by Matt King
“Wasteful,” Meryn said as she watched it go. “It’s not enough to save you.”
“It’s enough to save the part of me that matters,” Soraste answered. She watched her spawn descend. Once it disappeared into the clouds, she nodded. “I’m ready now.”
Meryn reached both hands toward her. Soraste closed her eyes. Her features began to fade as her body returned to its shapeless pure form. Before he could utter a word, Meryn shredded her into pieces, pulling Soraste apart at the edges until she was nothing but clumps of scattered energy. One by one, Meryn absorbed the body of Soraste through her hands, brightening her inner light until she was nearly too brilliant to look at.
August couldn’t turn off his sight. He was forced to watch as Meryn murdered her friend. “You’ve lost your mind,” he said.
When Meryn faced him again, she took hold of his thoughts, seizing him mentally. He stopped breathing. Every inch of his body felt like it was on the verge of splitting in half.
“Stop…this,” he choked.
Meryn drew him closer until her face dominated his sight. “We used to think of ourselves as the pinnacle of evolution. In the end, we were nothing but exaggerated versions of you. We deserve Pyra. I deserve her.”
His air dwindled to near nothing. “Meryn…”
“Listen to me,” she commanded. “Our self-centeredness had a price. I didn’t want to die, so I began the Circle War without thinking of the eventual cost. I wanted John to live, so I saved you both on Earth. Billions died, but I had my prize. I allowed him into my heart because I hadn’t known love. I wanted it. He loved me back, so much that he didn’t want a life without me in it. He wouldn’t let me sacrifice myself to save you. I’m no longer doing it to save you. I’m doing it to save myself the pain of living. Amara was right. Do you hear me, August? Amara was right. No thing should live forever.”
His vision snapped back to black just as his lungs were on the verge of imploding. The pain intensified until he could no longer form coherent thoughts. Every part of him screamed with horrible pleas for death.
I wish you luck, she said through his thoughts. The Circle has failed. If you survive, be better than we were.
His pain melted away suddenly. In its place came a sensation of inflating. He could sense himself growing, but not just physically. His consciousness expanded and kept expanding until he felt like the entirety of his knowledge was nothing but an atom in the endless sky. The sensation of emptiness lasted only a calm second. It was like the ocean receding before a tidal wave. All at once, his thoughts were inundated with information—of worlds beyond counting, of structures piecing the universe together, of lives and memories covering eons. He no longer felt like a person living in the universe. He felt like a part of it, as though he was connected to it and could manipulate its inner workings on a whim, like life and everything that makes it were puppets and he held all the strings.
He imagined it was what it felt like to be a god.
The thought brought equal parts fear and exhilaration. He opened his eyes. Eyes. Not mechanical substitutes, but his own eyes once more. His body was still in his human shape, but it was made of light. No, not light. This is the essence of life. This is what binds us. He marveled at his knowledge, how it flowed easily into his thoughts and then returned, as though it was a natural process he’d practiced for lifetimes and not the freakish avalanche of input it had seemed at first. He surveyed his new body as he pieced together what had just happened. Meryn and Soraste gave their lives for him. To him.
As soon as he realized the enormity of what they’d done, a kaleidoscope of colors raced through his body, matching the flurry of horrifying thoughts surfacing in his mind: Pyra was still out there. She would be coming for him. He needed to run, but to where? He needed to save others, but how?
His body started to expand, losing its shape in the process. He held onto it with a slipping grip. Below him, the Alliance waited on a world that he could obliterate if he let it slip too far.
He closed his eyes and mentally reigned in his thoughts, pulling them with a fierce mental force he didn’t feel he could trust. Slowly, as he composed his strength to the point where he felt something resembling control, he took stock of himself again.
I need to get down there. How to do that was the question. He was too large to go to the planet as he was. Somewhere in the flood of knowledge he’d gained had to be the recipe for changing his body’s makeup. Almost as soon as he had the thought, he had the answer. I am never going to get used to that.
He drew himself inward, shrinking his size as he sped through space toward the planet below. As he flew, he marveled at his newfound sight. Unlike the mechanical eyes Soraste had made for him, he could switch fluidly between layers of vision, going from what he’d known as normal, to infrared, to ultraviolet, and then deeper to see the binding energies that formed the latticework of the planet’s stone and earth.
He dialed it back to the spectrum of human sight again after he used his new eyes to find the Alliance. Aeris and Ion appeared as small dots of energy similar to his own. They stood together on a vast plain, waiting.
Keep it cool, Dillon. Pretend like this insanity is normal. Somehow.
Clouds streaked past him until he was below their ceiling. He slowed his speed, noticing for the first time that he was trailing a white streak behind him. He flipped himself over so he could land feet-first, coming to a stop when hit the green grass near the Alliance. He stumbled as he landed, sticking his leg out so the momentum didn’t make him fall.
Ion hovered silently. Aeris and the Horsemen stared at him slack jawed.
“Sup,” he said.
“You’re…” Aeris began, but couldn’t finish. She took a hesitant step toward him. “Are you…?”
“Yeah,” he answered. He looked down at his glowing body. He could see straight through to the grass behind him. “Oh, hold on.”
