Eli and Taia then left out of the house and headed down its steps.
It was clear that it was still relatively early in the evening considering it was still light outside and there were people walking all through the neighborhood.
“Which way do you want to go?” Eli asked Taia looking down at her.
“Whichever way is less likely to get me killed.”
Eli laughed and began walking right, away from the city. “I know just where to go.”
Taia followed him and tried harder to take in her surroundings. She still couldn’t get over how different each of the houses looked from one another. Nor how large they were. They were truly built like palaces and castles.
“So this is how all Supes live?” Taia asked Eli.
“All Supes?” he repeated. “No, not at all. You saw how I live after all. It’s only the richest and most powerful of Supes that live here.”
“Other than being a Senator, what can you do to be able to afford a house like this?”
“A few things,” Eli said. “The more rare your power, the more money you can make selling it for services.”
“Services?” Taia asked.
“Like for example, being able to heal people. That’s a rare power. So healers make a ton of money and live in some of these houses. And the better you are at healing people, the more money you make. If your power is useful, you should be able to market it.”
“But what else can be marketed to Supes when they have everything that they want?” Taia looked at Eli.
Eli raised an eyebrow at Taia. “You really have no idea do you? Just come on.”
Taia followed Eli further down the street. They were walking for quite a while before Taia realized that the landscape of the neighborhood began to change.
The homes were gradually getting smaller and were looking more like normal houses and homes than ostentatious palaces. They were even beginning to look more similar to one another.
Eventually, the pair had arrived in a neighborhood where all of the homes resembled something closer to shacks than they did actual houses. And they all looked exactly the same.
“What’s going on?” Taia asked. “Are we in one of the human camps that you were talking about?”
“We’re still in Carthage,” Eli said shaking his head.
“Is this where the humans live then?” Taia asked. “The human slaves.”
“The humans all live with their masters in their homes.”
“Then what is this?” Taia asked.
“You couldn’t have thought all Supes were living like Senator Gates,” Eli said. “You have to remember, the entire premise of the Regime and how life should go and people should live is based off whoever’s strongest. Not all Supes are strong.”
Taia looked around. She saw people walking in the streets looking wearing rags and obviously aged clothes. She saw one man with a sign that said “Will dance for Money”
“Will dance for money?” Taia asked. “Dancing isn’t a power.”
“Says who?” Eli asked. “Not all of us evolved into people that have super strength or teleportation or flight. Some of us Transcended into just being people who could do normal talents better than humans. But in this Regime, people like that can’t thrive.”
“But he’s not even a real Supe,” Taia said. “Just because he can dance well doesn’t make him dangerous.”
“Is that what makes us a Supe? Because we’re dangerous? I thought it was because of our DNA and that we’re Transcended. All abilities aren’t as powerful as others. Some are useless in the eyes of the Regime. Like being able to communicate with plants or rocks. And some Supes never even discover what their abilities are but they know they’re Transcended because their DNA says so.”
“How can a Supe never find out their abilities?” Taia inquired. “Someone would know if they could read minds or shoot lasers out of their eyes.”
“Yea but not everyone’s ability is that simple,” Eli said. “What if you have the ability to control the trees in a rainforest but you never go to a rainforest? Or you have the ability to understand any language but all you’ve ever heard your entire life is English? Or you can control a specific type of animal that you never come across? Sometimes people never discover their abilities. Now come on.”
He then began walking further down the street with Taia following him.
The state of this part of Carthage was nothing short of deplorable. The majority of the businesses were in terrible shape. There were hardly any vehicles in streets, the complete opposite to the area of the city that they had arrived in.
“The further you roam into the city, the worst it gets,” Eli explained. “It sucks, but the less powerful you are, the more poverty you’re in. So if you’re not something like a high ranking Core officer, a Sports Star, a Seer; you won’t be living in a palace like the Senator.”
“A seer?” Taia asked.
“People love seeing their future.”
Eli turned a corner and continued walking.
“But you’re strong,” Taia said. “If you were still in the Core, you could be living well. Maybe not like the Senator, but still well.”
“After what they made me do in the Core, you know I could never go back there Taia,” Eli said sadly. “And even if that hadn’t happened to me, I really hope that seeing people living like this,” Eli motioned to the conditions around him. “Would have made me realize that me living well was not really worth it if this was happening around me.”
This was hard for Taia to believe. Everyone in her Sector lived more or less in the same conditions. That was just how it was. But she felt like she wouldn’t mind living a life of lavishness if she deserved it. This around her wasn’t right of course; how these people lived was barbaric. But Taia did not know why Eli felt that his own state of living would have to be affected by this.
As if reading her mind Eli said “It just wouldn’t be right for me to be living comfortably while other people struggled.”
Taia felt a pang of guilt as she realized that Eli was a lot more selfless than her. “But you know everyone isn’t like you Eli,” Taia said. “Not everyone thinks about other people like you do. Especially not other Supes. Clearly.”
Eli laughed. “You really don’t think much of us do you? A guy I know, a Supe, was living in a house bigger than the Senator’s. And he gave it all up.”
“Impossible,” Taia said disbelievingly.
