Bonded Telepaths

by Enid Titan

  “Don’t you have dogs on Earth?”

  “That’s a dog? It’s the size of…”

  She had nothing to compare it to that the boys would recognize. Vortha had a distinct absence of animal life, aside from a few birds and shimmery tiny insects. This was her first time seeing the megafauna of the planet. This “dog” must have been around the size of a moose. If that was a dog, she hated to think what a bear might look like, or what other creatures might lurk below.

  16

  Southern College

  Dogs, bearkits, skunks, vamphares, and carnivorous deer. Poppy saw all of them from the sky on her first night in the transport pod. The second day, she woke early to read and study and met Oz alone in the common area.

  “We’re going over the sea soon,” he said, “Have you ever been?”

  Poppy shook her head.

  Poseidon smirked and then responded, “No need for me to torture you then. It’ll be torture enough.”

  He hadn’t been exaggerating. Toward the end of the second day on the pod, they began their transport over the sea. The pod hovered well above the waves and Poppy assumed they’d be safe. She hadn’t realized how tall the waves would get and how horrifyingly deep the waters would be. The pod was dragged beneath the water a few times and Poppy clutched Castor’s thigh as she peered out the window to see all manner of terrifying creatures. Even the tundra was sparsely populated compared to the sea. Schools of teething fish, miles of thick seaweed tangles, shimmery sharks and enormous tentacled whales and squid teemed in the navy waters.

  The pod seemed to be mixing hovering and swimming depending on the conditions and Poppy’s nausea intensified. She hardly wanted to go to bed, especially not alone. What if the pod got dragged down and she was stuck at the bottom of the sea? Ajax stayed awake with her in the common room, falling asleep on her lap as she reviewed her notes for the debate.

  Ajax must have carried her into bed because she woke up the next morning there with all her notes tucked away in her backpack. They were still at sea on the third day of the journey. Poppy could now identify twenty species of sea creatures, and she had Jason explain to her — much to her disturbance — about vamphares, essentially vampire-bunnies.

  “They used to roam Vortha when our parents were kids.”

  “You could wake up and find one sucking the blood from your newborn. Wily creatures.”

  “Not a funny joke,” Poppy grumbled.

  “They’re being serious,” Ajax assured her, “They were a scourge.”

  “Bunnies are adorable!”

  “Earth bunnies perhaps. Not vamphares.”

  “I’ve seen pictures of them. They look exactly like cute white bunnies! You three are messing with me.”

  Cas shook his head.

  “I only hope you never encounter one yourself, Penelope.”

  Poppy smiled. The boys had been right about this trip. They sent their coursework back to campus via the pod’s panel each day and spent the rest of it together. Poppy liked talking to them, learning about Devor and running her hands through their hair as they snuggled on a pod chair, instructing her about the biodiversity in the ocean or on land.

  “My family has a place on the Southern continent,” Jason said eventually.

  Of course, they did. Poppy silently wondered whether there was a square inch of the planet that Jason’s family hadn’t established an estate upon.

  “The manor?” Castor asked.

  Jason nodded.

  “They’ve gone to Sekhmet-beta for the semester and won’t be back for a while, but Daphne’s got custody of the house during our tri-week.”

  Tri-week was the three week holiday between the first and second years of school. Poppy imagined she’d spend hers on Vortha unless the Fengari had other plans for her. They spent most of the third day on the transport finishing homework and receiving detailed lectures on debate strategy from Oz.

  He’d taken it upon himself to lay off Poppy, which she appreciated. By the morning of the fourth day, they could see land from the pod. Poppy never thought she’d find a worse way to travel oversea than the boats she’d used to get across America. She’d been wrong. The pod was efficient and safe, she’d give it that, but the entire experience had been terrifying.

  The Southern continent was far more mountainous than the Northern one. The pod tilted again as they ascended five-thousand feet to cross the mountain range that separated the Southern cities from the coast.

  “Do the Southerners eat seafood?” Poppy asked eventually, interrupting what had been a rather boring math study session.

