Kastori Revelations (The Kastori Chronicles Book 1)

by Stephen Allan

  “The reason I didn’t answer her the first time was because I was in so much pain I had to fight off the oncoming shock. I’m serious, sis, that girl can hit. Forget like a man—there’s a reason Pops wanted her as his bodyguard, and it’s not because she’s beautiful.”

  Celeste’s eyes slanted in curiosity, but she said nothing and Cyrus went silent. Her thoughts turned from the amused to the concerned. Cyrus only went silent when he’d gotten beyond angry at someone. I should’ve said three hours instead of three days.

  “Cyrus,” she said, trying to get him out of his funk, but he said nothing, instead finishing the last of his eggs, not even looking at her. “Do I need to be here?”

  He snorted, but Celeste knew him well to know it was not disrespectful. Celeste got up, threw her trash out, and walked over to her brother, standing over him.

  “Before you see Crystil again, come hang out with me. I don’t need you two interacting with this much heat. OK?”

  Cyrus nodded without looking up. She moseyed to her quarters, only the sounds of her boots making noise.

  Inside her room, she sat on the edge of the bed, removing her boots slowly. Her room, so white it may as well have been an avalanche of snow, contained little besides an actual bed. On the wall lay the control panel for her display tablet, on which she could read about anything humanity had left behind.

  Almost all of it meant nothing to Celeste. She didn’t want to read about folklore, or the different sects on Monda, or biological theories on why certain fur-coated animals survived blazing summer heat.

  Instead, she opened a file with most of her childhood memories, mostly in the form of photos, some in the form of videos. It was a time when an apocalypse on Monda seemed like a bully’s terrifying story, not a reality, and when her father cared for them as children, not as a distant figure leading an entire empire. Celeste started from the beginning, when life just felt like a series of games with her brother.

  In the first image, she, Cyrus, and her father hiked the Reygar Mountains, reaching elevations of a few thousand feet. At the time, it felt like the toughest hike ever, but she could remember their father playfully teasing them that they would have tougher mountains to climb someday.

  “Better times,” she said with a short sigh. “I wish I was still on that mountaintop.”

  She scanned it for a few more seconds and flipped over to another photo—the day her father became emperor when she was ten years old. They all wore their finest robes, she in red and white, Cyrus in black and red, and their father in gold and red—a sight amusing in retrospect. In the empire, many hailed the day with cautious optimism. Dad had a reputation for outreach and some believed in his ability to find peace.

  Celeste still did. Even after the hurried, emergency escape, Celeste believed her father had done the right thing. She believed her father wouldn’t have pushed them away without making an earnest attempt at peace. In fact, she felt reasonably sure that he had made peace, but that an extremist had necessitated the evacuation.

  She wished her father had joined them so that he could bridge the gap between Crystil and Cyrus.

  “Dad…”

  The emotions swelled, and she quickly swapped through more photos, mostly as a distraction. She came to the last photo, taken before their father had his final meeting with the magicologists. She remembered hearing some people say they had to take a photo in case he didn’t come back.

  Well, they were wrong. But maybe it would’ve been better if they weren’t. I wouldn’t have had the rushed goodbye. I wouldn’t be out here, having no idea if we’ll make it.

  No, stop it. Come on now. Dad wouldn’t have sent us out this way if he didn’t believe in us. He always said he would never ask someone to do something that he couldn’t do himself. He’s doing this because he knows we can.

  Just. Believe. OK?

  She closed out the photos and sighed.

  Then the hurried footsteps came from outside, and she felt a very different kind of volatile emotion. Celeste tensed, her shoulders arching up and her legs feeling like jelly at the possibility of something worse than another fight. Cyrus wouldn’t even get to fulfill Celeste’s one request.

  “Cyrus!” Crystil said.

  That sounded… upbeat?

  Something seemed out of place, but Celeste felt less tense. She walked out and saw Crystil standing in Cyrus’ doorway in a surprisingly relaxed position.

  “What do you want?” Cyrus said.

