel. I shrieked, but was cut off as a sudden thrust punched me in the stomach. The world blurred around me; the pressure was so intense that I couldn’t move at all.
And then it was over.
I was set down against a group of oblong boulders screened by the canopy of a sad-looking tree. As soon as I was on the ground, my body revolted against what had just happened and I vomited the contents in my stomach, which was mostly nothing but brown-tinged water.
“Sorry,” said Zira, but his tone was unapologetic, “had no choice.”
I looked up at him in disbelief, wiping the sick from my mouth. He was visibly tired, breathing heavily and wiping sweat from his temples. He didn’t even look at me and set his gaze out across the dunes. His coat whipped against him in the hot wind like a black flag.
“How did you move like that?” I asked, shakily.
The yellow visor faded from the top-half of his face and he slowly turned his head toward me. His eyes were like fire, emboldened by the shade. “How does the sun come up?” he asked.
I didn’t reply, confused.
“How does the wind work? How do cruise vessels fly?” he continued, then laughed uncharacteristically, feigning ignorance with a thoughtful gesture and condescending glare. “Trees; what’s their story?”
“I-I don’t—”
“You don’t understand,” he finished. “Which means you wouldn’t understand how I move the way I do.” He nodded at the satchel. “Eat. Rest. We’ll continue at sun-down.”
Then came a moment of silence as I glared at him, feeling the sting of his words like a backhand. So dismissive of me; I was nothing but a bother. Why bother anyway?
Zira returned my look of laceration with a sideways grin, narrowing his eyes, insinuating his words not be taken as suggestion. I sank to a cool, shaded patch of sand and ruffled through my satchel. Fine, I was hungry anyway. He turned his back and took several steps forward, watching the desert.
“Are you not going to eat?” I called.
He didn’t respond, placing a hand to his ear and bowing his head.
“Are you eating or not?” I called again.
“Hold on a minute, I’m talking.”
No he wasn’t. I studied his posture again.
Wait, was he? “To who?”
Zira shot me a sideways glance. The yellow screen had returned over his eyes. “You never stop, do you?”
“Never.”
My sarcasm seemed to surprise him. All he did was raise his hand at me and turn around again. I didn’t know what that gesture meant but it was clear he wasn’t eating, at least not now. I fastened up my satchel and tucked it against the boulder behind me. I ate canned, slimy meat typically served as an ingredient in stew. The stomach pains were gone, replaced by hunger pangs. I, too, stared at the desert, though in the opposite direction.
It was like an ocean of sparkling rust, its waves frozen in place. There was no wind to ventilate the insufferable heat. How could anyone live here? Zira had said this was what Svissa would become. Was that true? Did that mean this place hadn’t always looked this way? I wanted to ask, but knew he wouldn’t tell me. I was worthless to everyone.
I looked down at my food, half-finished. A tightening in my chest made me throw it aside in a tiny fit of anger. Albeit tiny, the action was significant enough to catch Zira’s attention and in my peripherals I saw him look over his shoulder.
“Hey,” he called. “You can’t toss your trash there. We can’t leave any evidence or they’ll track us.”
I said nothing, nor did I move. Tears began to sting my eyes. The can rolled down the sandy incline.
Zira didn’t repeat himself, only watched. When I locked eyes with him, his visor evaporated. He approached, shoving his hands into his pockets. He stopped in front of me, looking down at the top of my head as I trained my eyes on my knees. “What now, hm?”
“I hate you,” I said. “I’d rather die right here than go anywhere else with you.”
Zira hesitated. There was a moment of silence as I felt the tears brim my eyes and roll down my cheeks. I wanted to shrink into a tiny particle of sand and blow away.
“I’m sorry you feel that way,” he said quietly, lowering on a knee. “And you aren’t the first person who’s said the same.” His attempt at humor failed; I only wiped my eyes. He looked toward the pile of trash at the bottom of the incline. “I’m not good with… people,” he said, appearing to struggle with that confession. “I think I’ve said that before.”
“You haven’t.”
“Well, then I’m saying it now. How can I stop you from doing…that?”
I looked at him. “Doing what?”
Zira waved a hand over my face, grimacing. “That.”
I think he meant me crying. “Tell me what you know. Tell me what’s happening. Who is after us?”
He laughed mirthlessly, looking away. “There’s a reason why I’m not telling you things, and it’s solely for your protection.”
“I don’t need protecting. I’m not the little girl you keep making me out to be. I could be useful, if you let me.”
“Could you,” he sighed, hardly a question. “You could make yourself the most useful by doing what I say. Pack up your trash and let’s move, if you think you’re well enough.” He saw my expression fall and added, “I’ll tell you what I can along the way, alright?”
*
Zira kept to his word once we started trudging up the slopes. It was midday—although I had no way of knowing if this world’s sun acted like ours. If it did, we were heading south. I was informed by Zira minutes later that I was wrong. Apparently the sun rose in the west and set in the east here, which meant we were heading north.
“There’s an OSC outpost about fifty miles from us,” he said. “I’m hoping I can get into contact with someone from O-I for a rescue.”
“Are there soldiers there?” I asked, this bit of information reviving some hope in me.
Zira didn’t respond at first, clearly choosing his words wisely. “I’m told it hasn’t been active for two decades. The most we can hope for is that its transmission devices are still functional and it isn’t occupied by unfriendlies.”
“Told by who?”
“My headquarters.”
“Are you speaking to them through your yellow smoke-thing?”
At my description, he smirked. “Sort of. It helps me connect to them. We communicate through here.” He tapped his temple.
“You can speak to each other in your minds? Through thoughts?”
“It’s called telepathy. And yes.”
I shook my head. Zira cast me a sidelong glance.
“What?” he asked, amused.
“Well you keep throwing around science-y terms for things, but anyone else would call it magic. You do more than what our Twin Gods can.”
“To lessers, magic is science ye
t to be explained,” he said. “So you’re half-right. Perhaps your deities are ‘higher’ beings, like me.”
I kicked away a stone in my path, noting the oddity of it being around here in the first place. “Honestly, I don’t think they’re real.”
“Yeah,” said Zira, looking behind us, having also noticed the stone, “I wouldn’t be so sure.”
“Meaning?”
He took a while to respond again. I’d begun to realize just how aloof he really was. “Do you know anything about children being taken from Svissa to O-3?”
It was my turn to hesitate. “I…don’t know? Children being taken? Why?”
“Your father died from latent symptoms of the Great Forest fire. What do you know of those who survived without symptoms?”
I shook my head, unsure of how exactly to respond. I knew nothing of it. I’d had no idea people survived it without symptoms.
“Your mother; she died after giving birth to you, yes?”
I nodded.
“From complications of the fire.”
“Yes.”
“Have you received any screening?”
“Screening?”
“Medical screening. Anyone ever take your blood for testing?”
“Zira, what are you—?”
“I’ve been reviewing historical Svissan documents and other OSC articles related to Svissan policies—”
“In your mind?”
“—And according to some articles there are medical screenings of newborn children whose parents survived exposure or potential exposure to the Great Forest fire.”
“What for?”
“I’m not sure yet. All I know is that thousands of children across Svissa in the past twenty years have been taken off-world from Jabron port if they showed any signs.”
“Where are they taken?”
“Don’t know.”
“What are the signs?”
Covenants: Elegy (Hymn of the Multiverse Book 8) Page 7
