“Okay, now you got my attention,” Breeze said sarcastically as he folded his arms across his chest.
“My recruiters—” Oslo began.
“Vermillion and Horton? Yeah, whatever happened to those clowns?”
Oslo ignored his comment. “My recruiters seem to have been...out of contact for quite some time and I have not been able to reach them. Though, I do believe I will be hearing from them soon.”
“Right, the same way we couldn’t reach our parents over the comms because of this fog thing you have over the island. Well, now that Ray seems to have figured out a way to drop it, I suppose you can talk to them again.”
Oslo’s face turned red, and when he spoke, it was in a soft, but earnest voice. “How exactly did all of this come about?”
“Well, since you have no control around here, Ray seems to have been wandering about and poking his nose inside every building here. Maybe you thought we were too dumb to go around and explore this place, but we have. I’ve spent a lot of time around the hangars looking at the aerocraft and robot mechanics you call the RF. Robot mechanics! We don’t have anything like that back home, and I don’t think there is any place like this in the world even though everything looks so old. As for Ray? Well, I guess he got what he wanted. He’s been trying to reach his father ever since he got here and found a way to do that. That Science and Engineering Building by the way? Loaded with all kinds of machines. Oh, and there’s some guy named Bram living inside a tube in the basement. Can you explain that away?”
Oslo and Kera became visibly agitated at the mention of the name. Kera glided up to Oslo’s side and hovered next to him.
“Tell me young man, what did you see?” Oslo’s voice was like a whisper.
Breeze told him of his encounter with Bram.
Oslo turned to Kera. “Why didn’t you tell me this before? You were down there with them? You were observing the whole time? You only told me you saw them departing Perihelion, and no more.”
“I did not wish to alarm you further.” She placed a hand on his shoulder and drew him closer. “We have spoken about his before, my dear man. I have always been an unwilling participant in all of this. I told you from the very beginning not to bring them here, and to keep this forsaken island closed and hidden from prying eyes. I have also been encouraging you since they arrived to send them back home, that no good would come from this. There are things on this island that were placed here for a reason because most could not handle the truth if they discovered the true nature of it all.”
Oslo grabbed her by the shoulders. “I brought them here for a good reason, so do not try undermine my decisions, woman. I went out of my way to retrieve Sally for you as I thought that would at least make you happy.”
She resonated as her body became translucent and she broke free from his grip, and then hovered before him as ghostly mirage. “I do not need to be close to her in order to observe her. Wherever she may be, I merely have to close my eyes and she is there. Bringing her here has caused greater calamity and increased the risks of being discovered. By them.” She finished her words with a hiss as she pointed at the sky.
Oslo groaned. “How many times must I say this? They are dormant. They no longer rule the skies like they once did—”
“Then explain your urgency in scouring the world for them.” She pointed at Breeze. “If you no longer live in fear of those above, then why the mad rush to recruit, no,” she said with a sick smile, “to save and shelter as many of these paranormal children as possible? Don’t bother to answer, I will. Because they are back, sweeping this planet from one continent to the next and taking those they deem valuable and eliminating the rest. You and I both know this.”
Oslo put a hand up to her. “Rest your tongue, woman.”
Kera materialized to swat his hand away. “I will even say their name. The Elephim.”
Oslo took a step towards her, and she shrunk back.
“Yes, Oslo, that very name. The one you dread to hear. They are back. They are burning cities again, are they not? Just like in the past.”
“I thought I was helping by bringing them here to give us a chance to reclaim the world again for ourselves,” Oslo said as he loomed over her. “I also thought I was doing you a favor bringing her to you and creating an opportunity to secure a legacy.”
“Sally and I may be alike, but as I told you, I can guide her no matter where she is.”
“No!” he roared. “Foolish woman, do you think they do not have ways to block your access to her?”
“I am prepared for whatever they may throw my way and willing to accept the consequences. Are you?” She shimmered brightly and floated closer to him. “You should have let sleeping dogs lie. But no, you had to stir the hornets’ nest. We all could have faded quietly into the night, but you just can’t give up the past, can you, my dear Ole?”
“When you call me by that name, I know it’s just your way of getting under my skin.”
“I’m reminding you that even in the past, you were never really accepted here, no matter what you did with Raza and Bram. Even now, you are still an outsider on this empty relic of an island. Go back to Scandinavia. Better yet, take Nina with you to Appalachia. You will find safety there, or at least closure and peace of mind. Keep your promise you made to Raza and make her whole again.”
Breeze heard enough. “Can’t say I understand anything you two are talking about. But I’m smart enough to realize that it’s pretty serious. I’m going now,” he said and turned his back to them.
Oslo stood before him. “Breeze, wait. Just hear me out, ja?” Oslo said as placed his hands on Breeze’s shoulders.
Breeze was too stunned by how quickly Oslo moved to resist.
“I have kept much from you and from the others as well, but for good reason. I now realize the error of my ways. If only I had conveyed to all of you the sense of urgency in my mission, then perhaps things would not have turned out this way. But you are all that I have left. I beg you young man, listen to me now.”
