by Frankie Rose
I shrug. “It was like any other day until it wasn’t. We were on our way to the Keptan system. The Elders were planning on cleansing a small M-class planet called Darax. As far as the Construct was aware, the inhabitants of Darax were poor. No real wealth. No real technology. They assumed their work would be done quickly and they could resume their initial mission.”
“Which was?”
“Repairs to another Construct vessel that had been damaged.”
“Damaged by whom?”
“Pirates. A marauder group. They weren’t sure. They were furious about the attack, though.”
Darius drinks from his beaten water canteen, pressing the lip of the metal receptacle up to his mouth through the nylon mesh. “And when you arrived at Darax?”
“The Invictus was barely in range before a barrage of missiles were launched from the planet’s surface. They hadn’t anticipated an attack. The Invictus was a large ship. It couldn’t maneuver quickly at close quarters with such little notice. We sustained critical damage to nearly every sector.”
“And what did you do during the unfolding chaos?”
“I seized my opportunity. I ran for the hangar bays and I climbed into one of the emergency escape pods. The Construct soldiers were fleeing in droves. That’s when I saw Jass.” My palms are sweating. I hate recounting this story. Every time I do, I somehow feel complicit with him. Like we’re connected in the eyes of the seers, one way or another, and they’re expecting me to lead him here to end them all. Darius is the most mild mannered of the seers, though. If I have to tell this story again, the words so repetitive and familiar now that they’ve become rote, I’d prefer to be telling him. Darius places his water canteen on the ground, in between his worn, dust covered boots, and he spreads his hands out in front of him. “What did he do, child?”
“He…he ran into the hangar. He didn’t seem like he was looking for an escape route, but it was hard to tell. He seemed like he was looking for something. Everything was moving very quickly. Alarms were sounding all over the ship. One of the generals was shooting at other Construct soldiers, putting them down one by one.”
“Why would he do that?”
“Stryker was a madman. He tried to stop me from getting into an escape pod when I ran into the hangar, but I grabbed a cutting torch from the floor. I slashed him with it across his face. He was furious as a dying sun. Maybe his rage lead him to it.”
Outside, an eerie howling sound cuts in between the low moaning of the wind. Grains of sand ting against the corroding walls of the shelter. Darius ignores the call of the dune dog and the approaching storm, waiting silently for me to continue. So I do. “I was panicked. It took a while to figure out how to initiate the pod’s emergency launch protocol. When I looked up through the pod’s view port, Jass was standing on the opposite side of the hangar, absolutely still. He was facing me. I was filled with…an immediate sense of…I don’t know what to call it. Dread? Fear? I hit the launch controls and strapped myself in. The panic subsided for a second when the pod ejected and began to move through the hangar, heading out into space, but then the pod just stopped. No matter what I pressed, it remained hovering in the air. Other pods were ejecting and departing without a problem, but mine was stuck.
“I looked out of the pod display again and I saw Jass, standing closer now. People were running all around him, mad and afraid, but none of them hit him. It was as though he was magnetized and he repelled them. People flowed around him like water flows around a rock, not touching him, not disturbing him. His right hand was raised in the air, his palm aimed directly at me, and…and it seemed as though his whole body was shaking. My pod was frozen in space because of him. I knew he was able to affect things with his mind, but I had no idea he would be able to stop a pod.
“General Stryker eventually noticed what Jass was doing. He marched over and spoke with him. It seemed as though Jass was ignoring him at first, but eventually he slowly lowered his hand. I felt…”
Darius tips his head to one side, a little further than a normal human being might. “What did you feel, child?”
This part is always the hardest. What I experienced in that moment, when Jass released his hold on my pod, still confuses me to this day. It scares me. “I felt like he was trying to communicate with me somehow. I felt like he was trying to get inside my head.”
“And did you allow him in?”
“No. There was an intense pressure, and I had this…sense of him. It was terrifying. I pushed against the pressure. It grew for a second, and then…it was just gone.”
Darius and the other seers have never seemed interested in what happened after that moment. They took my pod apart piece by piece when I arrived here on Pirius, so they have all the telemetry reports. They know the pod bypassed seven inhabitable planets before it arrived here. I was trapped inside for twelve days with barely any survival rations. I had no means of controlling the shuttle, no technical understanding of how to set a course, so I just sat there, freaking out until the power read out began flashing manically and alarms began sounding. For the first time an alert flashed up on screen inside the pod, asking if I wanted to take emergency measures in order to reach the closest planet with a stable environment before oxygen supplies were diminished, and I hit the big green flashing YES button. I crash landed on Pirius two hours later, sustaining three broken ribs and a concussion that made me black out at random intervals for three days afterward.
Darius nods, seeming to process the information I’ve told him. Outside, the dune dog howls again, closer now, this time followed by another, longer, more melancholy howl. Darius should be going soon if he wants to make it back to the sub city before the sand storm hits, but he doesn’t move from his position perched on the edge of my one and only wooden stool. Instead, he looks up at me, his clouded eyes just visible through his mesh mask.
“Have you ever felt that pressure again, Reza? In the seven cycles you’ve been here on our planet, have you ever experienced that same feeling inside your mind?”