  “Yes. Funny question, jazad. What did you get for number five?” Jason peered over at her work before she could answer. Poppy covered it with her palm.

  “They aren’t close to the sea, though.”

  “They have a lake.”

  “Dare I ask what creatures lurk beneath,” Poppy mumbled.

  “Twenty-foot eels, giant serpents, tooth-fish…”

  “Tooth-fish?”

  “Yeah. They’re about fifty feet long. Delicious.”

  “How big is this lake?”

  “It’s populated.”

  “I gathered.”

  “Now, come on. We won’t have much time for homework during the competition. I want to finish this.”

  Poppy stopped her questions for the time being. Oz had them practice debating throughout the entire fifth day of their journey. They hardly had time for meals, let alone for rest. When they arrived at the Southern College, they had one day to explore before the debate began. Poppy had forgotten what it was like to be an oddity. On Vortha and at the Academy for telepaths, everyone had grown accustomed to the strange pink alien.

  Here, they’d heard rumors, but most had never seen a real human up close before. Poppy pulled her cloak tightly around her and stuck close to the boys. The Southern College was less majestic than the turreted Academy but lay on a sprawling campus about triple the size. The students here were paler skinned than their Northern counterparts and appeared even more resistant to the cold.

  Debate day arrived and Poppy sat with her team, dressed in their smart Academy debate uniforms, ready to win, ready to make her school proud, pleased to have finally found some sense of belonging.

  17

  Leaving Vorste

  In the third round of debate competition, Poppy recognized why Oz worked them so hard before coming here. The competition was stiff and the Academy for Telepaths had nothing in terms of overall preparation compared to the Academy for Political Service on the Southern continent, or Vortha Humanities College. Devorans could be long-winded and even if they kept their emotions buried, during a debate, their strong emotions often bubbled to the surface and into her awareness.

  They’d won their rounds so far, and toward the end, Oz’s cruelty intensified. Luckily, she didn’t find herself alone on the receiving end of his jabs. He went after everyone and only stopped when Lyric burst into tears, uncharacteristic of her usually upbeat manner. Lyric’s outburst had the odd effect of relaxing Oz, and tensions settled when the team made it into the final round. Poppy had done well, which earned her Oz’s approval.

  As the end of the debates neared, Poppy found herself less worried about winning than about the words Sibyl had whispered to her as she lay dreaming. She’d grown to like Oz, especially since he stopped haranguing her. Poppy hardly thought his hostility was strong enough to lead her to the path of doom and destruction thusly proclaimed by Sibyl.

  The night before their last in the Southern city, Vorste, the boys noticed Poppy’s sullen attitude and attempted to cheer her up before the last round of debates. Oz and two juniors would be their picks for the final round, Castor reminded her. There was nothing to worry about then, except enjoying herself. The air in Vorste was thinner than Vortha due to the altitude and even Jason, who was accustomed to a variety of Devor’s temperatures seemed to find the place cold. Poppy didn’t think her nose and cheeks would ever lose the sharp scarlet that sett
led upon them.

  Nothing the least bit ominous happened during the final night of the debates. She sat beneath Ajax’s warm embrace with Lyric on her right. Lyric whispered to Penelope anxiously before Oz’s introductory speech and if she didn’t know any better, she would have thought Lyric romantically interested in her co-captain. Oz’s speech earned him a round of applause. The Telepaths Academy defied expectations by making it this far. Poppy learned that some Devorans viewed Telepathy as too emotional a field to render skilled debaters.

  The team proved them wrong and cinched a victory. The Southern College hosts had placed in third, and the Academy for Political Service won second place, breaking their ten-year victory streak. Their host school invited the team for a celebratory dinner and afterward, they had one day to explore the city before the long return to Vortha. Poppy didn’t want to admit to the boys how anxious she was to cross the sea once more in the pod which had proved itself robust. Rendering her power to the captainless vehicle as they heaved and sank and rose again from the sea made her queasy. The boys probably already knew, Poppy realized when they were extra sweet to her and even offered to braid her hair in traditional Devoran styles during their night off.

