The X-Variant (The Guardians Book 1)

by Rosemary Cole

  Shortly after arriving here, she had learned that both the SanFran and San Jose Guardian refuges had moved out of the expiring mega and into the foothills of the Sierra Nevada range. Some of the original agents still lived in the SanFran refuge (now known as Morgan Lake), but others no longer existed, including Adira, Jaff and Paran. Their epsilon ancestors must have died in the expeditions. And there were Bei there now, too, agents she now remembered living and working with.

  No one else was aware of any of this, she thought. No one but her. She hunched over, massaging her temples with her fingertips.

  “Are you all right, Kala?”

  She straightened and patted Wilm’s hand. “Yes, don’t worry. I do remember now. I must be suffering from stress and fatigue.”

  He smiled and squeezed her hand. “Well, you should be able to get lots of rest and relaxation now that we’re here.”

  Kala noticed Saban walking by the pavilion; he shot them a sidelong glance and then continued on his way.

  “I hope you’re right,” she said.

  Chapter 27

  Whitcomb Creek Guardian Refuge

  September 2079

  KALA DID GET PLENTY OF opportunities for rest in the following days, but instead of relaxing, she worked as much as possible. The weather dialed itself down from fearsomely hot to just bearable, with the temperature falling below one hundred for the first time in two months after August slipped into September. She spent as much time as possible in the fields, helping the beta humans with the harvest, and when she wasn’t doing that, she volunteered for scavenging missions, scouting—anything to fill her time. She took frequent shifts at the nursery so she could spend time with Little Kala. She did drone watch duty and even took her turn working in the kitchen, cooking and cleaning as she had been accustomed to doing her whole life.

  The humans stared at her in astonishment when she began to work alongside them, but she ignored it. After a while Jialy joined her there and then other Unathi began to help as well, looking a bit shamefaced.

  Staying busy was good; it helped her avoid thinking about everything that had gone wrong, everything she’d lost. And it worked most of the time, but somehow the pain managed to sneak in when she least expected it. She’d be riding along on an expedition and without warning, the tears would start flowing. The Whitcomb Creek agents knew her situation, and some were sympathetic. They would touch her shoulder comfortingly and murmur soothing words, trying to help.

  Others remained cool toward her; Kala was sure this was because they disapproved of what she and Sidra were doing—protecting an epsilon and two non-beta humans in clear violation of the mission guidelines. How long, she wondered, would Sidra be able to keep them in line? She kept her drones on Little Kala and the others as much as possible, and worried when she was too far away to get to them quickly if anything should happen.

  Kala often helped Wilm in his newly set-up laboratory, for which purpose he had requisitioned one of the small cabins. He had taken samples from every human and Unathi in camp for a comparison study he was doing on the different strains of the virus. He filled her in about his various projects, including the plans he was developing to build the time travel device.

  “I can’t actually build it here,” he said. “The power from the dam isn’t enough to operate it. I’ll need a nuclear power reactor to create enough energy. There’s one up in Washington about two hundred miles southeast of Seattle; I’m hoping that Sidra will set up an expedition so I can go there and study it, see how I can merge the human technology with ours.”

  “I’ll push your case if I can,” Kala said. She thought about how she had hoped to bring Jennie and the baby to 2616 with her, and felt a great heaviness inside. It was too late for Jennie, but maybe she could finally make Little Kala truly safe.

  Sidra invited her on long walks, and they talked about many things. He had originated south of Asaya, and they compared their experiences of growing up and going through the X-crisis.

  On a crisp, clear day in the third week of September, he took her out on the lake in one of the boats, showing her how to operate it. He turned the motor off and they drifted lazily, enjoying the stillness and the bird calls. Kala trailed her hand in the cool water, watching for fish.

  “What are you thinking about?” Sidra asked.

  She sat up, rocking the boat gently, and took a deep breath. “Do you remember when you asked me why I did this? I never answered you then. I’ve been thinking about it a lot, trying to figure out the answer for myself.”

  “You don’t have to answer, you know,” he said quietly.

  “I know, but I want to. You asked if I love these humans so much, to go through what I have. My answer is yes—I find I love some of them just as much as I could love an Unathi.”

  “I must confess that I don’t understand that,” he said. “They’re not like us at all. They don’t think and feel as we do.”

  Kala threw him a sharp look. “Have you gotten to know any of them? Really talked with them?”

  He didn’t answer.

  She smiled wryly. “I’ve seen how some of your agents look at them. Like they’re nothing but cattle to be herded around and bred. Sarah told me that Oscar marched up to her, told her they’d been ‘matched’ and that she’s supposed to start having sexual relations with him.”

  “That’s necessary for the mission; you know this. We need as many betas as possible, so we are encouraging them to procreate.”