Breeze nodded.
“Long ago,” he sighed, “very long ago, I too, arrived here much like you, a fish out of water. This place, as I imagine you have surmised for yourself, is no school. It was an outpost. A military outpost. The last of its kind in a world that was dwindling into mediocrity and eventually, destruction. I came here as a raw recruit with gifts I did not quite understand, much like yourself. I would rise up through the ranks and into the Military Science Battalion. It was there that I would meet Raza, who became my wife, and Bram, the man who became my best friend.”
He relaxed his grip on Breeze. “It was in that very building the three of us began to unravel the mystery of the hidden forces that were sowing the seeds of dissent and destruction throughout the planet, and across to her far flung colonies on other worlds.”
Breeze spoke up. “When you talk about colonies, you mean space travel?”
Oslo smiled broadly. “Yes, son. Yes. It was a magnificent time. An age of heroes!”
Breeze laughed. “Space travel isn’t possible. It’s a myth. The best we can do today is just fly through the atmosphere. Nothing else.”
“It is there you are wrong, young man. It was a gilded age, where anything was possible. I should know. I lived it. You must believe me.”
“You lost me with the space travel thing. That’s how I know you’re insane. It’s not possible.” He brushed Oslo aside and resumed his march to the stairs.
“Did you not see anything here at all that piqued your curiosity? Or are you truly the lowly son of a scrap metal hoarder?”
Breeze came to a sudden stop upon hearing those words. He was tempted to turn around and say something, then continued on his way.
“March away, young man, off to obscurity and insignificance, much like the rest of the world. No hope. No future. No dreams
. Just emptiness.”
Breeze whipped around. “What do you want from me, old man? Why do you keep saying these things?”
“After all you have witnessed, are you still asleep?” Oslo said. He was framed against the encroaching morning light with Kera in her flowing white dress beside him. Excort stood off to the side.
The three of them were not that strange to him. Seeing the dregs of the desert come to his father’s scrap yard allowed him to witness the sad and dark underbelly of the world with its maddening poverty, the hopelessness, and the wasted lives. A world where Nomadic people aimlessly wandered the desert searching for scraps to sell to his father so they could feed their children.
It dawned on him that the three individuals he was staring at came from a different time. They had lived longer than most men ever have. Far longer. He didn’t know how he realized this, it just came to him. Like a thread that unravels from a sweater and reveals the flesh that it was trying to hide.
He strode over and dropped his backpack at their feet. “I came here because my father said it would give me chance to see more of the world, and that I would get the training to better control my powers. Well, I can say that I’ve definitely seen a lot, and that you guys aren’t really instructors now, are you?”
“My, the brilliance that spills forth from this one. Please, Oslo, send him on his way before he dazzles us with more, for I fear we could not bear it,” Kera retorted.
Oslo raised the back of his hand to her face, and then addressed Breeze. “I promise that if you stay, I will focus everything that I have, all of the resources at my disposal, to teach you how to master your flying abilities. But son, you can do so much more than fly. Surely you understand this?”
Breeze shrugged. “I just know I never get hurt. If I slam into the ground or into the side of a mountain, I leave a crater behind. What if I could learn how to fly better, then what? I go back home to the scrap yard and do what? Enter in the air shows and get paid to be a freak? I’ve got enough problems as it is, I really don’t need anymore. You said it yourself, I’m the lowly son of a scrap metal hoarder.”
Oslo shook his head violently. “No, I take it all back. I had to say something to get your attention.”
“Such a brilliant tactician,” Kera murmured.
Oslo shot her an angry look.
Kera rolled her eyes and turned away.
He turned back to Breeze. “Please, don’t give up on me like the others. Be different. Stay the course. Give me time.”
“Time for what?” Breeze stood up to the towering man and looked straight into his eyes. “What do you want from me?”
Oslo started to speak, and then stopped. He became flustered and he turned to Kera.
She blinked at him. “Oh, my counsel you now seek? Very well. Tell us, Oslo, we stand here before you as a captive audience. Regale us, what do you want from them?”
Oslo’s face turned red and his breathing became labored.
“Stop that,” Kera said. “You always had such legendary difficulties telling people what you want. Is it safe to say that’s almost how you lost Raza?”
His eyes went wide as he glared at her.
“Oh my, hit a nerve, did I? Turn your wrath away from me. I did not start this, you did. Tell Breeze of your grand mission, and let us see if it can withstand the trial of a young man’s judgment.”
Oslo closed his eyes tightly and clenched his fists.
Kera cackled. “Not so easy now, is it. You accuse me of hiding from the world on this island? Turn the mirror upon yourself. Crisscrossing the globe on your sailing vessel, while avoiding Elephim to find the children of gods long perished. To raise an army to march against those who have put this planet in shackles. Tell him. Tell him everything. What is there for you to lose? It appears you are down to just one recruit. And not much of one, from where I’m standing. What will he do, crash into his opponents? Brilliant strategy, yes?”
