The Far Shores (The Central Series)

by Rawlins, Zachary

“Vivik is late. He has been coming in late every day for a couple weeks now. Mr. Windsor is confused. He even made him stay late to talk about it after class last week.”

  “Really? That’s pretty strange. I mean, Vivik loves school. It isn’t like him to be late for any class, even the ones about stuff that he already knows.”

  “Vivik has been weird lately,” Eerie said, looking down at her desk and frowning. “You should probably talk to him.”

  “Okay,” Alex said, forcing a smile. “I’ll grab him after class, see what’s up. I’ve been wanting to catch up anyway. Maybe we can have lunch or something. Anyway, he’s not really the one I want to talk to. I’ve been meaning to ask – what are you doing tomorrow night?”

  Eerie hesitated for a moment, and Alex was sure she would say she had to work, that she was needed at Processing for something or other, his plans ruined for another week. He had to return to the Far Shores Sunday evening, so tomorrow was his last chance.

  “Well, I have some coding to finish before Monday,” Eerie said doubtfully. “But I guess I could put it off. Why?”

  “Really? Great! Can I – that is – do you want to go somewhere? Can I take you somewhere?”

  Eerie blinked and appeared confused.

  “Where?”

  “Not telling,” Alex explained smugly. “It’s a date. You don’t get to know,” he said, secretly hoping that Katya would come through. “You’ll just have to trust me.”

  “A date?”

  “Yeah. Wanna go on a date with me?”

  Her hesitation stretched out long enough to inspire a new anxiety in Alex, one that hadn’t occurred to Alex until that moment, though it should have – the Eerie might not be into the idea. He had been so focused on the possibility that she would be busy, or that Katya’s mysterious arrangements with the Black Sun would fall through, that he had never considered the idea that Eerie might simply be disinterested in a date. Though she had invited him to San Francisco to attend a rave – and wasn’t that basically a date? Wasn’t it the same thing?

  It sure seemed like the same thing to Alex, but what Eerie thought was a perpetual mystery to him. Sometimes he worried over their ongoing failure to communicate.

  “Okay.”

  Alex was so engrossed in worry that the bright response caught him off guard.

  “Really? Then you’ll come?”

  “Yes,” Eerie said, with what could have been a very small smile. “If I am your girlfriend, then I should go.”

  “Right. Of course.” Alex cleared his throat, laughed nervously. “I’ll, um, come and get you at your place, okay? Around nine?”

  “Okay.”

  Mr. Windsor entered the class with his typical cheerful greeting, and Eerie turned her attention to their teacher, leaving Alex torn between excitement and trepidation. He sat back in his chair, fully aware that he had a stupid grin on his face, and not caring one bit. He had a girlfriend, after all. It felt very real all of a sudden, and he didn’t care what anyone thought, about it or him.

  Excepting Eerie, naturally.

  “What about it, Mr. Warner?”

  He became belatedly aware that Mr. Windsor was talking to him, and therefore that the entire class had turned in his direction, and became instantly flustered, trying desperately to recall what Windsor had been discussing. Naturally, he drew a complete blank, because he hadn’t been paying attention in the slightest.

  “Uh, I’m sorry. What about what?”

  Mr. Windsor smiled benevolently, as if Alex’s inattention was not at all taxing his legendary patience.

  “Would you care to share anything from your recent experiences at the Far Shores with the class? There is a great deal of curiosity and speculation centered on that facility, after all, and I’m sure that many of your classmates would be very interested in hearing something about your time there.”

  “Ah. Okay. Well, let’s see,” Alex said, mentally scrambling to come up with something to tell the class, trying to remember if the Far Shores was one of the many topics to which Miss Gallow had sworn him to secrecy. “There’s, um, there’s a beach. It’s out in the Fringe, you know, so there’s a beach, but there’s no, uh, no ocean. It’s just Ether.”