His body reacted to his thoughts without hesitation. In an instant, his transparent body reconfigured itself into the armored look they were used to.
The Horsemen bowed their heads to him.
“No, no. Don’t do that. I’m just a dude.”
Aeris came toward him until she was an arms’ length away. She reached up and gently touched his face. “Your eyes,” she said. Her own purple eyes shifted between his. “They’re so blue.” She smiled as she said the words. She pulled her hand back quickly and blinked. “What of Meryn? Did she…impart this on you?”
“Soraste and Meryn gave their power to him,” Ion said, floating forward. “And gave up their lives in the process.”
August nodded. “Soraste sent something down here. Was it for you?”
Ion hummed loudly before replying. Unless August was seeing things with his new eyes, his shell was brighter than before. “I carry a rudimentary version of her consciousness. She wanted that much, at least, to live on. Should we survive, I will transfer her to one of her systems after.”
Survive. He immediately felt the weight of Pyra’s threat at the mention of the word. She would be coming for him soon, and he couldn’t let them get caught in the middle of the fight. Not that he knew how to fight her, or even if it was possible to kill her.
“I’ve got to go,” he said. “I can’t stay here. Pyra will be coming for me.”
“And what will you do?” Aeris asked.
Hope there’s some entry in this Wikipedia for Gods that tells me. He might as well have said the words because his hesitation answered for him. “I’ll figure something out.”
“We can help you.”
“Not this time.”
“There are no more gods left to fight with you, and you can’t do this alone.”
“I have to. You saw what she did to Amara. To Tiale. I can’t risk her doing that to you, too.”
After he answered, a thought drifted through his mind, one he immediately took hold of. Maybe he wasn’t as alone as they thought. I think Meryn made me insane. This can’t possibly work. Even so,
did he really have a choice?
Ion moved to Aeris’s side. “You’re thinking of Gemini.”
“God damn it. You’re not supposed to be able to read my mind. It’s the other way around.”
“It was the only logical next step. He’s as much as god now as you are.”
A god. He tried and failed to picture himself in the role. I’ll worry about it later.
“But will he help us?” Aeris asked.
“I don’t know,” he answered. In truth, he wasn’t sure he wanted his help. Gemini had killed billions. That wasn’t something he could forgive.
Ion swirled blue clouds across his face. “Pyra cannot be beaten alone, if she can be beaten at all.”
“As always, your confidence is appreciated.”
“The likelihood of your survival is lower than you imagine.”
“I get it.”
“In short, you are outmatched,” he continued. “With Gemini, you are less so.”
“But we’re still outmatched?”
Ion hummed along without answering.
“Do it,” Aeris said.
August studied her. “Are you sure?”
She shook her head. “No, but what other choice do we have?”
He nodded. As he did, he felt a gnawing pull to leave before Pyra found him. “You may want to move back a little. I don’t know how all this works yet and I don’t want to set you on fire.”
“Wait,” Aeris said. She took his arm and led him away from Ion and the Horsemen. She gave them a quick look over her shoulder before taking both his hands in hers and resting her forehead against his.
“I’m coming back,” he said.
“Do not make promises to me you can’t keep. I know what you face.”
He could sense the fear in her voice. “It’s me, remember? I don’t have a chance if I’m not fighting against impossible odds.”
She gave a gentle laugh. “Whether you come back or not—”
“I told you—”
“Whether you come back or not,” she repeated, “I want you to know that I’ve grown from simply having you in my life, to wanting you in it, to needing you. You are a part of me now.” She leaned in and kissed him.
The moment came and went too quickly. He didn’t want it to end. “So does this mean we’re…you’re one with me?”
She gave him a sad smile as she stepped away. “You should go.”
“Yeah, I guess so.” He let go of her hands and waited until she was back at Ion’s side before morphing back into his transparent form. He glanced up at the empty sky above. “I’ll send Pyra your love.”
Aeris lifted a hand in goodbye. He tried not to think of it as his last image of her as he left the ground.
In seconds, he was past the planet’s atmosphere and speeding toward the stars. He focused his vision on the pathways through space, searching for another concentration of energy like his. Finally, he saw it—a small pulse of energy near the universe’s edge.
He picked his path and sped off to meet Gemini. He only hoped he could get there before Pyra.
CHAPTER THIRTY-NINE
Gemini appeared as a red cube near the edge of the universe. August was still trying to get a handle on his newfound bank of knowledge, but he was pretty sure someone like Gemini shouldn’t look like a box. His power was dense, concentrated. He was stronger than August had thought, which meant they might have a chance after all.
If he agreed to help, that was.
Before August arrived, he slowed down enough to check behind him for Pyra. He hadn’t seen a trace of her yet through any of the pathways, which worried him. As far as he knew, the gods weren’t nearsighted. He should have been able to see her by now.
He shook it off and created the last synapse in his journey, reaching out with mental hands to take hold of the space for his exit and bending spacetime to his current position. It was like compressing a spring connecting two spots, one he could walk through and then release again to regain its shape. He emerged through the face of the synapse. Gemini floated nearby, a brilliant red candle in the emptiness of space.