  The next morning, Oz roused them early. With medals ‘round their necks, he barked orders at the team as he led them back onto the transport pod. The sullen nature Poppy knew him for appeared to have returned with a vengeance. On the transport pod, the juniors and sophomores retired to their rooms to study. Their professors showed little mercy, nor approval for their victory, and they faced grueling exams upon their return. Lyric and Oz sat together in the common room, a look of doting admiration plastered across Lyric’s face which Poseidon didn’t notice, or didn’t want to.

  Jason had crawled into bed and fell straight to sleep. Ajax did the same. Castor refused to leave Penelope’s side, though his dull amber eyes and softened ears indicated his exhaustion.

  “I won’t leave you alone until we cross the sea. I know how it scares you.”

  “It doesn’t scare me,” Poppy denied flatly.

  Cas smirked.

  «I know how you think, Penelope. We’re mates.»

  Mates who hadn’t mated since before they’d left Vortha. Poppy couldn’t deny that she was frustrated.

  «We haven’t done a lot of that lately,» she said.

  Cas squeezed her hand and took her head onto his shoulder.

  «I know, my little alien. We will. Soon.»

  «I don’t feel good about this journey, Cas.»

  «The Fengari queen can only see one possible future, not all of them.»

  «I hope you’re right.»

  «Close your eyes. Sleep on my shoulder. We’ll be over the mountains before you know it.»

  Poppy closed her eyes and let Cas stroke her hair, and be the voice of reason she desperately needed them to be as worried hurtled through her head like New Grand Central Station. Poppy dreamed as she slept against his solid frame, but her dreams weren’t telepathic, just regular nonsensical dreams of her past in New-Manhattan, of Uncle Monty polishing his glasses and of CJ. She still missed him and wished she could have had a proper goodbye.

  A loud thud woke Poppy.

  “What was that?” she gasped.

  The pod was dark, except for Castor’s eyes, which glowed yellow.

  “I don’t know. Nothing, probably. We’ve just hit the sea.”

  “Perfect,” Poppy grumbled.

  “Come. Don’t worry.”

  Cas kissed her, and Poppy willed herself to let her worries go until another loud thud sounded against the outside of the pod.

  “Nothing out there can get in here, right?”

  “Of course not. I can’t even tell you when the last pod crash was.”

  “I should go back to my room, shouldn’t I?” Poppy wondered.

  Cas shook his head.

  “I told you, I’m not leaving you alone.”

  “We could squeeze in there,” Poppy suggested, “I don’t want you to be uncomfortable.”

  “I’m never uncomfortable when I’m caring for you, Penelope. Now come. Sleep. And don’t let the sound trouble you anymore.”

  Poppy closed her eyes but that didn’t stop her heart racing. Castor’s eyes had been a bright yellow, which meant for all his words of kind comfort, he was just as scared as she was. Perhaps more. Castor never worried unless he had good reason.

  18

  The Tundra

  Ajax and Cas ventured outside onto the tundra for no longer than six minutes as Poppy roused Jason. He’d hit his head and she thought he might have a mild concussion.

  “What happened?”

  “We crashed. The pod’s open but… we’re missing people.”

  “Pods don’t crash,” he grumbled and tried to get up, before slumping backward and finishing off with a heaving groan.

  “You must have hit your head when you went down.”

  “Pods don’t crash, Penelope. You don’t understand. If the pod went down, it’s because someone caused it to.”

  “Who would do that?”

  “I don’t know but we need weapons. Provisions…”

  Jason groaned and slumped backward again. Poppy kissed the top of his head and stumbled over to the front of the pod. Cas and Ajax had maneuvered their way through deep snow back to the entrance.

  “No sign of them. If they’d walked off, there would be footprints.”

  “Teleport?”

  “Maybe.”

  A little yelp inside the pod indicated Lyric had awakened. She shot to her feet and called for Oz.

  “He’s not here, Lyric,” Ajax said, doing his best to sound soothing, but not quite shaking his alarm out of his voice.

  “Where is he? What’s going on?”

  Cas tossed her a torch which she deftly caught.