My stomach turns over. I don’t like lying to my friend. I do feel that same sensation inside my head. All the time. It’s more than that now—a connection of sorts, linking me to Jass. It’s always there, so ingrained in me that it seems as though it’s an integral part of me. Telling Darius that won’t get me anywhere, though. It’ll get me kicked off the planet, and what then? “No,” I say, shaking my head. “I haven’t.”
Darius straightens up, shifting with meticulously slow, considered movements. Collecting his canteen and his leather satchel, he packs his water away and slides the bag’s strap over his head. He sighs heavily, making his way toward the tattered cloth covering the entrance into my home. Sand swirls inside, billowing over the previously swept floor, shoring up against the base of my footlocker. “I know I’ve been asking these same questions of you for a long time now, child, and I apologize for that,” he says over his shoulder. “You see, I’m afraid I haven’t been very honest with you. My people can glimpse into another’s mind. We can normally see visions of the future, but…ever since you landed here, none of us have been able to see a thing. We haven’t been able to confirm the truth behind your story, because we cannot reach inside your mind. Our cues from the future have all but disappeared. You’re an enigma. Your presence here on our planet has upset our abilities. You’re a bright light, blinding all of those who stand too close to you. And even if we did still have access to our gifts, Reza, we would never use them on you without your consent. Like Jass Beylar, your mind is locked from the inside. Unlike the Construct, we have never been in the business of trying to prise locks open against their will.”
Guilt seeps into me, taking root. “If that’s the case, if I’m the reason why your visions have left you, then why haven’t you made me leave? Why have you allowed to let me stay here all this time?”
Darius smiles. “Before you arrived here, a small part of your future was witnessed,” he continues. “Chancellor Pakka saw you here during a
time of need for us. A time we would need your help. Sending you away would have been counter to the future she saw. Chancellor Pakka also saw that you and Jass…you are one and the same.”
A jolt of dread hammers through me. “I’m sorry? The same? I don’t think so.”
“The same energy that runs through Jass’ veins also runs through yours. You can feel it when you close your eyes, Reza. You know it exists there, dormant and sleeping.”
I revolt against the idea. It can’t be true. No way in seven hells. A part of me is paralyzed, though. I do possess an inexplicable energy. I can feel it swirling through my veins, every moment of every day. It’s been there for as long as I can remember, and it’s gotten stronger ever since I fled the Invictus. Is there even the smallest possibility that…?
No.
No. Darius is wrong. That’s all there is to it.
The seer leans against the wall of my tin shack, smiling flatly behind his mesh mask. “Don’t be afraid, Reza,” he says. “People only need fear things they don’t understand. With our help, you’ll understand the gift you’ve been given. You’ll learn how to control it, just as Jass has. We’ll help you master yourself, and in return for our assistance, you will help us.”
An icy chill settles over my bones. “Help you with what?”
“We need Jass away from the Construct. He’s on his way here to find you, Reza, and we need to keep him here. For good.”
TWO
JASS
FIGHTER
Trying not to read someone’s mind is like trying not to poke at a broken tooth. The desire to explore it, feel its contours, test out the limits of the pain associated with it, is next to impossible. And besides, denying yourself something so satisfying is just, well…pointless. Much better to just do it and get it out of the way. Much easier to go into someone’s mind and simply pluck out the information you seek instead of wasting hours torturing it out of them. I tried explaining this to a girl once. She misunderstood me, though. She angled her pretty head to one side, blinked her owlish brown eyes at me, and said, “You think it’s better to ask for forgiveness than for permission?”
I admit I was disappointed. Up until that moment, it had seemed like we were on the same page. She understood how intoxicating power was. She said she knew how it could make you feel liberated, high, drunk on the rawness of it. She said she knew how difficult it would be to turn your back on it, so why even try? And then she went and said that and ruined everything.
I’d leaned forward, pressing my forehead up against the glass that separated us, and sighed, stabbing the point of my gloved index finger against the coarse material of the black Construct uniform covering my thigh. “No,” I’d told her. “I do not think that’s better. I do not ask for permission. I do not ask for forgiveness. What would be the purpose?”
I heard later that Stryker ordered the girl be purged from one of the airlocks on the port side of the ship. That she’d been asking for me before they bundled her through the interlocking metal doors and hit the big red button that signaled her demise.
If she hadn’t have asked that stupid question, I might have experienced remorse that I hadn’t been there to say goodbye. As it stood, I was glad the girl was gone. No more pretty head. No more owlish brown eyes. I was free to focus on my work once more, to gather more power and cover myself in glory, and so that’s exactly what I did. They trained me to within an inch of my life. They equipped me with the necessary skills to survive anywhere in this galaxy, and then they handed me the reins. They gave me dominion over a research post. At least that’s what they called it. In truth, Archimedes is a prison world where Construct scientists conduct some of the most brutal and horrific testing ever recorded. I haven’t been back there in weeks, though. The place is too maudlin, even for me.
The doors behind me swing open, groaning loudly, and a foot soldier enters the old chapel where I’ve taken refuge. “You’ve been summoned, Lieutenant.” he informs me, saluting me stiffly.
