by Matt King
Paralos had warned him that she might try to create a divide between them by filling his head with doubt. He thought knowing it was coming might help him guard against it, but now that he heard her, he couldn’t deny that some part of him started to question Paralos. How much did he really know about him?
He pushed the thought away, mad at himself for even entertaining it.
“You know I am telling you the truth,” she said.
“Stop looking in my head.”
“I do not need to. Not anymore. I can see it in your face.”
“I don’t even want you reading that. I don’t want anything to do with you. With any of you. All you do is use people. Well you’re not going to use me. Not anymore.”
He felt the power within him swell as his anger rose. The lines of plasma ran faster across his skin.
Her eyes narrowed. “You think you can kill me.”
He stayed quiet, trying to will his thoughts to remain the same. He couldn’t help but picture setting himself off and seeing her ripped to shreds from the blast. As soon as he had the thought he frantically tried to forget it, as though that might erase it before she saw.
“This is how you repay me,” she said.
“I don’t owe you.”
“All I have given you, and you think to murder me.”
“You said it yourself. I was born for greatness.”
She laughed. “Tamaril warned me you would succumb to your own delusions of grandeur. Seems he was right yet again.” She moved closer to him.
“Stay back.”
“Or what?” Her eyes dared him. “What will you do, Michael?”
“You can be killed.”
“By you?”
“I can do it.”
“No,” she said. “You can not.”
Without thinking—without worrying about what might happen after—he closed his eyes and let his power loose again in a violent blast. He expelled it all, pushing it out of his system as fast and as powerfully as he could make it go. His veins coursed with energy. It was nothing like his death blow to Velawrath or even to the Orphii. It felt as though he was setting fire to the universe.
Maybe she was wrong. Maybe she was bluffing and I’ve killed her.
When his power emptied, he opened his eyes to see the effect.
Amara stared back at him, bright and full of life. A cloud of his red energy surrounded her.
I can’t reabsorb it, he thought in a panic. When he looked down, he saw gray skin, dull and dormant. His circle was gone.
“I want you to remember this,” she said. “In the days ahead, when Paralos fills your mind with dreams of glory, I want you to remember this feeling of powerlessness.”
He clutched his fingers to his throat, frantically trying to stop its collapse. He gasped for air that wasn’t there. Pressure built behind his eyes that felt like it might crush his skull.
“Remember that you stood before me as you once began—as a human, not a god—and know that you can be nothing more.”
His vision began to fray at the edges. He thought he saw a synapse appear, but his mind could barely process what was happening to him.
“I allow you to live this day out of respect for the laws of my Circle, but when I see you again, Michael, you will only get one more chance to return to my side, laws or no. Think of what I have told you and consider your answer carefully.”
Then, like a balloon re-inflating, the air returned to his chest. His vision solidified like a movie coming into focus.
Once he’d reclaimed his breath, he searched the stars for her. He was alone again. The red energy seeped through his skin, gradually bringing him back to life. Gone, though, was the sense of power that came along with it. As he watched the plasma feelers return to his skin and reconnect with his shell once again, he didn’t hear Amara’s words echoing through his thoughts. Instead, he felt the echo of his powerlessness, just as she had ordered.
You will never be good enough. Never.
This time it wasn’t his father’s voice mocking him, or even Amara’s.
It was his.
CHAPTER TEN
No one had said a word when they made it back on board after the Tria fight. The Horsemen returned to their cabins, bloodied and beaten from their civil war. They didn’t even wait for Cerenus to heal them. Bear stood alone on the main deck, staring out at the ocean of stars. Cerenus claimed he needed to monitor the ship’s computers during their departure. That left August and Aeris by themselves in the halls of the ship leading back to their rooms.
“What did you see?” he’d asked her.
Aeris paused with her hand on door to her cabin. Her back was to him. “I saw the truth,” she said.
She went inside before he could ask what that was. Then again, maybe he already knew. Hadn’t he been shown the same?
Instead of retreating to his room, he’d decided to visit Ion. He told himself it was to check on his teammate, but it was just as much to prepare for the fallout of what was to come. No one had said anything, but there was a definite storm brewing inside every member of his team. The second someone broke the silence, the mutiny would come at him in a wave.
When he sat down beside Ion’s container in the control room, he allowed himself a relieved breath for the first time. Maybe it wasn’t so much a breath of relief, though. Maybe it was more like a signal that he was finally ready to let it all out—the pain of what Coburn showed him. The pain of feeling the wrath of those he’d failed.
The pain of losing.
The central column of the control center revved to life. Ion opened his shell without August having to knock first.
“Good to have you back,” August said.
Ion’s shell was full of color once again. Instead of the bands of pearly white he usually showed while housed in his shell, he was a swirling kaleidoscope of colors, constantly changing shades as though he was trying them all on again after having them taken away by Tiale.