“No, really,” Eli said with conviction. “Remember I said one guy had developed most the technology for the city? He wanted the technology to be used for all of the city. He got rich because of it. But when he found out his inventions were only being reserved for a certain portion of the population, and they were being against humans in the camps, he stopped making inventions for the Regime.”
“But he was still rich,” Taia said. “Just because he stopped making inventions doesn’t mean he had to give everything up.”
Eli laughed bitterly. “You think he got to keep that money? You don’t disobey the Regime. He’s in prison now.”
Taia’s eyes widened. “Seriously? I didn’t even know the Regime had prisons.”
“Yea, seriously” Eli said. “Said he’d rather be in jail than contribute to the plight of more people. And you know that Blake would give up his house in a heartbeat to save lives.”
Taia was staring at Eli in disbelief.
Eli continued. “Not everything in the Regime is as good and cozy as you think. A lot of Transcendeds fight against the Regime and end up in one of the prisons. Some Transcendeds are good Taia.”
But Taia just could not accept that. She stopped. “A Supe killed my mother” she said.
Eli looked at her in surprise. “What?” she said.
“13 years ago,” Taia began. “It’s my only memory of my mother and it’s of her dying. A Supe somehow got into our Sector. He was a wanderer and wasn’t even part of the Core or anything I don’t think. We didn’t have sensors yet. He was just
walking and came across our walls. He was able to transform into some big creature, I can’t remember exactly what. But he broke through the walls and my mother ran to fight him. She was so beautiful. I can remember her long brown hair flowing as she ran with her gun over her shoulder into the battle. Not even thinking about her own safety. She told me to stay put but even as a child I had a hard time doing what I was told. I ran after her. And I saw him snap her neck.”
Speechless, Eli just stared at Taia and she kept talking.
“My father and a couple of other soldiers killed the Supe. That day changed both my father and I forever. It was the Sector’s first time encountering a Supe in decades. I became dedicated to becoming a soldier and my father became dedicated to protecting his people. The Sector started running less and less missions. I trained every day.”
Eli stared at Taia. “A Supe killed my parents too,” he said.
Taia looked at him in surprise. “What?” she asked. She remembered that he had said that his parents had been taken from him when he was recruited by the Core as a child. That must have been what you meant. “Then how do you not think that they’re not all bad?”
“Other than the fact that I’m one of them?” Eli asked with a small smile. He then started walking again. Taia followed him.
Within minutes the two had arrived at a park. There were several children playing there this evening running and hopping on the old rusty slides that were there, playing on the swings and just having fun. Eli and Taia went and sat down on an old bench and observed the park.
The children were all clearly Supes. One of the children had a tail. One of them was flying up to the top of the slide before going down instead of climbing the ladder to get there. Another one of the children had a third eye on his forehead. But what was most amazing about all of the children is that they all looked so happy. They didn’t look evil or like ruthless killers, they just looked like children.
“Are they bad?” Eli asked Taia, nodding at the children.
Taia looked at them. She couldn’t deny that these kids were hardly different than any of the kids at her Sector.
“Well not yet,” she said quietly.
“So is it inevitable then that they’re going to be evil? Do they not have a choice in the matter?”
“Eli,” Taia began, ignoring the question. “Why did you bring me here? Why are you showing me all of this?”
An old woman then came up to the pair. “Hello loves,” The elderly woman said.
“Hello,” Taia said smiling at the old woman.
“Are one of these children yours?”
Eli and Taia looked at each other before laughing. “Oh God no,” Eli said. “We were just walking and came to sit down at the park.”
“Oh thank goodness,” The elderly woman said smiling. “You two are much too young to have any children. I was almost twice your age before I had my first child. But you two are such a beautiful couple. Here, please take this.”
The elderly woman then stuck out her hand. Something green then began growing out of it. It slowly grew larger and larger until it sprouted a flower. It was a long stem rose, without any thorns. The woman handed it to Taia.
“It’s my ability,” she said, seemingly very proud. “I can grow a rose. But only a rose. But it doesn’t have any thorns! I worked for a florist years ago. People loved my roses.”
The elderly woman then began walking away. “Thank you!” Taia called after her. The woman just raised her hand without turning around and kept walking.
“That’s why I brought you here,” Eli said. “I wanted to show you that not all Transcendeds are bad. I’ve met a lot of good people that have been Supes. Good men, good women, that have fought to help your people. It’s not Supes that you have to fear. All of us aren’t all bad. It’s the Regime that’s the problem.”
Taia looked at the children in the park. “But if that’s the case, why won’t these people fight against the Regime? And the other Supes that disagree with their methods.”
“These people are beaten down,” Eli said. “And the Regime is too strong. Not all Supes are bad but the majority are misled. They think that this way of living of the strong thriving and the weak only surviving is the only way to go.”
“Well why don’t you do something?” Taia asked.
“I’m not strong enough,” Eli said to Taia. “More people will probably only get hurt if I tried to fight against the Regime.”
“What do you mean?” Taia asked.
“It doesn’t matter,” Eli said, standing up. “But I’m not fighting against the Regime. You are. I just wanted you to know it’s some good Transcendeds out there. People like Blake that you can trust in your fight.”