  Cyrus…

  “Celeste needs to be here too.”

  “Right here, Crystil,” she said.

  Crystil turned, and she uncharacteristically had a wide, uncontrolled smile. Celeste let hers form and sat on the edge of Cyrus’ bed. Her brother still laid on the bed, his feet crossed and his arms folded. He looked annoyed.

  “I have some great news. Anatolus is real, and we can inhabit it!”

  Celeste jumped off the bed and joyfully lurched for Crystil, hugging her. Crystil seemed taken aback at first but returned the tight squeeze.

  “Dad was right,” Celeste said, still hugging Crystil.

  “I never doubted him,” Crystil said. “Never have, still don’t, and never will, no matter what.”

  She turned to Cyrus, who sat up but remained on the bed.

  “You know this is good news, Cyrus! Get up!”

  He could no longer hide his joy as he smiled and slowly flung his legs over the bed, giving Celeste a loving hug. He didn’t get any closer to Crystil, but did give the subtlest of appreciative nods. It wasn’t friendship, but it beat being mortal enemies.

  “Yay, we don’t have to die on a metallic hunk.”

  “Don’t get too crazy yet, we do have to land,” Crystil said, still smiling. “The mission isn’t quite done. But with that said, these ships have had one accidental landing in the dozens of years we’ve had them, and even that one barely damaged the ship and not the crew. So the odds are very much in our favor.”

  Dad was right.

  The thought kept repeating. Their father had told them they’d find a new home, and he was right. It was enough for tears of joy to fall as Celeste kept a hand on Cyrus’ shoulder, removing the tears with her other hand.

  “So what exactly do we know about Anatolus, beyond that we can live there?” Cyrus said.

  “Cortanus,” Crystil said.

  “The planet, for all intents and purposes, is the size of Monda. However, the planet has significantly more water as, by our images, it has about ten percent of the land that Monda did. All of the land is congregated into a single continent.”

  The two siblings nodded. That could work, Celeste thought. Humanity won’t reach the population levels it did on Monda, but does it need to? Besides, we’re starting with three people, not three thousand or three million.

  “From our research, there doesn’t appear to be any civilizations. Our images of the land, when visible by sunlight, show a variety of wildlife, similar to that of Monda. While some of this wildlife would seem large enough to be problematic, overall, the daytime life is not a serious threat. On the northern part of the continent rises a tall mountain, far taller than anything that exists on Monda. By our estimations, this mountain rises over a hundred thousand feet.”

  “Well, if we ever need a good workout,” Cyrus said, which caused Celeste to laugh harder than normal.

  “The atmosphere contains familiar conditions with winds, storms, and precipitation. Oxygen levels are slightly lower than on Monda, but you will feel as if you are breathing at a higher elevation. This is all of the information I have at the moment. Please let me know if you have any other questions.”

  “Yeah, uhh, when do we get to explore our new home and throw a wild party on it?” Cyrus asked.

  “I am sorry?”

  Crystil shook her head, but the smile remained. Celeste, seeing this, had hope that the two might actually get along.

  “He means when do we land.”

  “Within the next week.”

>   Crystil looked at each Orthran sibling and put her hands out as if to say, “And that’s that.”

  “Congrats, guys. We have a home. We’re going to continue training to prepare, with the simulations updating based on any new information regarding Anatolus. Please let me know if you have any questions.”

  “We’re good, thanks, Crystil,” Celeste said.

  “Yeah, thanks,” Cyrus said sincerely.

  Crystil nodded and walked out slowly. When she left, Celeste again squeezed Cyrus tightly in a hug.

  “Ow, ow, I’m still sensitive there, ow.”

  “Cyrus! We’ve got a home. Dad was right.”

  Cyrus pulled back, smiled broadly at his emotional sister, pulled her back in, and kissed her on the top of the head.

  “Our father would never have done this if he didn’t believe, Celeste. We have to carry on that belief, no matter what.”