  Alex had broken out in a cold sweat, his brow furrowed, trying to desperately to recall anything he had learned, anything of interest. He found himself recalling the strange nocturnal activities that he and Katya had interrupted – the hazmat-suited technicians conducting their nebulous tests at the edge of the endless sea of tumultuous Ether – but that obviously wasn’t the kind of thing he should be discussing, outside of the fact that it would probably get them in trouble, admitting that they had seen it. Much of his time at the Far Shores had been spent on the same Program activities that he did at the Academy, working out, or doing yoga with Katya to kill time. His mind ran desperately over the old diesel buses, the new, generic furniture, and the featureless white halls with the evenly spaced doors, marked only with numbers.

  “Oh! I met Dr. Graaf, the guy who, well, I guess maybe he runs the place?” Alex looked up hopefully at Mr. Windsor, who gave him an encouraging nod. “Yeah. He seemed...nice.”

  Alex stared at the empty white square projected on the screen in front of the class, and opened and then closed his mouth a few times. Mr. Windsor let the silence stretch out longer than Alex thought he was reasonable, and he felt his cheeks burning as his mind turned up blank after blank.

  “He isn’t allowed to talk about most of it,” Katya called out, mercifully coming to his rescue. “Audits business, you know.” Katya popped the last bit of her croissant into her mouth and chewed contentedly for a moment, beaming at Mr. Windsor as she continued. “And they haven’t shown us too much of the work they do there, because we have been involved with the Program. It’s not as if Alex is an idiot, or anything.”

  Alex froze behind his brittle smile, torn between being grateful to Katya and planning a terrible revenge upon her.

  “Naturally. I should have guessed as much,” Mr. Windsor said smoothly, sliding a transparency on the face of the projector, the phrase “The Far Shores – An Institution of Discovery” written large across the screen. “I only asked because, as a result of our recent student exchanges with the Far Shores, this class has been offered a singular opportunity, one that we will be taking advantage of, week after next. An opportunity to get out of the classroom for a short while, and experience a different method of learning firsthand.”

  Alex snuck a look at the class, relieved to see that whatever Mr. Windsor was talking about seemed to have garnered almost universal attention. That wasn’t a huge surprise – field trips were a rarity at the Academy, due to security concerns and logistics. When students required real-world or Central experience, it was generally provided in the context of field study, of which every student had a mandatory period before they could graduate. This was generally limited to the student’s presumed future occupation, however, and never took place in a group setting. Even Alex himself was intrigued, and he had already spent a couple of weeks trapped at the Far Shores, bored out of his mind. If nothing else, he thought hopefully, it would mean an extra opportunity to spend time with Eerie.

  He was about to return his attention to Mr. Windsor’s presentation when he noticed Vivik closing the classroom door quietly behind him. Alex tried to get his attention as he tiptoed to a seat in the back of the class, but Vivik was either more concerned with avoiding Mr. Windsor’s attention, or ignoring Alex, because he didn’t acknowledge him. Alex gave up and decided to talk to him after class instead.

  “The Far Shores have offered the class housing and transportation, and made their facilities available for us to tour, under the guidance of Dr. Graaf and Dr. Tsu, who are the heads of the institution,” Mr. Windsor said, nodding at Alex as if he had contributed something. He started blushing all over again, but when he glanced next to him, Eerie was staring at him and appeared vaguely impressed, so maybe it wasn’t all bad. “There are a variety of la
boratories at the Far Shores, and facilities for a range of studies – though, as you may have heard, much of their work revolves around the Ether, mainly theoretical applications. The Far Shores is perhaps best known for the experimental power generation facility,” Dr. Windsor said, replacing the transparency with what looked to Alex to be the schematics of some sort of industrial building, “brought online only last year – designed in conjunction with the Academy’s own Dr. Vladimir Markov – which is already providing almost half of the electricity consumed in Central. An expansion of that particular project is already underway, incidentally, and those of you who are on the engineering track may have already received recruitment materials regarding the effort.”

  Judging from the whispering and rustling in various sections of the classroom, Alex assumed that Mr. Windsor was correct.

  “That is hardly the only project of interest at the Far Shores, however. During our time there, we will have the opportunity,” Mr. Windsor shuffled a new transparency onto the projector, this time featuring a bullet-pointed list, “to visit the programs for Life Sciences, Theoretical Physics, Chemistry, Nanotechnology, Etheric Networking and Information Technology, Spatial and Statistical Mathematics, Etheric Philosophy, and Protocol Sciences. I believe that there will be something to interest everyone. I will distribute some literature that the Far Shores have provided...”

