Orphans and Outcasts (Northland Rebellion Book 1)

by Kylie Leane

  “Itsy bitsy spider went up the water spout.” Titus’ voice was muffled somewhat by the tight confines of the air-ducks.

  Jarvis’ hands were sweating, smearing their oddly blue-tinged illumed perspiration on the glossy walls he struggled to cling to. His master, somewhere below, continued to sing the old children’s tune that was now looping in his head.

  “Itsy bitsy spider went up the water spout. Down came the rain, and flushed poor spider out.”

  “Master Titus, that is not helping!” Jarvis shouted into the gloom. He squeaked as his boots slipped and he plummeted, losing control of his gravity-bubble as fear of the unknown overwhelmed him. Skin burned as he fought for a grip, smashing his fists and heels against the walls until he stopped. His racing heart thrust daggers through his chest and he stared blankly into the humid air, tasting his own blood. Cursed Sun On High, he was being so childish, not controlling his own gravity and not keeping his thoughts stable.

  “Jarvis? Yeh all right up there, laddie?”

  Come to think of it, how, by the Almighty Sun, was Titus doing this? His master was a fair bit larger than he was. Then again the Messenger had been consumed by a Twizel; it would not surprise him if he had simply turned into some kind of slinky shape and slid down the walls. Jarvis groaned. Oh—how far he had come from the farms of his forefathers.

  “Fine. I’m fine. Just having trouble stabilizing my gravity. I think it might be, ah…It might be the dark and the humidity.”

  “Ah, yah, it could be left over conditioning from yer imprisonment. Don’ let it get to yeh. Happens to the best of us. Yeh should have seen me before I was consumed. Piece of stinking pve’pt poop I was. We be almost through, I think. I can see a light.”

  Jarvis found Titus’ nattering relaxing. His imprisonment haunted him—the torture of the Twizels that had slaughtered his family, the lashes that still scarred his flesh. But if Titus mentioned it, somehow it did not seem so frightening. Titus had an odd way of making him feel respected despite still being a lad. According to the Hunter, in the eyes of Messengers, at ten and three sol-cycles he was old enough to run his own squadron. Titus looked to him to hold every type of responsibility a Messenger his age would, whether he had been trained in the legendary House of Flames or not.

  Apparently his ordeal of being captured and kept in a box for two sol-cycles warranted respect from his master. He was not about to lose that respect now.

  Hand under hand, he continued his downward climb.

  Titus was right, he concluded, peering at the symbols floating in front of his vision: they were almost through the network of small tunnels, per the data that trickled into his mind from the new environment around him.

  “Ah-hah!”

  The shout of victory tickled his alerted ears. Jarvis winced at the high-pitched twang and shook his head, trying to rid himself of the echo.

  “Made it! Come on laddie, ain’t too much further ta go. Drop—yer gravity will catch yeh.”

  “I can’t.”

  “Jarvis, trust yerself. Trust yer gravity. Come on, Little Weasel. When Zinkx was yer age he infiltrated a Zaprex Way Station and took down eight of the machines inside.”

  “Zinkx this, Zinkx that!” Jarvis spat back. “All you and Khwaja Denvy do is talk about how amazing Sir Zinkx is. I’m starting to think he doesn’t even exist.”

  A bellowed laugh caught him by surprise. “I’ll give yeh a clue, as long as yeh don’ tell Clive. He truly does think Zinkx is as grand as we make him out ta be. What be better, laddie? The story of a grand legend, or the truth of that grand legend? What if the truth of that legend be a nightmare? Be it not better to tell a fabricated fairy-tale?”

  “I would rather the truth.”

  “Yah, yer be a spoilsport, Little Weasel.”

  “Stop calling me that!”

  “Oh, I made yeh mad. Get down here and punch me.”

  Jarvis hissed. He dropped. Gravity control had taken him months to perfect, and he had needed it to manage Ki’b, the little Kelib girl who had claimed him as her future husband. Whatever would his mother and sister have thought of him, betrothed so young like a little lord of a lofty city? His father would have laughed like a jolly old drunkard. With the cheerful thought of his family’s smiling faces foremost in his mind, Jarvis sailed downwards, daring to speed up until he caught a glimmer of light and abruptly halted himself inches from the floor.