He hesitated before he approached. As usual, he hadn’t thought of anything to say. To buy some time, he morphed himself into human shape again while he made up his mind. As soon as he formed, he could sense a mixture of anger and confusion inside Gemini. He expected Amara’s champion to match him in returning to human form. Instead, Gemini’s energy ricocheted around the walls of his cube.
He’s trapped. August checked once more for a sign of Pyra. The pathways through the universe were still quiet. When he looked back, he studied the cube more closely. Walls of energy surrounded Gemini on all sides, connected by interlaced atomic bonds he’d need to break in order to free him.
“What are you waiting for?” Gemini asked.
August hadn’t heard his voice since their meeting at the Vontani bay. It was oddly affecting to hear the deepness. There was a slight undertone of duality to it, as though it was two people speaking at once.
“You came here to kill me, didn’t you?”
Not yet. He made sure to keep his thoughts hidden. “I came to ask for your help.”
He hoped it would catch Gemini off guard and it seemed to work. The energy in the cube slowed momentarily before returning to a constant churn. “I doubt that.”
“Believe me, if there was any other way, I wouldn’t be here.” He pointed to the cell walls. “Who did this to you?”
“Amara.” Gemini said the name with no shortage of venom. “Who did that to you?”
“Meryn.”
“Well looky at us. A couple of new gods in the club. Think we’ll get hazed?”
“We’re the only ones left now.”
Once again, Gemini’s energy paused its flow. “What do you mean?”
“I mean they’re gone. All of them. Champions, too. Pyra killed them, and that’s why I’m here.”
“Amara’s gone? Paralos too?”
“Yes.”
After a silent hesitation, something resembling laughter emanated from the cell. “Good.”
For once, he couldn’t help but agree.
“This feels familiar, doesn’t it?” Gemini mused. “You and me separated by prison walls. Seems like ages ago.”
“Yeah, yeah, memories. We can scrapbook later. Right now, we need to talk about Pyra.”
“What’s the hurry?”
“She’s headed this way.”
He could see Gemini’s mind working, a frantic display of light bursts. “All right. What’s your plan?”
“I’ll let you out of there on one condition: you help me fight her.”
“How do I know you won’t kill me?”
“You don’t,” August replied. He didn’t try to hide the threat in his voice. “Right now, though, we need each other. If we take her on separately, we’re dead. She’s too powerful. The only shot we have is to do this together.”
Gemini seemed to draw inward before answering. “No,” he said.
It took August a second to realize he’d actually said the word. “Are you shitting me? You heard what I said, right? Death witch…on her way here…all that stuff.”
“I’m not coming out of here or lifting a finger to help you unless you promise not to kill me.”
“You’ve killed millions of people and you want me to promise you’re not going to pay for that?”
“I didn’t ask for any of this. I didn’t choose to become a weapon.”
“No, you just chose to go along with it.”
Gemini scoffed. “And how many people have you killed in the name of some god who didn’t give a shit about you? Somehow that’s okay though.”
“God damn it, we don’t have time for this.”
“Then you better decide quickly.”
He felt like crushing Gemini in his cell right on the spot, Pyra be damned. Instead, he closed his eyes and thought of Aeris, and Bear, and Ion, and everyone else he’d fought with in the war. It had all come down to thi
s. He couldn’t fail them.
“I won’t hurt you now,” he said. “You have my word. If we survive Pyra, I make no promises, and that’s the best you’re going to get. Now you can either sit there in your cell and wait for Pyra to come kill you, or you can help me. Your choice.”
Gemini’s silence stretched long enough to make August scan the stars again. The pathways were eerily quiet. Come the hell on already. Finally, Gemini answered. “Do it.”
August reached out his hand, immediately taking control of the restraints holding the cell together like his fingers were attached by strings. He closed his eyes and severed the bonds, loosening the cell until it was a collection of energy hovering around Gemini. August absorbed it quickly. He could sense Gemini’s hunger when he saw the energy nearby.
Like a balloon inflating, Gemini unfolded to his full size, which was only slightly smaller than August. August waited for him to morph into his human form. Nothing happened. Instead, Gemini’s energy roiled in a shapeless mass. He doesn’t know how to control it, he thought.
“Now what?” Gemini asked. His voice hid a layer of nervousness beneath his bravado.
“Now we wait.”
“Wait? What for? We should be going after her.”
“She’s hunting us. We stay here where there won’t be collateral damage.”
Gemini roiled in silence for a moment. “So what do we do until then?”
“Get ready. Whatever it is you do to…do whatever—get it started.”
“I blow up. There’s not a lot of preparation.”
“Is that all you do?”
He could see the thoughts start to race faster in Michael’s mind. That’s right. His name was Michael. He’d been calling him Gemini for so long, he’d forgotten that he had once been a person. He was a kid. A kid.
“I can maybe do more,” Michael said.
“Like what?”
“I think I can focus it.”
“Focus your blast?”
“Yeah!” He sounded like he might set himself off from excitement just thinking about it. “Instead of one big explosion, I can channel it to just hit her.”
