Two more mages were taking aim down the room at holographic targets, and taking cover behind obstacles set up throughout the room. Sara could see the shimmer of shielding on the walls as Sergeant Razz held a hand out, fingers splayed, feeding the shields with a trickle of his Aether.
“We probably want to get to the observation room before the spells start flying. That cat of yours is a little vulnerable in here. Not to say that my people will fire spells at random, but better safe than sorry.”
Alister gave the sergeant major an aloof look, which Sara ignored as she headed for the viewing room. Once inside, Alister jumped from her shoulder and perched on the windowsill, his face pressed to the glass as he watched the mages adjust aim on the targets. He seemed to be truly interested in what they were doing, which surprised Sara. Alister had never shown much interest in anything that wasn’t food or a warm lap.
The mages each let a bolt of force loose, sending it down range at an incredible speed. One of the mage's bolts splashed against the shielding around a box, the target ducking low to avoid the blast. The second mage was able to clip the top of their target’s head, dealing a killing blow.
Specialist Gonders stepped up to the two and began to talk on a channel that allowed everyone to hear. “Deej, do you know why your bolt hit the cover and Oriel’s hit the target?”
Deej, a lanky man, stood to his full height of two meters, looking down range. “Aye. I aimed low, clipped the box,” he said, a slight Indian accent coloring his words.
Gonders shook her head. “No, your aim was right on, but your bolt was too big. You’re a fire specialist, so you were trained to spray the target, but force damage is a more precise thing. You need to focus down to a pinpoint. You can pour the same power into the spellform that you do with fire, but you need to sharpen down those edges. Here, look.”
She opened her hand, and the small projector built into her glove brought up the spellform for force bolts. Sara was very familiar with the form; it was one of her specialties, after all. It was a standard textbook form, not particularly sharp or rounded. It was kind of like a template that casters could customize to fit their style better.
“This is a basic form and will produce a bolt nearly a foot in diameter. To focus down the bolt, you need to sharpen here, here, and here. But you need to give that energy somewhere to go, so you need to round out this edge. It makes the bolt longer by lessening the force on the long axis. What you end up with is more like a spear than a squished basketball.”
Sara nodded. “She’s good. It took me a while to learn that trick. Sometimes in order to make a thing harder, you have to make it soft in other places. Deej’s bolt was better than most, but it’s the little things that make spellforms great.” She said into her and Baxter’s private channel.
Baxter nodded along. “Gonders is a wiz when it comes to force bolts, but she has just as much to learn about fire forms as Deej does about force. That’s what these sessions are for—honing down skills in an environment where everyone is counting on you to get it.”
Alister was examining the spellform in Gonders’s hand with a critical eye, and Sara swore he was shaking his head in slight disappointment.
She walked over and crouched down next to him. “What? You think you could do better?” she asked, a smile on her lips. The balls on this little cat.
Alister turned to her and, honest to god, raised an eyebrow. Sara was taken aback at the very human expression, but before she could truly react, her mind was filled with a spellform for a concentrated bolt of force. She put zero effort into the form, but it was clearer than anything she had ever seen. Her years of form theory identified all the minute changes to the basic form, and she could see that it was perfect. The changes were so numerous and fine-tuned that she was sure she could never envision it on her own.
The form evaporated in an instant, and Alister turned back to the window, a smug look on his face.
Sara stumbled back and was caught by Baxter.
“Are you okay, Captain? What happened?” he asked, concern thick in his voice. Sara noted that everyone was looking her way, but no one said anything.
“I’m fine. Fine. Sorry, I just got a leg cramp. It’s been too long since I’ve worn my armor, is all. Thanks for the assist, Sergeant,” Sara said, covering badly for the misstep.
Aetheric armor made muscle cramps nearly impossible.
She straightened up and looked down at the little black cat that was paying her no mind. We’re going to have us a little talk after this is over, you little shit, she thought at Alister's back.
The cat’s eyes focused on her in the window’s reflection, indicating that he had heard her. Or at least giving the impression he had. She cocked her head, but Alister just focused on the mages in the other room.
“Would you like to give the gravity change a try?” Baxter asked her.
Sara was startled from her half revelations about Alister. “We can wait for them to finish.”
“They’re just finishing up now and about to break for lunch. Deej and Oriel were the last two,” Baxter said, opening the door and stepping out.
True to his word, the mages headed for the door. The viewing room emptied out, the soldiers giving salutes as they passed her. She turned to Alister as the door closed behind them, giving her and Alister some privacy.
“Are you crazy? You can put a spellform into my mind? Why haven’t you been doing this the whole time?” she quietly growled at Alister, after switching her comms off. He turned and cocked his head at her like she was the crazy one.
She was talking to a cat, so maybe he was right.
Alister’s eyes widened when what she had said finally registered. He perked up and began to bounce up and down on the window sill. “Merp! Merp!”