“I trust you,” Taia said.
Eli shook his head. “I’m not in this fight. But Blake is a good Supe. Is it so hard for you to believe not all Supes are evil? Are all humans good?”
They weren’t. And Taia knew this. Because if they were all good then she wouldn’t be in this predicament at all and her friends would still be alive. She knew a human that was just as evil as any Supe. Lieutenant General James Connor.
“Come on Taia,” Eli said. “It’s getting dark. Let’s go.”
The two then left the park and headed back to the Taia’s room in the Senator’s house.
Even with Eli in her room and feeling relatively safe, Taia still had a restless night’s sleep. There was simply too much on her mind. Was Eli right? Was it possible that everything she believed about Supes was wrong and it wasn’t all of them that they should hate but just the Regime itself?
Eli left in the morning so that they could both shower and get dressed in private. Taia did not know if it was fortunate or unfortunate that Eli did not walk in on her this time. Blake had teleported to a store and bought Eli and Taia suitable clothes the day before. In what was a surprise to Taia, the clothes were actually okay. They weren’t too obnoxious and they actually fit.
Eli and Taia were in the kitchen eating breakfast, being served by Alfred when Isla Gates walked in the room. “Good morning Captain. Tia,” she said the name disdainfully.
“Good morning,” Taia responded irritably but not daring to correct the Senator.
“It’s Taia, Senator,” Eli said patiently. “And I am not a Captain anymore.”
“Of course,” Isla replied dismissively. “Slave, where is Bartholomew?”
“He is still in his room ma’am.” Alfred replied. Blake and Eli were right. Calling Alfred by the wrong name was better than calling him ‘slave’.
“Well then go get him,” The Senator responded, clearly annoyed. Alfred rushed out of the room hurriedly as he went to fetch his ward.
As the Senator grabbed a plate of food and sat at the table with Taia and Eli, they both froze. Taia was annoyed: the table was huge. Why would she choose to sit right next to them?
“So Eli,” Isla began. “How have you been?”
Eli was clearly as nervous as Taia. This woman just did something to him. “I’ve been well ma’am,” he said. It was clear this was no longer than young man Taia had taken a walk with the night before. This was Eli Proof, the soldier.
“Good,” Isla responded. “You all will spend the day with me.”
“Why?” Blake walked into the room still wearing his pajamas. He grabbed a piece of bacon and sat down at the table. “Do you miss me that much mommy dearest?” Blake was smiling at his mother.
Isla stared at Blake for a second before ignoring him and continuing. “I want us all to arrive at the ball together. And that will be best achieved if we all leave the tailor together after we get what we need for the ball.”
She looked at Eli. “Captain Proof. You coming to this ball will be wonderful. And as my guest of honor, you will give me leverage to push whatever agenda I want through the Parliament.”
Eli grimaced. It was clear that he did not like being used by the Senator. But it did not seem as if he had much of a choice.
“Speaking of pu
shing my agenda through the Parliament, finish eating and get dressed within the hour” she said pointedly at Blake. “You all will accompany me to a very important meeting that I’m having to get one of my policies passed.”
“Why don’t you just fight whoever is voting against you?” Blake asked.
Taia looked from Blake to Isla. Was he serious? If people were voting against you, was it true that all you had to do was fight them in the Parliament and they’d be forced to change their minds?
“It’s more than half of the Parliament voting against me Bartholomew. I can’t kill them all.” Isla said. Taia’s eyes were wide.
“Wait,” Eli said. He was concentrating hard. “Nearly half? One meeting isn’t going to change half of the Parliament votes. Who are you meeting with?” He looked worried. Scared even. Taia had never seen Eli look scared.
“Ah yes,” Isla said licking her lips. “You’ve always been very perceptive Eli. I’m sure he will be happy to see you.”
The Senator then got up and left, leaving her plate of food barely touched on the table.
“No,” Eli said, his eyes wide.
“What Eli?” Blake said mouth full of bacon. “Who are we going to see?”
“The most dangerous man on the Planet,” Eli said. “She’s meeting with the Prime Minister of the Regime.”
Chapter 8
Within the hour, Taia, Eli, Blake and the Senator were all in the Senator’s hover limousine headed to where they were meeting the Prime Minister. Eli explained to Taia that these limos were given to all Senators and were paid for by the government. And being the perfect gentleman he was, Eli had allowed the Senator and Taia to get into the car before him, but this meant that Taia’s heart was beating at twice the normal rate as she was forced to sit next to the Senator.
The most impressive thing that Taia found about the car beyond the fact that it had its own television and refrigerator, along with the most comfortable seats she had ever experienced in a vehicle, was that it drove itself. Evidently this system was created by the same Supe that designed the majority of the other technology in the Regime.
The Senator inputted the destination of the meeting she was having with the Prime Minister and the vehicle took off. The ride was very tense and uncomfortable. Isla looked as irritated as ever and was looking out of the window. Taia was very nervous being forced to sit next to the Senator. And Eli was tense, looking ready to jump at the Senator in case something happened. Blake however, had on large headphones and was playing music very loudly, oblivious to the tension in the vehicle.
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