  Mr. Windsor paused to hand out a few stacks of colorful pamphlets for the class to pass around.

  “...and if you notice a particular program or faculty member of personal interest, I encourage you to let me know. I have been told that Dr. Graaf intends to schedule individual times for students to experience firsthand any of the ongoing studies that catch your interest. Let me emphasize the uniqueness opportunity, one that has not been afforded to any previous class at the Academy, or to citizens of Central at large. The Far Shores is a private, classified research facility, so their decision to invite our class is a privilege, and a rather exciting one. Please do review the materials, and consider seriously whether any of the programs currently conducted at the Far Shores are of interest to you. Are there any questions – yes, Miss Martynova?”

  Anastasia spoke calmly, but Alex got the feeling that she was at the very least annoyed, if not angry. Of course, that was next to impossible for the unflappable Mistress of the Black Sun, but he still got that impression.

  “Isn’t this a rather poorly veiled attempt at recruitment?” Anastasia held up one of the glossy brochures in one hand. “I have seen similar materials. The Hegemony produces them...”

  “Hey!” Grigori snarled, half-standing from his chair.

  “As does the Black Sun,” Anastasia continued coolly, not acknowledging his interruption. “My understanding was that the Academy had a strict policy prohibiting the open recruitment of students who have not yet completed their studies here. Is that policy suspended for organizations with which the Academy has partnered?”

  Mr. Windsor, as usual, looked delighted by any class response he received, even one that was blatantly challenging.

  “An excellent question! To respond – no, Miss Martynova, the rules remain in effect. No attempts will be made to recruit students to work at the Far Shores, and I will be on hand, along with Rebecca Levy, to make sure all interactions are appropriate and within the guidelines of Academy regulations. This trip is merely an opportunity for students to experience cutting-edge research-and-development facilities firsthand. If the Black Sun would like to extend an invitation for our classes to visit their own research facilities,” Mr. Windsor suggested, full of guileless enthusiasm, “then I would be delighted to arrange such a venture. As is true for the Hegemony, and any other interested and relevant parties, I might add.”

  “Noted,” Anastasia responded, sitting back down with a sour expression.

  “Any other questions? Discussion? No, well, then, let’s move on to today’s lesson…”

  ***

  Daniel Morgan was where he preferred to be on a sunny afternoon – and in Flagstaff, those were not uncommon – on the private golf course that was reserved for his cartel, and entertaining ranking members of the Hegemony. The day was warm but not overly so, the grass well tended and recently cropped, and at the tenth hole, he was only a single stroke above his handicap. He shielded his eyes from the sun with his hand while he watched the ball sail smoothly across a sand trap and land within an optimistic two-stroke range of the hole, and felt that generally all was right with the world.

  He took a seat in the plush, off-white electric golf cart and waited for his caddy – Mauricio Delgado, the very promising son of his chief of security – to drive. Instead, the conspicuously fit and subtly armored young man seemed preoccupied with the miniature headset that he wore, occasionally whispering responses in Spanish, speaking too rapidly for Daniel to understand. There was no particular hurry, however; his schedule for the afternoon was completely clear, with nothing scheduled until a dinner that evening in Glendale with representatives of the furiously expanding North Cartel, so Daniel sat back to enjoy the sun and the chirping of the birds.

  Minutes ticked past, and the conversation Mauricio was holding in his headset became more heated. Daniel fluctuated between annoyance at the delay and slowly growing concern at whatever could preoccupy his head of security and his personal bodyguard. Then Mauricio flashed him a quick look, coupled with a smile that was likely intended to be reassuring. Daniel could see the concern in his lively brown eyes, and his mood darkened. While he waited impatiently for the conversation to end, Daniel Morgan checked to see that his compact pistol was lodged next to the seat in the golf cart, loaded and ready to deal with any unforeseen situation. Daniel closed his eyes momentarily, extending the reach of his prodigious empathic abilities, scanning the vicinity for anything untoward.