Sara leaned back from the excited display the little cat was putting on. Then it hit her, This is what he’s been trying to do the whole time. He really wasn’t trying to poop on the table back in our apartment. He was trying to give me a spellform.
“How does it work? I’ve been trying to cast for days, and nothing. Is this what you were talking about; the connection? I need to be able to cast to protect this ship and the people on it; that includes you, you little turd. Why did you let me waste all that time trying to make spellforms on my own if you were just going to give them to me?”
She was babbling, and she knew it, but her frustration was bubbling over. She felt like she was on the cusp of learning a secret, but the last clue was just out of reach. She moved to put her hand to her face, but the faceplate stopped it. The tactile response was the same.
“You hinted that I didn’t complete the Familiar spell. Are you waiting for me to do something?” she asked, knowing she was missing something.
“Merow,” Alister said, demanding her attention.
She pulled her hand back to see the little cat facing her from the sill of the window. He looked around to be sure no one could see, pointed at her with a paw, and then patted his own chest with the same paw. He cocked his head, seeing if she understood.
Sara thought about the gesture. “You need me to ask you for spellforms? That seems like it would be practically useless in a battle situation. I need to be able to react quickly.”
Alister shook his head, and then repeated the gesture. She could see he was just as frustrated as she was.
She frowned, “Can you give me spellforms right now, if I ask for them?”
“Merow,” he said, nodding slightly.
Sara felt at the connection she and Alister had when he first shown up. It was stronger, like it had grown in thickness, but was still tenuous in some indescribable way. Our connection must have matured like he said it would; I wish he had let me know sooner. It’s not ideal, but it will have to work for now. She smiled, at least she would be able to cast magic again.
“Okay, let’s start with that then. When I’m out there give me the force bolt form you showed me earlier. At least I’ll be able to practice casting a little. I can
figure out what we need to finish the Familiar spell later,” she said quietly, as the door opened up, and Sergeant Major Baxter stuck his helmeted head in.
“Are you coming, Captain?”
“Yeah, I was just doing some mental exercises,” Sara said, stepping out the door with Alister close on her heels.
Baxter looked down at the cat. “Do you want to lock him in the viewing room?”
“No, he’ll be fine with just the two of us. Let’s get that gravity generator up and running. Do we know what the gravity is on Colony 348?”
Baxter stepped up to a control panel on the wall. “Yes, Ma’am. It’s 1.4 gs Earth gravity.” He selected the appropriate setting and punched the ‘accept’ button.
Sara felt the pull of gravity begin to ramp up. She felt like she was accelerating up at a steady rate, and her body registered the changes internally. The Aether suit began to compress around her in response, trying to even out her blood flow. It was slightly uncomfortable, but nothing too difficult to deal with. She lifted an arm to feel the difference, but the suit compensated for the additional weight, making the movement easy. There was a slight feedback that reminded her the gravity was heavy, but not so much that it slowed her down.
Alister stumbled slightly under the heavier gravity, but seemed to be able to shake it off better than she would have if her suit didn’t compensate for the forty percent increase in weight.
“I’ll feed the shield, if you want to take a couple of shots at the targets to get used to the difference,” Baxter said, bringing the shield to life.
Sara noted that there was a spellform recessed in the wall used for the shielding, letting anyone power it, even if it couldn’t modulate to the most efficient form.
Sara stepped up to the range and held out her hand. The stance was not necessary to direct the spell, but the human mind was a thing of habit, and aiming with her hand let her visualize easier where to send the bolt. Sara prayed Alister would do as she asked; the last thing she needed was to be unable to cast a spell while a subordinate was watching.
She admonished herself for coming at all now that she had an audience. A stupid impulse, made out of desperation. This had better work.
She concentrated on the spellform, but it slipped from her mind, like it had done ever since she’d summoned Alister.
She clamped down her teeth in frustration. The little shit was leaving her high and dry.
She felt Alister jump up onto her shoulder and was about to yell at him for being a dick, when he slapped the side of her helmet with a paw and hissed in her face.
The action was so sudden and out of character for the usually docile cat, that her mind went blank with surprise. As soon as the apparition of the spellform she tried to make vanished from her mind, it was replaced with the perfect version Alister had shown her in the viewing room.
Her eyes widened in sudden understanding: he couldn't provide the spellform if she was filling the space with her own attempt.
She had been taught in the academy that a mage must segment their mind into two. It was the ability to actually think of two things at once that separated a mage from a normal person. Most people couldn't do it. They could either envision a spellform, or channel Aether, but not both at the same time. It all snapped to clarity for her; Alister was the second half of her mind in a way. He provided the form, and she provided the power; a truly symbiotic relationship.
Alister's spellform blazed in her mind like a beacon. Its perfected form was beautiful; it made any spellform she had created on her own look like a child’s crayon drawing. The geometric shape was sharp and clear, and had a sense of depth that had eluded even her best attempts.