  “Yes, I know that. But it could be handled more sensitively. It just goes to show that we don’t really see them as people.” She realized her voice had become strident and made an effort to relax.

  Sidra looked out across the water. “No, I guess not,” he said after a time.

  “Do you want to know what I think?” she asked.

  “Always.”

  “I think they feel more strongly and deeply than we do. They’ve had to struggle and cope with loss on a daily basis. Suffering was the norm for them even before all this happened. As for us, it could be that centuries of tranquility and the intervention of our syms have dulled our capacity to cope with stress, our capacity to feel. No wonder some of us snapped on this mission. Think about it.”

  He took her hand, caressing her palm with his thumb, and looked in her eyes. “I will, if it makes you happy.”

  She nodded and gently pulled her hand away.

  Sidra was pursuing her patiently but relentlessly. She was fully aware of his desire for her; he made no secret of it. In the direct, open Unathi manner, he had asked her to bond with him not long after she and her group had arrived in Whitcomb Creek. She had an uneasy suspicion that he had issued some kind of hands-off order to the others. Jialy, for instance, was obviously attracted to her, but never mentioned or acted on it, which was not the usual Unathi way.

  Kala was also keenly aware of her own powerful attraction to Sidra, but she fought it. She wasn’t sure she trusted him, and wasn’t ready to move on from her relationship with Liet and Crisfer that had ended so disastrously. She was still submerged too deeply in her loss to respond to his advances. He seemed to realize this and was giving her time.

  “I’ve never had such a physical reaction to anyone before,” she said to Wilm in one of their confidential talks in his lab. “It’s like my body, not my head, has decided that he’s the one I need to be with, and my body is just pulling my heart and mind along with it. I can’t stop thinking about him and when he comes near me, I turn to jelly. It was never like that with Liet or Crisfer, or anyone. Do you think this is normal?”

  Wilm pressed his lips together, thinking. “I’m not sure,” he said finally. “It certainly isn’t typical of how we were back in 2616, before this mission. It could be that being here in this situation with the humans has brought out an atavistic trait that was overlooked in our gene therapies, and our syms don’t know how to deal with it.”

  “Great,” Kala said with a sigh. “That could also explain some of these agents’ obsession wit
h fighting and weapons, couldn’t it?”

  “It could indeed,” he replied.

  Lying in bed at night, Kala struggled to suppress her feelings for Sidra, which were very pervasive and physical.

  Araka?

  Yes, dear?

  Can you turn that off somehow?

  I do try, the Oneness knows, but one can only do so much to counter the flood of dopamine and serotonin. He chuckled. My advice is to jump on and enjoy the ride!

  I don’t know. I don’t feel at all in control, and I don’t like that. It’s scary. Anyway, I don’t trust him. Ever since Crisfer

  My dear, dear girl. You don’t have to trust him to enjoy him. I’ll help you keep your wits about you.

  If I don’t trust him, I can’t bond with him. You know that. I’m certainly not going to couple carelessly like these humans do, an empty act with no meaning. Anyway, you’re sure encouraging me a lot. I’m starting to suspect you get something out of it, too.

  I certainly do, dear one. Your enjoyment is my enjoyment. So hurry up and get on with it, won’t you?

  She knew her sym was jollying her, trying to cheer her up, and there was a time when she would have laughed and joked with him, but she was a different person now. There were times when she was almost cheerful, could smile a bit and even utter a rare laugh, but there were also days when she felt hemmed in by dark, heavy clouds that wouldn’t lift.

  She knew that Brandon was going through something similar. She would go to him when she saw it happening and they would sit or walk silently together, sharing their grief and sometimes holding each other. He kept Bessie the crowbar fastened to a loop of rope around his waist and touched it often; an odd memento of his dead wife. He seemed to need to talk about her. He went on and on and Kala listened, learning all the details of Jennie’s life, including the fact that she had Hispanic, Chinese and Anglo ancestry, and that her father had been a violent man, a criminal. It felt strange to know more about Jennie after her death than when she had been alive.

  More often, however, when she felt this way, she would walk in the woods alone. On one such day in the last week of September, she was miles from camp when an early-autumn storm hit. The trees bent over, submitting to the forceful winds, and the rain whipped down. It wasn’t anything her tough Unathi body couldn’t withstand, but she sought shelter anyway, crawling under a natural lean-to formed by a tipped-over tree with a jutting shelf of earth and leaves caught in its exposed roots. She peered out at the rain hammering down, gilding the forest floor with a silvery sheen. Winter was coming.