  Titus whistled and clapped. Jarvis cocked his head to one side, looking across at his master leaning casually against the wall. Whenever he heard Titus’ drawling voice he imagined a tall melanite-skinned Southern Tempath from the silver mines with a pick-axe over his shoulder. But Titus was not a Tempath; he was a Retenna breed—skin like yellow orthoclase, hair as fierce as the fires of their cities’ furnaces, and a body as spindly as the willow trees that lined the mighty Cor River Network. Titus was not his voice.

  “Khwaja Denvy says I must refrain from showing anger.” Jarvis straightened his tattered leather vesting. Ki’b was going to be upset again over the damage to it. She fretted something awful about their attire, now that they could afford to buy clothes again.

  “If Khwaja Denvy told yeh ta walk off a cliff, would yeh do it?”

  “No.”

  “Good. Just checking.” Titus ruffled his hair playfully. He pointed down a dark corridor. “I say let’s go this way.”

  Jarvis rolled his eyes, visualising the direction with his optical view of the star-glider’s schematics. Holographic symbols, invisible to Titus, spun around him as he walked beside his master. The world was lit in a brilliant display of images and he cringed at his inability to translate Zaprex. He was able to comprehend certain things due to the new information feeding into his mind, but he could not understand the language. It was as if he was missing a vital key. His fingers coiled unconsciously around a small prism tucked under his vest. The hum resonating from the piece of crystal was a constant comfort.

  “Well, I gotta hand it ta the fairies—they had some nice decorations,” Titus called from up ahead. Jarvis caught up, finding him admiring a section of crystals that had burst through the corridor floor and twisted into a formation around the ceiling.

  Titus’ hand reached out for the dazzling glow and Jarvis reacted instinctively, pulling his hand aside.

  “Don’t touch, Master! They are not normal crystals!”

  Titus looked at him in confusion.

  “They are the Matrix Crystal of this vessel,” he quickly explained, releasing the grasp on Titus’ wrist. “I think, from what I am picking up from the mainframe, this ship crashed here, and it was never shut down properly. No one was here to look after it, so the Matrix Crystal broke out of confinement and it has bled through into the other systems. If you touch it, it will send out a charge…oh…”

  A smile had snaked its way across Titus’ lips and Jarvis groaned, rubbing a hand through his hair in frustration.

  “Right, you’re technically already dead. I forget that.”

  “Nice that yeh do, laddie.” A grateful wink was cast his way. It was true; Titus did like it when any of them forgot about what he called his ‘untimely burden’, so he could be poetic and embellish his tale for later retelling.

  “Just wanted ta see if it be the same as the ones in the House of Flames.” Titus held his hand closer to the light of crystal. Jarvis watched in morbid curiosity as his master’s skin peeled back, and, layer by layer, the flesh decayed until all that remained was bone. Titus rattled the bones playfully, wiggling his eyebrows boyishly.

  “Shouldna be surprised, I suppose. I be a creature of shadows and Zaprexes loved their light.”

  “I’m sorry, Master.”

  “Aw, don’ be, Little Weasel. I stopped bein’ sorry about it a long time ago.”

  His hair was ruffled by the cold bone hand.

  “What does it do? Do you know?”

  Titus gave a thoughtful tip of his head. “Hmm, I think it is the form of light the crystals give off. It is
on the same spectrum as the Sun or some mumbo jumbo like that, blah, blah…I never listened to Raphael long enough to keep up with what she was saying.” Titus studied his burning skin for a brief moment longer before unhooking his magnificent black coat. He wrapped it around his frame. The silky fabric activated upon meeting his shoulders and pooled, protectively coating him.

  “Happened all the time at the House, with them thraki crystals hanging everywhere,” Titus muttered. “One of the many reasons why I was decommissioned ta Second Base. The High Elder said I made people uncomfortable, being what I am and all.”

  “But you’re not a Twizel. Surely they understood that?”