“You saved our asses back there. I don’t think we would’ve lasted much longer if you hadn’t shown up. The Tria were…” He trailed off as the memories replayed themselves. “They weren’t what we were expecting. What I was expecting, anyway. I don’t know. Maybe we had it coming. I led us in there like there was no way we could lose and then it all went to shit. I’m still not totally sure what happened. I never even drew my swords.”
As if he were making up for it too late, he took out one of his swords, but he shied away from looking at the polished metal. Even though it had been a while since Soraste gave him his eyes, he still had a hard time stomaching his reflection.
“I think I’m losing them.” He surprised himself by saying the words out loud. “I can feel it, you know? When I give orders, it feels like they’re following more out of duty than anything else. Even the Horsemen look at me differently. Not that I blame them. I haven’t exactly been tearing it up in the decision-making department. Ever since we formed this group, the best we’ve been able to do is win a few scraps. We haven’t made so much as an inch of progress in this war.”
August sheathed his sword and rubbed his hands over his face. His gloves clinked against his eyes.
“And then there’s Aeris,” he said. “She and I have never really talked much about whatever it is we have going on. If anything. There is something though, right? I mean, after what she said on Earth about us being together under different circumstances, I kind of assumed we were a thing. Or something. But lately she gives me this look all the time, like she’s disappointed in me or—” He let out a heavy sigh and let his head fall into his hands. “Christ, I’m talking to a god damn ball like it’s the second coming of Oprah. What the hell is wrong with me?”
“There is nothing specifically wrong with you that I can detect, which is hardly surprising, given your ability to heal.”
August raised his head slowly. He looked around hoping someone else had heard it too. “Did you just talk?”
“I emitted vibrations that mimic
ked the sounds of words in your language,” Ion said.
“That counts. Oh man, I knew it. I knew I wasn’t hearing things last time. Bear owes me ten bucks.” He’d been wrong about the Speak-N-Spell voice, though. Ion sounded more like someone speaking through the back of a fan. “Wait a second, talk again.”
“For what purpose?”
“Just making sure.” He felt like running to grab everyone. Under different circumstances, he might’ve. “So what makes today so special? I’ve been coming in here and spilling my guts to you forever, it seems like, and you’ve never said a word.”
Ion levitated between the columns attaching his shell to the rest of the chamber. He was silent for so long, August thought he’d gone mute again. Finally, he answered. “I do not often interact verbally. Usually, there is no need.”
“People don’t need to talk where you’re from?”
“It was never my intended purpose. Soraste created me to observe her colonies and study their behavior. Originally, I was to advise her as she sought to create the perfect society for the species.”
“Originally?” August asked.
Ion paused again. “She did not appreciate my advice.”
“Which was what?”
“That she was wasting her time. I informed her that humanity, as a whole, did not deserve the benefit of her attention because of its destructive nature. In effect, she was traveling in a circle hoping to find an end. She also did not appreciate the humor in the irony.”
“So, what? Humanity is doomed?”
“Everyone is.”
Great. A misanthropic robot. Maybe getting Ion to talk wasn’t such a good thing after all.
“Humanity—” Ion left the word hanging. “You are a troubled species.”
“No offense, but I don’t really need a computer to tell me that.”
“Even now after nearly losing your life, you are making jokes.”
“I’ve been killed before. You get used to it.”
“Do you? The fear of death drives much of what you do, and in many cases leads to the exact fate you wish to avoid. I have studied thousands of worlds filled with trillions of human lives. I have listened. I have observed. I have accumulated a record of every philosophical dogma developed by your civilizations. In many cases, I have been given direct access to the thought patterns of your minds. In all my years of study, I have found one prevailing commonality of the human worlds.”
“Yeah? What’s that?”
“The fear of being human. It is human to die. You spend your life trying to deny death. It is human to live. Most avoid living. So much human potential is spent creating ways to transcend humanity. Never before has there been a race so uncomfortable with itself.”
It’s like talking to every goth kid I knew from high school. “You know, for a champion, you’ve got a pretty bleak view of the people you’re trying to save.”
“There is no saving them. There is only prolonging the inevitable.”
“Does Soraste know she made you suicidal?”
“Soraste appreciated that she could not read nor predict my inner dialog. She developed my functions of thought and analysis until I could change my programming myself.”
“So you could program yourself to be anything.”
“Yes.”
“And you chose to be a clinically depressed beach ball.”
“I choose only to tell the truth about what I see, when I am asked.”
August thought about all of the people he’d met in his life on Earth. There were a few he could count as good, but the majority were either too generic to remember or complete assholes. Multiplied by a few trillion, he could start to see why Ion was so down on the human race.
“You said you observe and tell the truth,” August said. “What’s the truth about us?” He felt a strange pang of nerves. He’d never had a real job review before, but he wondered if this is what it felt like.
