Wings

by Fearadhach MecRaudri

  She nursed him through the conversion of his wings. First his old wings had to come off, which the geneticists accomplished using genetic code similar to the loss of a child’s teeth. Then came another bout of wing growth. The second time turned out to be harder than the first, his older body had even more trouble adjusting to and making the changes.

  As the most joyous memories passed it became harder to stay in the flow of this memory cascade. Lucas felt both his heart beats increase as the end loomed before him. His time in the OCI had been tough. Other men, men who had not done nearly the work he had, were promoted ahead of him for no reason. He brought in one criminal after another, taking down whole rings, yet rose with painful slowness. Delores stood right there through it, though, helping him deal with the frustrations.

  In time promotions came. He made it all the way up to deputy director of the OCI. This took him off of undercover work. They offered to give him the wing treatment again, give him the feathered wings which brought more prestige and more flight endurance. He refused, telling them he liked the agility of the bat wings, though in truth the reason lay in the fact that he and Delores had gotten spoiled to showering together again.

  The deputy director position made him a regular society man, which they both enjoyed greatly. Then he started finding connections between the upper echelons of some of the crime syndicates and various high government officials. Very high government officials. He began to get subtle hints at the society parties that certain lines of investigation should be dropped. When those didn’t work the hints moved to bribes, then subtle threats, then threats which weren’t so subtle.

  Lucas’s body started to jerk slightly, trying to move, trying to force him to run from the cascade of memory before the pain started. The threats stopped, but were replaced by direct orders to stop certain investigations. They tried to convince him that others were taking over the work, but the reality became evident quickly enough. He began to covertly investigate his boss, and eventually came across the director’s secret personnel files – including the file on himself. The file had the assassination schedule for him and his wife.

  The panic set into Lucas’s bones as if this were that night, so many years ago. That file had been supplied by a Column operative. It saved his life, but not his wife’s. He’d come up from the computer at a run to find three armed men coming down the hall, their intention clear. He dropped two of them, and Torfan appeared from nowhere to drop the third.

  Torfan had been his friend for some time at that point, a civilian independent trader the ICO used as a contact man for their undercover operatives. Torfan’s allegiance lay with The Column, however. He’d been the one who found that file and fed it to Lucas.

  Lucas could feel the sweat now as the memory of the rush to his apartment flooded his mind. The smoke hanging in the air when they got to his complex told the tale even before his apartment came into sight. Torfan had stopped him at the end of the corridor from his apartment. The flames were pouring out of the windows and what used to be the door, but it took all Torfan’s strength to keep him from rushing down the corridor and into the apartment.

  Lucas’s breath came in ragged gasps as tears streamed from his eyes and the desire came back to him. The only thing he wanted at that moment had been to run into those flames, hold his wife for a last moment before he perished with her. At these moments of memory, he wished that Torfan’s grip had not held that night.

  The flames filled the vision of his mind, the memory of smoke filled his lungs. He wanted to scream, but could still feel Torfan’s hand clasped over his mouth, could almost feel himself being drug away.

  After a time, some immeasurable period of agony, the flames finally died and he returned to himself. He felt confusion for a little while, and wondered how long he’d been out. The lights were dimmed, and there was soft music played in the background. At first, he thought his friends had gone off to bed, but then he felt a drink pushed into his hand by a feminine touch.

  He took a sip. Straight, chilled whisky-just how he liked it. Torfan and Martha were sitting next to him. Lucas expected to see surprise on their faces, but saw only understanding.

  His surprise at their lack of surprise must have registered on his face, for Martha smiled sadly at him before, softly, speaking, “We know you better than that Lucas, and we have known about these episodes for some time. We have worked out the sort of things that seem to be triggers, and figured out that it is better if you get alone somewhere and deal with it.”