  A feeling of hopelessness pierced her to the core. The world seemed unspeakably black. She curled into a fetal position, holding her knees tightly, her body racked with sobs so violent it was hard to find a space to breathe. She couldn’t stop crying and didn’t try, just allowed herself to be sucked deeper into the heart of her own inner storm of misery. Thunder cracked and lightning flashed outside. Pooled rain crept in, mingling with her hot tears.

  Suddenly Sidra was there. He crawled into the little natural shelter and curled up beside her, sheltering her body with his, putting his warm arms around her. “Shh, shh,” he said. “It’s all right now. It’s all right.”

  “I’ve lost everyone, Sidra,” she said hoarsely, sniffling. “I’ve lost everyone.”

  “No, you haven’t. You’ve got me, you’ve got Brandon and Little Kala, Wilm and Alex and Victoria, Jialy and your other friends. You still have love, even if it feels like you don’t.”

  She sniffed and swiped at her eyes. “It hurts so much.”

  “I know, sweetness. But it will stop, I promise.”

  “No, it won’t. It will never go away.”

  “It will get a lot better,” he said gently, wiping her wet hair away from her face. He kissed her neck. “Let me help you. I’m here for you; let me help heal you.”

  At first she didn’t respond, but then something inside her snapped, and she twisted around and put her arms around him. The scent of him, the feel of his skin, the heat emanating from his body was intoxicating. Their mouths met and everything else was forgotten. She knew only desire, a great sense of relief, and an odd feeling that somehow, she was finally home. It had nothing to do with the place she was in—it was how she felt when she was with him, as if that was where she belonged.

  A few days later, she moved into Sidra’s tent. His roommate had moved out to give them more privacy. Once again, her life had taken a completely new turn, and she marveled at how easily it could happen. Just like that, everything was different. She was happier—floating even. Never had she realized that love could feel like this. Everything was sharper, more colorful, all of her senses more acute somehow. There was so much pleasure in the little things of ordinary life. She laughed more than she ever had, as if to make up for lost time. She took more time to rest and to play, roughhousing with Jialy and Brandon, making up silly games with Victoria, taking her and the baby on long walks.

  In her relationship with Sidra, Kala was encountering things she’d never known before in a relationship. Much of her thinking revolved around him; this in itself was a bit strange. She had a vague suspicion sometimes that Sidra was trying to control her. And there was this strange desire on her part to please him, even at her own expense. She wasn’t sure of herself and sometimes wondered if she was in over her head. In the back of her mind, she knew there was something wrong with all of this, but it was so marvelous to feel good, so delightful and so restful somehow, she couldn’t bring herself to do anything that might threaten it. So she suppressed that small, nagging voice whenever it popped up, and went on with her new life. It was enough… for now.

  EPILOGUE

  WILM HAD A PLEASANT sense of satisfaction as he glanced around his “lab.” It had taken him days to get the cabin cleaned to his exacting standards and all his equipment properly set up. Aside from the time travel device parts, he had the Unathi equipment he had brought with him from 2616, and some pieces from the SanFran refuge that had been scrounged from human hospitals and universities. It still wasn’t enough, though, and Sidra had promised him they’d look for more on future scavenging expeditions. But it would have to do for now.

  He turned to the project he had been working on, a comparison of the DNA of everyone in camp. No one to date had studied a human beta’s DNA in comparison with that of an Unathi Bei, a beta’s descendant; that should be quite interesting. He also wanted to investigate whether exposure to the original virus strains had affected any of the Unathi agents. He had promised to look into some of Kala’s oddities, and planned to study her DNA more closely, see if he could learn anything from it. There was so much he wanted to do, it was hard to put them in order of importance. He couldn’t wait to get started.

  He spoke to the Hub, and holographic representations of all the blood, virus and DNA samples he had taken formed in the air before him, overlapping, glowing as they reflected the ambient light. They were a bit rough due to the lack of available drones, which was natural with the small population of Unathi here in this time, but they were serviceable.

  He separated out the DNA samples, moving them to one side with a sweeping motion of his arm. He instructed the Hub to create readouts for each of them. He then sorted the blood and virus samples into two separate columns, grouping them by virus type and subject. Alex and Victoria were alpha and beta.

  Wait—hadn’t Kala said Victoria was a delta when she’d sampled the girl back at the lake? He rechecked Victoria’s virus sample—yes, definitely beta. The drones couldn’t be wrong; perhaps he’d misremembered what Kala had said. He’d have to ask her about that, but right now it could wait.

  He stepped over to the DNA readouts, enlarged them and placed them in the same order as the other columns. Something caught his eye and he stopped, frowning. With a flick of his hand, he moved Kala’s readout up next to the baby’s. The two sets of DNA were strangely similar. He used his finger to overlay them, making them semi-transparent.

  His mouth fell o
pen. They were absolutely identical.

  THE END

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