“You are a strange group,” Ion said. “Not at all what I was expecting.” He drifted away from his housing and started to circle around August slowly. “The godclone, Cerenus. Him I am most familiar with from his dealings with Soraste. He is like many of the gods: focused on himself, the power he holds, and finding ways to increase his power. The rest of you, however, are intriguing. The Horsemen, as you call them, are particularly curious. So single-minded of purpose. Unquestioning loyalty. Then there is John ‘Bear’ Lawson, a man who is incredibly strong, yet only uses his strength as a last resort to resolve conflicts. He fights because he feels it is his duty to protect, and he would not think to question a decision to give his life to save others.”
“What about Aeris?”
“She still cares for you.”
“I didn’t mean that way.”
“I believe you did,” Ion said. “As for the rest of my observations, I believe her to be your greatest asset. She is fierce, cunning, powerful, and yet she cares more about those she loves than she values her own potential for rule. She has all the qualities of a tyrant but is curiously averse to tyrannical actions. She has been a pleasure to study.”
August leaned back against the wall and crossed his arms. “That leaves me. Go on. I can take it.”
“There is much to process when studying you, especially given how forthcoming you have been in speaking with me.”
“Yeah, well I didn’t know I was contributing to a case study.”
“I do not have much experience with individuals who wish to be a hero,” Ion said. “The vast majority of people I interact with have no aspirations to lead, let alone engage in heroic acts. Many people pretend to want this. They dream of it. Few actually do what is required, so you are unique in this aspect. It appears to be the driving force behind many of your actions, other than the usual hubris and narcissism common to those in command.”
“I’m not a narcissist.”
“I have witnessed you admiring your suit in mirrored surfaces on many occasions.”
August looked down at his armor quickly. “What do you know, anyway? You’re a floating ball. You’re one hook away from a Christmas tree ornament.”
Ion let a blue streak pass over his face. “And you deflect criticism with humor.”
“Maybe.”
“The humor is almost exclusively funny only to you.”
“Alright, alright.”
“Due to narcissism.”
“Okay, I get it.” August stood and pretended to watch the lights moving through the wall of computers. “What I really wish you could give me some insight on is the people we need to fight. Of course, that would require you to, you know, actually fight, so you don’t have much experience there. Thanks for finally jumping in today, though.”
“You would not have survived had I not.”
“Cerenus could have done…something.”
“Incorrect,” Ion replied. “And I have withheld from fighting simply because you did not need me. It is unwise to fight as one unit. Having all champions in one place leaves us vulnerable to a single attack which could wipe us all out.”
“It might also mean winning a fight without losing anyone. Did you think of that?”
“Obviously.”
“Right. Obviously.” August turned and leaned back against the wall. “So are we going to talk about it?”
Ion paused. “Talk about what?”
“What happened. What happened to us. What happened to you.”
“The Tria are fascinating,” Ion said, although his tone was anything but admiring. “Their powers have not been witnessed, according to Soraste’s records.”
“Well they’ve sure as hell been witnessed now.” August felt a bolt as he pictured Mordric’s eyes turning to him. He pinched his forehead as though the pain still shot through his skull. “The guy hit like a train and he never even touched me.”
“Mordric connects with his victim’s psyche and implants visions in their heads. These visions usually draw upon the fears and weaknesses of his prey. This mental connection allow
s Mordric to effectively drain the cognitive capacity of the mind, as well as harm it physically. In the end, he reduces the brain to little more than liquid remains. The subject cannot survive, even with a healing factor.”
August pictured his brains leaking out his nose while he laid defenseless on the swamp floor. “Okay, so maybe you did save our lives a little.”
“And then there is Ellia,” Ion said. “Her familiars spawn from the cloud that surrounds her. As long as she’s protected by her shroud, she can create any sort of beast she can imagine. They exist in her mind, but they are able to interact with this reality, as we have seen. She considers them her pets.”
“And you know all this just from being near them?”
“No,” Ion answered. “Tiale showed me.”
“Showed you?” August came off the wall. He walked to Ion’s side. “What do you mean she showed you?”
“Tiale is…unstable.”
“She’s a god damn lunatic, is what she is.”
“Lunacy—a derogatory term for mental illness, which is itself little more than an imbalance of chemicals in the human brain. Treatable in most civilized worlds, yet seen as untreatable in your own, though I cannot imagine why, other than a societal need to bolster their own psyche by belittling the deficiencies of others.”
“I know I don’t speak spaceball, but if I didn’t know any better, I’d say you were stalling.”
Ion hummed in place, silent for pause. “Incorrect.”
“Incorrect?”
“Incorrect.”
August waited for him to go on before resorting to prodding. “Alright, so we’re dealing with someone who has a chemical imbalance and likes to kill things with her finger. And she also likes to talk to you.”
“I would not categorize it as a conversation,” Ion said. “As I said, she showed me things, mostly about herself.”
“What about herself?”
“She showed me what she sees.” For a moment, Ion’s hum seemed to be louder, like a computer under heavy load. “She showed me because she knew I would understand, though I cannot say how she interfaced with me. I have no means of open communication with the outside world, and yet, she spoke to me.”