  Lucas began to form a question, but Torfan answered before it could be asked, “How? We are your friends, Lucas. We pay attention to these things, work them out. The specifics don’t really matter. What matters is that, though they are coming less often, they seem to be getting worse. You really should…”

  Lucas waved a hand to cut Torfan off, but kept the heat out of his reply, “I will not go see a shrink! I earned my wings through force of will, fought my way past the family system to the position I did, forced myself to speak to Delores that first time, then came to The Column and -through force of will- forged a bunch of Sanctuaries which scarcely even communicated with one another into a coherent whole. I will not have my own mind rebel against me, and I will not have someone else rummaging around in it.”

  Torfan leaned forward to speak softly, steel in his voice, “You seem to be forgetting how much help you had with many of those things, Lucas. I came down here with you, and played my part in forging The Column together. So did many others. You have had no trouble accepting help on other things, why…”

  Lucas had felt his face harden as his friend pressed the point, but Martha saved him by pulling Torfan toward an upright position. Her face held a warm but sad smile that she spoke, “Very well, Lucas. We will not press you on it further, at least not tonight. Just know that the only reason we ask this is that we do love you. Also know that you can tell us these things. I don’t know what you see when this spell comes on you, but I would like to. Not for my own curiosity, but so that I can help you carry the weight. You take far too much on your shoulders, Lucas. Let us take some as well.”

  Martha stood abruptly with that, not even allowing him to respond, “Well, I believe that is enough of that. You, sir, look dead on your…um…seat, and I will not have my guest discomforted so. Off to bed with you now, shoo!” She made a shooing motion with he hands, and all three of them laughed softly.

  Just as Lucas rose to head for some rest the door chimed. There stood a young, uniformed girl, which made Lucas feel uneasy even in his relaxed state. A message sent by personal courier instead of over the internal network never meant good news. Lucas felt the hazy happiness brought on by his friend’s concern begin to drift away as she addressed him directly.

  “Sir, a CentGov ground-penetrating scanner ship just flew over the Koton Sanctuary-outpost. Some dozen miles past the Sanctuary it shut off its scanner, did a snap turn, and made a direct line for base. It transmitted something just before shutting off the scanners, but it was in a code we haven’t cracked yet. Lindar, the base governor, is requesting assistance in the evacuation.”

  Torfan and Lucas looked at each other with a slight sorrow. A moment ago, the tension of the war had seemed blessedly banished for the night, now the door had opened and it returned with a vengeance. Torfan spoke, “Koton is one of the smaller Sanctuaries, we could have it evacuated in under eight hours. Evacuated and destroyed in twenty-four.”

  Lucas nodded, “Yes, but we don’t actually know if that scanner saw anything. It could be out fishing. There was a report a week ago of a ship behaving strangely. It would fly off from its base at fairly slow speed, then suddenly send a code-burst and hurry back to base. No one was able to get close enough to figure anything out in terms of what the ship was doing, but now I think we know.”

  Torfan shook his head, “Hell of a thing. If we start evacuation and they were out fishing, the activity will unquestionably alert them to our presence. If we don’t, but they found us,
we will lose an entire Sanctuary. One of the larger ones at that.”

  Lucas nodded as he quickly made for the door, “Knowing Lindar he is already mobilizing the evac. We don’t have that place set to blow. If the Legion finds one Sanctuary that large, they will likely start to rethink their assumptions about the size of The Column, and that could be disastrous. They don’t think we are big enough to be a threat at the moment, and I want to keep it that way. Hopefully Lindar hasn’t yet caused any activity that will get noticed. I want a look at activity reports from nearby Legion bases before we do anything!”

  His feet reached a fast jog by the time he got to the door. The courier followed him, as custom dictated. Courtesy demanded that he stay on foot to the situation room, so she could escort him back. But courtesy had its time and place, and too much hung in the balance now. He motioned for the girl to hang back, ran to a nearby ledge, and took wing, thanking his lucky stars to be in his home Sanctuary where he could find the situation room on the wing without help.