  “Messenger society is jaded, laddie. Had I not been the one ta’ve been turned, I would have acted just as they did. Yeh only see the world different when yeh step outside of the world. Remember that.” His master tapped his forehead sharply and Jarvis winced.

  “This noggin of yers is too good ta waste. That’s one thing yeh do have in common with the real Zinkx.”

  Jarvis smiled. “The real Zinkx.”

  “Aye, the one who doesn’t kill Twizels with his bare hands.” Titus cracked a laugh. “That’s what I do. Ohhh, wait until you run into Graa-crels, or Mites, or worse…Brainny-suckers.”

  “Brainny-Suckers?”

  “Yes, Brainny-Suckers are their official name in the Library. We tend to shorten it to Suckers, though, yeh know, ’cause yelling ‘Brainny-Sucker!’ takes a wee bit long.” Titus held up two fingers. “That’s with two Ns, by the way. Very important that.”

  “You’re making this up.”

  “No, mah son named them. Don’ let kids name monsters.”

  “Just out of curiosity, what is your son’s name?”

  Titus turned a corner, throwing back a grin in his direction. “Rosie Red Telvon—after his great, great, great grandfather General Richard the Red, who slaughtered the Magnificent Graa-crel in the Battle of Purification.”

  Jarvis smiled. During his imprisonment by the Twizels, and the long two sol-cycles in a wooden cage, he had come to understand that Messengers cared very deeply about the historical tales of their past. Even if the stories they told were comically overdone to the point of myth, they had a wonderful sense of grandeur to them.

  Messengers lived in their past, Khwaja Denvy had said, because they did not believe in a future. They had fought the same endless war for so long, they no longer saw anything more than war and now he, Jarvis of the Plains People, had become part of the Messenger mythology.

  He passed mutated crystals, each filled with philepcon liquid that resonated a song to which his own heart was beginning to rhythmically time itself.

  “Sir, we should take the next right. I think the control deck is down that corridor.” Images scattered over his vision as he looked back and forth, scanning the lower decks. The creaking of the hull was grating on him, just as much as it grated on the star-glider. The poor vessel was very tired—tired of lying in the sand-sea, being subjected to the pull and push of the haywire gravity, and controlled by the tides of Utillia. He felt sorry for it, to have been left all alone, dying, with no one to hear its silent screaming.

  “I can hear you,” he whispered. “I can.”

  Titus nodded. “Lead the way, Little Weasel.”

  He still could not understand why Titus had decided on Weasel for his pet name. He certainly did not look like one. If anything, his annoying adoptive sibling Clive was more of a weasel than he was, but Titus had named Clive ‘Volcanic-Boy’ for his eruptive behaviour. That was no better, and he could not understand why Messengers had to come up with random, stupid names for each other—or maybe that was just a quirk of Master Titus.

  He huffed, wedging his hands into his hip-bags.

  A door ahead of them had been jammed open by a large crystal formation, growing up the side of the wall and spilling out into a flower shape. Jarvis smiled, wishing Ki’b was with him, she would have loved the beautiful sight more than anything. Dropping onto his knees, he slipped under the ancient growth into the wide expanses of a round Central Control Room. His chest expanded as he breathed in the purified air, still ventilated through the star-glider’s inner core. Many of the floating terminals had collapsed from their stations, but a few remained free-standing. He skipped over to the upper-deck, landing elegantly on the main boulevard.

  “It must have been something when it was fully operational.”

  “We’re here for a reason, Jarvis, not ta explore ancient wonders. The last time yeh did that yeh got yerself infected. Let’s hurry this along. I don’ like the feeling in the air.”

  Jarvis pouted. Why did no one else feel what he felt whenever they approached Zaprex ruins—the songs that lingered sorrowfully, waiting to be set free? It was all so sad, and beautiful at the same time.

  He brushed a hand against a panel, static coursing through his finger-tips.

  “Hello, Bez-at:_Who_Lingers_by_Water.” He chuckled as the vessel’s name trickled over his optical lenses. “It is an honour to meet you. I hope you don’t mind, but I’m going to tap into your mainframe.”