  5

  As she heard the two siblings jubilantly celebrating behind her, Crystil, with her head high, a smile on her face, and guarded optimism about the future, walked to the cockpit. She sat down at the main seat, propped her legs up, and leaned back, staring up at the ceiling’s gray paneling. In the one area of the ship where she felt she didn’t need to act like a commanding officer, she let out a loud sigh of relief. She stared at the blackness, and her mind began racing on plans.

  She knew it would take time before Anatolus became visible. Yet no longer did space match her hopelessness. Instead, it signaled the opposite: a blank slate of possibilities.

  On that blank slate, she knew only one thing mattered besides the bare survival essentials.

  Her relationship with the Orthrans.

  Crystil had to build her relationships with Cyrus and Celeste. She could help them thrive. She could teach them everything she knew. She could help them regrow society on their new home. She could do just about anything.

  It had to start with the two of them, though, and it had to start soon. Sitting in the cockpit with the shouts of joy still audible, Crystil realized how her dictatorial approach would result in her isolation. She reminded herself as evident by their locations that it had already happened and would only get worse. They’d listen to her right up to when they became self-sufficient, at which point they’d tune her out. She was already feeling the effects of loneliness.

  She had no Dyson. She had no fellow soldiers. She had no emperor to guard, no sage wiser than any man or woman she’d ever encountered. She had no one she felt emotionally bonded to. She was alone, the oldest, most experienced, and, seemingly, most removed person in the universe.

  If she wanted, she had two young adults, each with a potentially crippling flaw, whom she could connect with as she had to others on Monda.

  If she didn’t want to feel like the last woman alive, she had to bond with them. She had to treat this less like a mission, and more as a cooperative experience.

  Yet when she thought of all that Anatolus could throw their way, all of the unknown variables, how green they each were…

  She breathed slowly as Cortanus printed off the notes from their earlier training, finally taking her out of her head.

  6

  Cyrus swung his sword overhead as the sharp, reflective blade came down on Crystil. With ease, she anticipated the maneuver, crouched, and blocked his attack by holding her sword horizontally. She kicked Cyrus in the stomach, making him drop his sword.

  “Ow, you really know how to go for my second weakest point,” he said as he recoild and held his hand up. “Hold on a second.”

  He collected himself while Crystil waited patiently. He slowly stood, paced on the creaking wooden floor, and grabbed and sheathed his sword, signaling his desire for a break.

  “I gotta be honest, Crystil, I don’t know why we’re training with these things when I can just shoot you and no amount of sword speed can protect you. I know you say follow the rules, but the rules won’t do much good when you’re dead.”

  Crystil deliberately sheathed her sword, maintaining her relentless, focused gaze on Cyrus.

  “You’re absolutely right, Cyrus. If you had a gun in this arena and shot me, you would win. But what happens when we run out of bullets? What happens when our only weapon is the one that doesn’t need ammo?”

  Cyrus’ mouth contorted as he struggled for a witty response. Nothing came, and he chose not to fight back.

  “In any case, Cyrus, you will benefit immensely from learning to use a sword. It will teach you to be cognizant of your surroundings in a way that firing a gun won’t.”

  Begrudgingly, he nodded.

  “I still want to shoot things up, but I understand, Crystil.”

  Crystil slightly smiled, but it vanished when she assumed her commander role.

  “You have trained for thirty-seven minutes, Cyrus. You and I can continue to train together, or you can train on your own. The choice is yours.”

  “I’ll train alone. You taught me enough for today, Crystil.”

  She showed no visible reaction, verbally or otherwise, to Cyrus. Instead, she ordered Cortanus to bring her out of the simulation.

  “Cyrus, what do you wish to practice now?” Cortanus said.

  He folded his arms, looked up in thought, and gleefully laughed, a process done for his own amusement.

  “Now that I can do it my way, let’s make it fun. Make me fight three people at once.”

  He dramatically removed his sword as three men appeared, each with their own respective sword.

  “Let’s dance!”