  Chapter 4

  Sar Cohen, Commandant of the Academy for the Legion, arranged his wings while watching Santiner Akido walk uneasily into his office and stand at attention. By the set of the boy’s shoulders and hesitant movements, it looked like rumors of his brother Korla’s fate had made it to him. All the better, since that would make the fire of the boy’s fury that much easier to stoke. He noted with some amusement that the boy still held onto hope, however. That sort of optimism and trust in the system would make it that much easier to push buttons and bring the desired responses.

  Sar left the boy standing at attention to stew for a few minutes, allowing the young imagination to play through the horrible things that could have happened to his brother. When it looked like those imaginings had reached the right fevered pitch, Sar looked up from his books and started in on him without preamble. "Looking at your face you have obviously heard the rumors, and I am sorry to say that they are true. Your brother is gone."

  Santiner understandably broke with protocol and sat without being offered. After a stunned silence the boy managed to force a few words, "...H-How...When...Is he..are yo.."

  Sar carefully managed his own tone and posture, put concern and condolence into his voice. "Yes, son, we are sure. He was flying a solo patrol when he, evidently, flew into the middle of a Mob-Column territory battle. A Column flyer was ambushed by several mob gunmen at a Nest. Korla shot the gunmen, thinking the flyer to be one of ours, only to be taken from behind by the very man he had saved. He made a valiant attempt to get free, but failed against his foe. He was taken alive and hustled onto a small cargo craft. They were pursued by a couple of fighters who responded to your brother’s automated call for backup. One of the fighters scored a glancing blow on the transport and it went down. The flyers jumped from the craft, but it smashed into a cliff. There were no survivors from the crash. Judging by the explosion we are guessing it was hauling fuel of some sort. There was nothing left at all. I am afraid that there is no body. The only comfort I can give you is that they did not take him alive."

  Sar watched the boy absorb the shock, and had to give a certain grudging respect as Santiner managed to stand and even pull off a passable salute, "Anything else, sir?"

  Sar took careful stock of his posture as they reached the critical moment. A lightening of tone, a slight lean back, yes, the boy had figured out that he had good news. Now to really bring his emotions into turmoil. "As a matter of fact, yes. You have been accepted for the wing-training program. You move to the wing trainee dorms as soon as you feel ready to begin medical testing to determine whether you can survive the wing growth process. Congratulations and… My Condolences."

  Sar felt a grim sort of respect for the boy’s admirable level of control. His nod of dismissal brought a mechanical salute from the boy, who managed to maintain proper discipline until leaving the office. He watched on the cameras as Santiner broke into a run, tears of abject fury streaming down the boy’s face. Perfect. The boy’s oaths to himself to make The Column pay were written large across that youthful face.

  He felt a certain regret, for they had not wanted to have to spend either of these two quite so soon. Sons of a martyr, they couldn’t really do anything else with them. If they were brought around to dealing with the real world, they would probably just seek vengeance for their father. Not that the psych profile of either suggested that turning them would be possible.

  Sar pursed his lips in annoyance as missed opportunities were put aside. This one should have had a five or ten year career and been made into a proper superstar, before being killed in action. Unfortunately, the media campaign for his brother had already gone too far, and transferring it all to his brother too easy. Sar allowed himself one last moment of irritation over it all. He couldn’t just scrap the campaign. The machinations of his peers were stirring people up again. Something needed to be done to distract them. People were ‘disappearing’ in large numbers, many of them likely swelling The Column’s ranks. If it continued steps would have to be taken there as well

  Now, however, to make sure that this cog in the machine received the necessary guidance. A push of a button on the desk and an image of the boy’s Dean came on to the screen. "You monitored that?"

  "Yes, sir. Let me guess. He is to be approved for wings after the normal duration and then not survive the growth process, right?"

  "For the sake of Rescue NO! What could you be thinking? Have you looked at his file? Both his father and his brother have died at Column hands, and neither he nor his brother ever even met their father. He was frightfully close to his now deceased brother. There was a lot of question as to whether to allow him to undergo wing growth, because he is the sort who would probably be all manner of trouble if he ever found out how the world really works, and too intelligent to be kept in the dark for long. Now, however, he will probably spend his life trying to repay The Column in blood, and will never stop to question it. Think a little man!"