  Like a number of empaths, Daniel Morgan’s empathy was processed as auditory input, and closing his eyes allowed him to better concentrate on the intertwined cacophony of emotional stimuli that engulfed him. The most immediate cues were his own rapidly diminishing melody of contentment and the rising crescendo of Mauricio’s tension, cut with discordant notes of fear and perverse excitement. Beyond that, he sensed the null hum of the surrounding environment, the simple songs of the birds and the insects – repeating motifs of hunger and fear, or their absence. Aside from the mundane sounds of natural emotion there should have been nothing…

  But that wasn’t the case.

  At the very edge of his range, several hundred meters distant, Daniel could sense the rather shrill notes of mirth and anticipation, woven in a tight harmony of sources acting in concert. And that was very troubling indeed.

  If they had been his security, or reinforcements sent by the Hegemony, or even Lord North’s representatives, Daniel would have sensed the flat tones of boredom and routine exertion, sounds produced by servants and messengers the world over. Even if they had been expecting trouble, as Mauricio clearly was, their expectations would have been tempered by familiarity and dullness of repetition. Any soldier on patrol or guard duty knows that most alerts are nothing more than an exercise, and treats them as such. A crisis only becomes relevant when one materializes. Soldiers on an offensive, however, carry a very different tune.

  “Mr. Morgan, sir,” Mauricio said urgently – his accent slight to the point of imperceptibility, thanks to years of work with a tutor that the Morgan Cartel subsidized – jarring Daniel from his extrasensory awareness. “My apologies. We need to move, sir. Something has gone wrong.”

  “Yes. Absolutely,” Daniel Morgan agreed, nodding while he removed the stainless-finish Colt from where it rested between the seat cushions and placed it beside his leg. “What do you have in mind?”

  “My father is inbound,” Mauricio explained, starting up the cart and driving it as fast as the pitiful electric motor would allow. “He suggested that we move to the east, and meet him near the perimeter for evac, sir.”

  “Very well. Tell me – what is happening?”r />
  Mauricio’s mouth was a tight line of tension, and he pushed the cart too hard, sending it bouncing over the miniature hills of the rough, each impact jarring through the minimal suspension. Daniel Morgan reached with the steadiness of a conductor to sooth the dissonance from Mauricio’s internal melody, restoring a measure of calm and clear-headedness to the reliable and loyal but largely inexperienced youth.

  He was not without experience – if not for Mauricio Delgado, then Daniel might well have died a year earlier, during an assassination attempt on the cartel’s yacht, moored in the harbor of Rio de Janeiro. If not for his quick reflexes and prodigious barrier protocol, the flechettes launched by a plastic explosive charge rigged to a nearby launch would likely have killed him, as it had so many others. Daniel Morgan had promoted Mauricio for his abilities, but he did not have the same confidence in him that he had in his father.

  “How far out is Santiago?”

  “Five kilometers.” Mauricio had to shout over the ruckus the cart made bulling its way through the low brush. “He is already en route.”

  Comforting information. Even accounting for the winding road that led to the course and the private wilderness that surrounded it, it would take no more than a few minutes for his head of security to arrive at the head of a small column of armored SUVs. Daniel Morgan would be evacuated, along with the boy – for security reasons – while his Santiago Delgado dealt with whatever intruder had the temerity to invade his privacy.

  Gripping the dashboard to keep his balance and avoid tumbling from the cart, Daniel Morgan had time to speculate as to the identities of unseen invaders. The Black Sun was always a possibility, obviously, but the Morgan Cartel was not among the more warlike factions within the Hegemony, and had never offered personal offense to the Martynova family. It seemed doubtful that Daniel Morgan would have been at the top of any list of targets, assuming the long-awaited war between the two archrival cartels had actually begun. He had enemies, of course – one did not survive seventy-odd years and innumerable political and personal squabbles, rising to the top of the cartel leadership, without ruffling a few feathers. By the same token, however, Morgan had learned early on that avoiding the creation of unnecessary enemies was equally important to continued success.