No one in The Nexus is religious anymore. Gods and idols are a thing the past. A long forgotten past. People have no comprehension of a higher power, which is just as the Construct wishes it to be. They are the only deity anyone need fear. They are the only super power to be obeyed. Seven cycles ago, the people of this planet, Darax, launched an attack on The Invictus, critically damaging it. I was in charge of punishing the people of Darax for their audacity. When The Nexus, the largest Construct base ever conceived or built, landed here in the wake of the attack, I found this chapel amongst the rubble. I’ve spent a considerable amount of time here since then, reading every form of scripture and dogmatic text I can lay my hands on in its dusty library. I find the information fascinating. It’s bewildering to understand how an enlightened race could believe in such a vast array of conflicting and patently ridiculous hearsay.
“By whom?” I ask the foot soldier, collecting up my leather gloves. My ability is somehow channeled through my hands. Not wearing the gloves feels like I’m being set free most of the time, but when I’m around others, it can be quite…overwhelming.
“Governor Regis. He has someone he wishes you to interrogate.”
“Someone?”
“A Commonwealth fighter. He was found wandering out in the flatlands. He was dehydrated and delirious, but now he’s recovered enough for questioning.”
I was enjoying my relative solitude in the chapel. Sometimes I like to close my eyes and listen to the voices of the thousands of people who once stood inside these walls and sent up words of prayer to their benevolent creator. Their fervent hopes and desires were strong enough to color the very foundations of the ancient building, and now they play back on a loop, like an echo, if only you know how to listen for them.
I would love to tell this soldier I have another prior engagement to attend to and I couldn’t possibly bow to Regis’s demands, but I owe Regis a debt. And it’s not as though he can simply go and find someone else to complete this task for him. I have a very unique talent, after all. No one else can do what I do. Not a single person in the entire fleet.
“Tell him I’m on my way.”
“Yes, sir.” The soldier leaves, and I’m alone with my thousands of ghosts once more. My gloves creak as I squeeze the leather, closing my eyes so I can concentrate. Where is she? Somewhere out there, amongst the chaos and the rubble, and the twisted, skeletal remains of this system, Reza’s alive and well. I’d know if she were dead. I’d sense a kind of otherness that didn’t belong. It’s been seven cycles since she escaped, and there hasn’t been a single day since that I haven’t opened my mind up to the powerful ebb and flow of energies in this universe, trying to find her. Occasionally, I’ll sense something, like a misplaced word on the tip of your tongue, and I’ll be able to feel her out there. I’ll know somehow if she’s working or if she’s sleeping or if she’s simply just existing in her own way. Very infrequently, I’ll get a sense of her mood, like a snatch of music suddenly bursting through speakers you had thought long dead, and I’ll know how she’s feeling. Such a strange experience. She seems happy a lot of the time. It’s only at night, when her guard’s down, that she reaches back down our connection in search of me. I know she can’t remember our little meetings when she’s conscious, but still. I wonder if I’m on her mind when she wakes up? I wonder if she thinks about my hands on her body, and feels conflicted? I wonder if she craves me, the way I crave her?
On the command deck, Regis is waiting for me with a young man, who’s bent double at the waist and bleeding from the nose. Regis looks disgusted, as he usually does, and the young man looks like he’s about to shit his pants. He appears to be in his late twenties, and yet when he lifts his eyes to look at me as I approach I see that he’s lived a thousand lifetimes. When you’re hiding all the time, fighting for your very right to breathe air, every morning when you wake, you begin a whole new existence borne of suffering. It makes you old before your time.
The Commonwealth fighter tries to shift back, fear
forming in his eyes when he sees me, but Regis beckons a foot soldier to take him out at the knees. The man hits the deck hard, crying out in pain.
“We’ve been waiting for you,” Regis says.
“I came immediately.”
Governor Regis, tall and severe looking like most Construct commanders, gives me a look that says he doesn’t believe me for a second. Pity he can’t read my mind and prove I’m lying.
Back when the Construct found me and told me they planned on training me to become their weapon, I was made to sign an agreement that stated I would never use my ability to see inside the minds of my superiors. A piece of paper is a piece of paper, though. Nothing more. There’s no way for them to know if I do or I don’t dip my toes into their minds, so I do it all the time. I’m excellent at shielding my feelings, no matter what information I may trip over as I stroll through their thoughts and feelings. Regis has a stronger mind than most, though. He practices strengthening his mental defenses on a daily basis. Walking into Stryker’s mind is like entering through an open door. With Regis, I have to climb a few fences.
“He knows something,” Regis says, flicking his hand at the fighter. “Get it out of him before he bleeds to death.” He marches out of the room, followed by three armed guards, leaving only two behind. As soon as the doors close behind Regis, I turn to the remaining men and stare at them. My eyes sear into their skin.
“Should…we go, sir?” one of them asks.
I don’t reply. I continue to stare until they slowly begin to back away, and then hurry out of the room.
“That’s a neat trick,” the fighter says, groaning. He spits blood out onto the metal grating. “Moody teenager wins staring contest. Frightens off armed men. Classic, really. I’ll make sure to tell everyone about that when I get home.”