  He wanted to laugh aloud as a garbled reply fizzled over his optical lenses. So, the star-glider’s computer, while in hibernation, still maintained enough of a personality to respond. His heart was flooded with an incredible swelling of connection as he settled into a floating glossy chair. The moment he contacted the surface of the seat, the interior of the room ignited with life. Titus yelped in alarm.

  “What’d yeh do?”

  “Don’t worry. It’s just sensing the philepcon liquid in my body. It isn’t enough to fully restart the ship, but I should be able to tap into the base-level programs. I’d need to be a full hybrid or a Zaprex with actual code to run this ship on my own. My philepcon levels are still too low right now for me to be classified as a hybrid. Give it some more time though, I’m sure.”

  “When did yeh grow an extra head?”

  “When I got infected by a fairy-machine. You remember it don’t you, Master?” he joked mockingly. “You lopped off its legs and smashed its heart while I was there. I thought I had died.”

  “Aw, yeh wee Little Weasel. Scared of dying, are yeh?”

  Jarvis raised an eyebrow. “I dunno. I guess.”

  “Yah, well, someday it happens ta us all. Just depends on how. Personally,” Titus put a long knife to his own throat, “I’m hoping for a swift chop to the neck.”

  “Fitting.” Jarvis rolled his eyes. It was another thing he had learnt in the company of Titus. Messengers discussed death and the passing to the Glorious Sun as though it were a common occurrence. He supposed to a race of soldiers it was, but it had been confronting to adapt to both Khwaja Denvy’s and Titus’ indifferent outlook on death. Even now, Khwaja Denvy facing his end, when he had once been an immortal, did not seem to cause alarm.

  It felt as though it should.

  A god dying in the way Khwaja Denvy was—it felt disrespectful.

  At least Ki’b was making a fuss, but, then, she was Kelib, and she respected ancient traditions.

  He shook his head. He had become a Messenger, but it did not mean he had to think like one. He was still Jarvis of the Plains People.

  Unhooking the triangle pendant from around his neck, he slotted it into a section in the terminal. Holographic screens ignited, spreading around him and he searched through them. So many words he had yet to learn. The language tumbled into his mind, but he could not comprehend it. It was far too much for him to currently grasp; it was all one step at a time. He flicked aside the seemingly useless information and kept a single display.

  “So, we are sending a message out on a loop, right?” Jarvis glanced over his shoulder.

  Titus paced the room irritably.

  “Aye, aye. If yeh can do it.”

  Something had spooked the Hunter, though he was not letting on what it was. Jarvis’ neck hairs hackled as he twirled a holographic control. He tugged up his sleeve, reading the scrawled-out numbers Khwa
ja Denvy had given him that morning.

  His brow furrowed as the screen glittered red, the symbols blurring. “Are you sure this code is correct, Master? It is registering as very old and, considering the state of this ship, anything it considers old must be, well, ancient. Guess I’ll just backdoor my way in.”

  “It is old because Duamutef may well be the oldest thing I know, and, thus far, it has never changed its base-code, so it should be the same.” Titus’ black shape settled beside him, resting like a hawk. “If yeh tap into its mainframe, the signal will boost itself, hopefully. At some point it will figure it out, if it ain’t too busy running around after idiots.”

  Jarvis fiddled with the nearest loop, cocking his head as he listened to the static noise over the ancient crystal-wave network. With a Matrix Crystal that had bled out of its containment, they should have managed to extend the signal. Neither he nor Titus needed to worry about the repercussions of the contamination that came with spending too long exposed to a naked Matrix Crystal. His body was becoming metal and crystal, and Titus was dead—but he dreaded to think of what was happening to those who dwelt in Utillia.

  “Who is Duamutef?” he asked.

  Titus was silent. It was never a good sign when his master was silent. Titus was either talking or stalking around but rarely did he grow silent unless a problematic question was asked or he was under pressure.

  “Duamutef is the Lady of the Tower.”

  Jarvis crinkled his brow. “What?”

  “Yeh know—the Towers! The brilliant thingy-ma-bobs that are supposed to fuse the jarvik world together.”

  “I know what the Towers are,” Jarvis shot back with a glare. “It’s just…why is it a lady of them? Wait. You kept calling it an it... Why not a she if she’s a Lady?”