  "Yes, I see. So, his training should be specially supervised to, ah, increase the effect?"

  Sar rolled his eyes, "Now you are thinking straight." He cut the connection and shook his head ruefully. Sometimes even those who understood how the world worked seemed unable to reach even the simplest conclusions.

  ***

  Alicia Akido looked out the window onto the courtyard of The Centurion, Headquarters and primary residence for the winged legionnaires and their families. She took a moment to notice the lush grass hemmed in on three sides by the cliff out of which the center had been carved. Her attention drifted to the sharp majestic view that could be seen as the meadow dropped off in a steep cliff to the valley thousands of feet below. This view always made her smile: she could happily stare at it for hours. Right now, however, she had students to teach.

  She turned her attention back to her third-grade class, and her breath caught in her throat as she caught a blur of motion through the window of the closed classroom door. She couldn’t be sure, but she thought she had seen the most frightening sight possible in her world: The man with broken wing stopping at her classroom.

  Her class had just settled into their seats, waiting politely for her to begin. She couldn’t find her voice, however, and had to fight hard to keep her breathing even. She turned away from the children to stare at the whiteboard, not wanting to show them the fear in her eyes. She attempted to take a few moments to collect her thoughts, but couldn’t even remember the day’ lesson. Searching through her mind didn’t help, as every attempt to find the day’s lesson brought up the very sight she tried to convince herself she hadn’t seen. Well, the old standby of review then, "Ok, Children, who wants to tell me what you have already learned about our world?”

  Several children raised their hands, and she selected one at random. The student rose nervously and began to recite, "The name of our planet is Kethelmar. It is a world of tall mountains, small patches of land, and shallow oceans. The largest piece of land on Kethelmar is the size of New Zealand
on old Earth...”

  “Miss A? … Miss A?” The sound of her name caused Alicia to start and turn attention away from the door. A mental review of the last few moments revealed that Tommy had asked what ‘New Zealand’ and ‘Old Earth’ were. Another boy answered, and she asked one of the girls to tell everyone how people came to be on Kethelmar, cut off from the rest of humanity.

  The rumors of a flyer down filled her mind, nearly drowning out the girl’s words. “The first settlers came to our world, Kethelmar, because the starliner they were on crashed. The ship was, as all interstellar ships are, huge, and carried over ten thousand people and lots and lots of cargo. The people on board were all kinds. Some were construction men, some stone cutters, some were engineers, and some were scientists. Most were on vacation, but there was also a group of some of the best geneticists in the galaxy who were holding a convention on the ship. They even had a bunch of prisoners on board.”

  The girl seemed ready to go on, but several other students now wanted the chance to speak. It took an act of will to keep attention focused on the class and not the door. Every time she managed to focus on the children a glimpse of a feather teased the corner of her eye, but nothing was ever there. A distracted point of the finger and one of the boys took up the review, “The trip the liner was taking was to view the nebulu…er…nebula which fills our night sky. Something happened, though, and they ended up inside it instead of looking at it. They weren’t able to get back out, since ships can’t pass through a nebula, but they found a star and our world.

  “They found that most of the planet was covered with mountains and hills. The stone cutters got together with the engineers and made tools to cut into the mountains. That is why our cities are in mountains instead of on land.”

  The boy sat down and seemed pleased with himself. Alicia moved to put the door to her back, hoping that would help as she gave another student the floor. The children became more enthusiastic as the review neared their favorite part. “After a while the prisoners started making trouble. They would commit crimes and then disappear into the mountains. There weren’t enough aircraft to chase the bad guys down, so the cops asked the genetic engineers for help. They figured out how to grow wings on people, but the process hurts, and the people for it must be carefully chosen or they could die from it. The special police force was called the Legion, and it is still going today. And the wings aren't even passed on to kids."