  ***

  He might actually learn. At least he listens when I’m done.

  As Crystil removed her helmet and returned to her locker, she turned back to watch Cyrus’ motions. She could only imagine what he saw, as to her, he was just a man in a suit and helmet awkwardly dancing, grunting for no apparent reason. She realized he’d asked Cortanus to give him multiple people to fight at once, a fun fantasy to act out but suicide in real life.

  Let him have it. He actually asks questions now. Even got me to change my mind on the sea hunting one, not that he’ll ever know that. He has a chance.

  We have a chance.

  She walked past the wildly gesturing Cyrus and out of the virtual training arena. She went past Celeste’s quarters, the door open and her back to the entrance. Crystil made her way to the cockpit and shut the door behind her.

  “Talk to me, Cortanus,” she said. “Any new discoveries on the planet?”

  “You have asked with more frequency in the last two days than you did in all of the previous seven combined,” Cortanus noted.

  “I’m giving myself all the reasons I can to believe,” she said. “Let’s hear some new ones.”

  “We still have not seen any civilized life on the surface. We have noticed some cavern entrances throughout the mountains, logically placed for a colony, but this does not suggest intelligent life. You may know of several creatures on Monda which did such things and did not have the intellectual capacity humans did. We have seen some small life breach the ocean, but nothing that has since gone to the land. Our imagery of the planet at night is still incomplete. There seems to be something that is disrupting our data pattern. We will not have a complete picture until we land.”

  “Understood, Cortanus.”

  She started to lean back, but when she realized such a thing would result in flashbacks she could not rid herself of, she stood up and walked out. She assumed a more authoritative look in case one of the siblings appeared. She walked by Celeste’s room and observed Cyrus in the training room.

  Hesitant to go back to the cockpit, she did something she hadn’t done since waking up.

  She initiated a casual interaction with one of the Orthrans.

  She gently knocked on Celeste’s door. Celeste turned with a cheerful smile on her face, one which did not fade upon seeing Crystil—a fact which the commander gratefully noted.

  “Hey, Crystil, what’s going on?”

  “Nothing, Celeste, just checkin
g in and seeing how everyone was doing,” Crystil said, trying to speak as a friend.

  “I’m doing good, just, well, reminiscing a bit. I look through these photos a lot.”

  She waved Crystil over, who politely declined. Looking at photos from Monda would only trigger the flashbacks she desperately wanted to avoid. Dyson. Eve. Emperor Orthran. The ships…

  “You sure? It’s good to look back and see where you came from.”

  “I’ll do that when I’m about to die,” Crystil said, much more coldly than she meant. “Or, perhaps, when we settle in on Anatolus,” she added when she saw Celeste’s reaction.

  “Are you—”

  “Don’t worry about it,” Crystil said. “What else are you doing?”

  Celeste sighed, trying to do so quietly. She left the photos and Crystil permitted herself a few steps forward. She began reading the text on the screen and wished she could’ve reversed her feet when she saw the discussion of magicologists.

  “Reading about the magicologists,” Celeste said, with a hint of excitement toward Crystil.

  “It’s best we’re done with them,” Crystil said.

  “Did you ever meet one?”

  Celeste looked as if she had just challenged Crystil’s credibility, and though the question from anyone else would’ve infuriated Crystil—she needed no reminders of what brought about the end of everything around her—she reminded herself of who Celeste was and where she was.

  “Yes,” Crystil said, biting her lip. “I have.”

  Celeste pushed no further. At least, that’s what Crystil thought when Celeste turned and Crystil began walking out of the room.

  “I just don’t get it.”

  Crystil paused at the doorway.

  “Don’t get what?” Crystil said.

  A long pause came as Crystil knew Celeste needed to build up the courage to talk. If I could just put some fortitude into that girl…

  “My father. He said… he said we could reach peace with them. He said he’d go and meet their leader, grant them enough land to live comfortably, and we would stop fighting. Dad always came through. Always. Crystil, he always lived up to his word. I can’t say it enough.”