When Oslo opened his eyes, they glowed. He looked down at Breeze, and then dropped to one knee. “Kera, in her usual acidic way, is quite right. The truth never should have been shielded from your eyes.” He swallowed hard as he took in a deep breath. “I had decided to recruit the paranormal children of the world. To create and train a fighting force, to hone their skills and help them rediscover the glory of Earth from the past. To destroy an enemy that resides above and have driven us into these dark times we live in today.”
Breeze nodded his head. “Okay, now I’m really leaving.”
Kera clapped her hands slowly. “Fantastic salesmanship. Pure gold.”
Oslo ignored her. “Breeze, I know your father. He is capable of doing fantastic things with metal. All sorts of things. He’s more than just a dealer of scrap metal. He is a creator and a fabricator.”
“My father? Are you serious? What has he created? I haven’t seen anything.”
Oslo smiled and pointed. “You.”
“Me? Are you kidding? He ignores me most of the time and acts embarrassed when he does pay attention to me.”
“Breeze, all things happen for a reason. There is no such thing as coincidence.” Oslo stood up and straightened his jacket. “There is so much to tell you. So much to learn. If only you would give me the time.”
Breeze picked up his backpack. “Well, you had plenty of time. If you just told us this earlier, who knows, we might have listened and just gone along for the entertainment. But now, no.”
“Breeze, there are others like you. You are not alone. You will be tempted to use your gifts in front of the ignorant masses. They will hunt you down and destroy you. They will not stand by and tolerate something they do not understand. They live in a fog of ignorance and poverty. Their hatred of themselves is far more powerful than the hatred they feel towards others. But they will take it out on those like you. Please, I implore you. Stay.”
“Nah, I’ll take my chances. Back home I can just keep flying around in the desert at night. Nobody has ever bothered me there.”
“And what happened when you flew out of your little world and into another? Did you not tell me your tale of flying into the Bad Lands and not realizing it? And what of the strange howling creature that you encountered at the lake, or the elderly couple who helped you get home? Did their story not pique your curiosity?”
Breeze slung his backpack over his shoulder. “Oslo, just tell me about that Bram guy you have in that creepy basement. That’s what I really want to know before I leave.”
“Bram was a good friend. A friend I lost to what I believe was a worthy cause. Together with my wife, Raza, we engaged in what we thought was a grand experiment, which turned into a noble failure.”
The blue color of his eyes faded as he stood up and walked to the balcony railing. “We came up with a plan. It was simple at first. Bram was a first rate projector, one of unlimited potential. Far greater than anything Sally has demonstrated to you. With a thought, Bram could step outside his corporeal body and fly through the air and to the stars themselves. His ability also let him see into the souls of others, to the point where it almost drove him mad. He marveled at the human capacity for duplicity as he saw how their thoughts never quite matched the words they spoke.” He chuckled. “I suppose if he was here right now, he would say the same about me.” His tone grew somber. “I came up with a plan to use the power of a projection device I designed and fabricated along with a robot assistant of mine. A device that would allow him to travel into the far reaches of the universe. That contraption you saw him inside of was a vehicle, but not the sort that you would travel with. This one tapped into the depths of the earth, drawing forth the vast reservoir of electromagnetic energy from the core and redirecting it through his body. Bram would step into the tube, or “The Chair,” as we would fondly refer to it, and use the extra boost of energy to project out into the vast depths of space.”
&n
bsp; “Why?” Breeze asked.
Oslo turned to face him with an arched eyebrow. “Good question. We had always suspected that what ailed our world was something so sinister, that its face could not be seen. Like the wind, you could see its effects, but can you really grasp the wind? Bram and I had a theory. If he could find a way to project backwards and forwards in time and observe, what would he see?”
Breeze shrugged. “Who cares? Look, if this guy was a time traveler, why not just change the past?”
Oslo shook his head. “You must learn to listen, and not speak when a story of this magnitude is being told. Attention to detail is everything in life. The most minor of mistakes can cause mishaps that reverberate throughout the fabric of time. But I will answer your question. Bram could only observe what was happening, but could not affect it. He would return to his body, often drained and exhausted, and would tell us everything he saw. We began to put together a picture of a past that showed the footprints of a shadow society that was eating away at the heart of our own. It didn’t use force. It didn’t use weapons. Their methods were very simple and effective. They used us.”
Breeze sighed. “I don’t understand what you’re trying to tell me.”
Oslo nodded. “Most don’t. When one thinks of revolutions, you picture weaponry and bloodshed. You imagine quick victories and the toppling of governments. The oppressed masses are now the victors. Peace and prosperity reigns throughout the land. No, it was not like that. This revolution took a very long time. It was planned out well in advance and would take centuries to see it through. But in the end, victory was achieved. And it was done without them firing a single shot and not one bit of destruction came directly from their hands, but through surrogates and useful idiots who aided and abetted them. The people, over time, just gave up, and handed their freedom over to them.”
“Them?”
“The Elephim,” Oslo said.
“By the thousands,” Kera whispered.
Breeze Corinth (Book 1): Sky Shatter Page 24