  “Are we exposed?”

  Ajax nodded solemnly.

  “Shit!”

  Poppy never heard Lyric raised her voice, let alone swear like this. She stepped up as the team leader.

  “We need to search the rest of the pod and make sure we have everyone. Then we’ll need to use our credits to get a bonfire going and emergency tents.”

  “What about animals,” Ajax pointed out.

  Lyric’s face went as pale as a blue face could go.

  “We’ll have to get ready to fight.”

  “We were out long enough for the sun to go down, which means we’ve been unconscious for a couple of hours.”

  “The pod must have been deoxygenated before it opened,” Lyric agreed.

  “What I mean is,” Castor shifted with the weight of what he was about to say, “Nobody’s coming. The emergency system should have sent a signal and we should have all been teleported into the city center.”

  “Shit!”

  “There hasn’t been a crash in decades,” Ajax pointed out, “If this was a manmade error, we’re the unluckiest Devorans to have lived.”

  Jason managed to wrestle himself to his feet.

  “We’ll be even unluckier if we don’t get moving. Cas, how many credits do we have left? Penelope, search the ship.”

  “I’m headed outside to find Oz,” Lyric announced.

  Jason grabbed her arm.

  “You can’t go out there alone. Two grown men are no match for dogs.”

  “I don’t care. If he’s out there, I have to find him.”

  “He’d never agree to you going out there alone. I’ll come with you.”

  “Jason!” Penelope pleaded.

  He’d made up his mind. Penelope left to search the rest of the ship. She managed to get Eros awake, junior girls Antigone and Galene were crouched out of sight in the back of the pod and sophomore boy Janus was fast asleep in his cabin, burrowed under sheets. Penelope got them all up. Everyone else was gone. There were no footprints in the snow, as Cas and Ajax pointed out.

  The bitter cold kept Poppy from thinking too deeply about Sibyl’s prophecy.

  “Are Jason and Lyric bac
k yet?”

  Ajax shook his head. He had a stack of supplies from the panel.

  “We don’t have much food.”

  “Can we stay here?”

  “Overnight, yes. We’ll have to keep watch, but we’ll have to get moving in the morning. We might be able to make it back to Vortha.”

  “What about the emergency teleport?” Galene asked, pulling her cloak around her shoulders.

  “We’ve tried reaching the school. It’s no use.”

  “We can’t go out there overnight,” Janus squeaked, in a remarkably high voice for a Devoran man, “There’s dogs and worse!”

  “That’s why we light fires,” Lyric said, appearing in the doorway.

  “Where’s Jason?”

  “Right here, Poppy. No need to panic.”

  «Sheesh, jazad,» he added, just for her.

  Poppy’s cheeks reddened. Admittedly, she was panicked. Lyric and Cas loaded them up with supplies. The pod would only get colder overnight and they’d all freeze to death without a fire. They might freeze to death anyway, Poppy thought morbidly. Ajax gave her extra gloves and socks and stuck a large fur over her head before he built the fire. Red and orange flames licked up toward the sky.

  The fire took about a half-hour to start. By then, Poppy couldn’t feel her nose or fingers. Once they got it lit, Lyric handed out weapons. Janus refused one and they argued over it with Lyric winning in the end. The Devoran preference for anti-violence couldn’t be maintained if a creature attacked. Galene and Antigone stuck close to each other and sat close to the fire. Eros and Cas got supplies ready and passed them out. Warm, spicy, Devoran soup brought Penelope welcome relief from the cold. They were meant to sleep three to a tent, but Poppy figured she could fit between her three boys considering she was significantly smaller than any of them.

  After they ate, Lyric assigned the night watch. Poppy got to sleep first since she was the coldest. Galene and Janus agreed to watch first. Lyric didn’t like the idea of Janus guarding them alone and frankly, neither did anyone else. He was about Castor’s size, but his lack of gusto for killing any invading creatures made them all nervous. Poppy slid into the tent, keeping all her clothes on as she snuggled between Ajax and Jason. Ajax rested his large arm over her and kissed her forehead.