She focused on the target, her mind free and uncluttered while that spellform blazed away. She shoved a small amount of Aether into it and pushed the powered shape from her mind.
A bolt of compressed force shot from her, traveling at a speed she would have thought impossible. She barely caught sight of the dark blue shimmer of compressed raw force that flashed through the air. Then the target exploded into pixelated gore, as the bolt passed through it and slammed into the wall.
Baxter grunted as the impact turned the shield dark red, taxing his Aether reserves as he dissipated the energy behind the attack.
Sara stared at the red spot as it slowly returned to its translucent, golden color. She had used such a small amount of Aether she could barely tell she had used any at all.
She swiveled her head to look at Alister, who was cleaning his front paw as if nothing particularly special had happened.
Baxter cleared his throat. “That was incredible, Ma’am. But if you could tone down your blasts a little, I would be much obliged. I don't know that I have the Aether to stop many of those. To be honest, I didn't know anyone could make a bolt that strong.”
“Sorry, I was a little overexcited, I think,” she said, before taking aim at a second target. “Are you ready for another round?”
“Yes, Ma’am,” he said, wonder and pride in his voice.
“Let’s do two in a row,” she said quietly to Alister.
The form appeared in her mind, and she fed it with just a trickle of Aether, sending a bolt down range followed two seconds later by another.
Two more targets were ripped to shreds.
The shield now had two red spots, but they weren’t nearly as dark as the first one.
“Is that too much for you, Sergeant?” she asked, a smile on her face.
“No, Ma’am, I can handle that,” he said, grinning.
Chapter 19
“I fixed it,” Sara said while eating dinner alone in her room that evening.
“I saw. It looked like you were throwing some serious energies around in the practice room. I only caught the tail end of the session, but it seemed like you had power to spare,” Cora’s voice came back, her mood much lighter than it had been the last time they talked.
Sara took another bite, building up to the lie she was about to tell Cora. “I told you I would be back to a hundred percent before we got there.”
Cora was silent for a minute, “You were right. I’m sorry. I should have trusted you.”
Sara waved a hand, “No. you were right to be mad. I made a mistake, and should have been honest with you from the beginning,” she said, her dinner suddenly feeling like a brick in her stomach. She pushed the half-finished meal away and reached for the wine.
“You’re the captain of this ship, and I should have deferred to your judgment. You were right, Sara. Take the win; you don’t get them from me that often,” Cora said, with a chuckle.
Sara felt like an asshole. Why can’t I just tell her the whole truth? Is my need for her approval so great? She shook her head slightly, No. It’ll be fine. I can cast, and my tactical abilities should be good enough for me to see what’s coming in battle. I hope.
She waved Cora’s praise away like it was poison gas, “I’m just glad this is all over. My abilities are definitely more potent, and it should be smooth sailing from here on out.”
“So that’s it? The Familiar spell is finished?” Cora asked, just to be sure.
Sara fought the urge to throw up, “Yup,” she said, chasing the lie with a swig of the wine.
Sara spent the next few days with various mages down in the practice room. She practiced everything possible using Alister's perfected spellforms. It took her a while to get the hang of casting without building the spellforms in her mind, but like learning a new yoga pose or a new operating system, the process became more natural to her with practice.
The only problem was that she needed to tell Alister what she wanted to cast beforehand. This showed the troops a level of competency, but it slowed her reaction time, and that would be disastrous in an actual battle. Plus, she needed to tell Alister in a way that the others didn’t know she needed him to provide the forms. They needed to think she didn’t have a crutch if they were going to trust her in battle.
Sara and Alister spent all the time they
were not in the practice room or on duty trying to communicate. The little cat was beyond frustrated, but for the life of her, Sara could not understand what he needed her to do. She did figure out that she needed to formalize the Familiar summoning in some way, but Alister just couldn't communicate the information to her in a way she could interpret. Their connection was more emotional than verbal, and had grown considerably over the last few days, but Alister couldn’t understand her in the same way a human could; it was almost as if there was something blocking true communication.
She came on the bridge an hour early, along with the day crew. They were about to drop out of warp, and it was all hands for possible enemy contact. Ambassador Foss had taken a seat on the visitor’s couch along the back wall. Everyone was strapped in, including Commander Grimms, who leaned forward in his chair beside Sara's.
The screen showed the same slowly expanding view it had the entire trip, but now it was almost back to its normal proportions. There was still a slight pinching of the starfield in the center of the screen, indicating they still had a short distance to travel.
Ensign Connors reported clearly and precisely from helm control, “Thirty seconds to warp completion.”
Grimms leaned over toward Sara. “We should probably be in stations, Captain?” He said it quietly so no one else could hear.
Sara looked over at him, and he jabbed his chin at her command ring in the center of the room. She was so tired from all the sleepless nights spent trying to communicate with Alister that her brain was in a slight fog, and she had not even thought to be at battlestations for their arrival. Sara gave a smile and nodded.
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