by J D Huffman
“And are those children human?” William pressed.
“They’re as human as I am,” Arkady countered. “Which is to say, they are imbued with something more than human-ness, but not quite the same as Totality-ness.”
William rolled his eyes. “Would it kill you to give a straight answer?”
“That’s as direct an answer as I could likely give you. We have children just as other humans do, and those children possess some measure of the abilities of their parents. It’s unclear precisely how that works, but it does.”
The concept particularly disgusted William. He didn’t want to think about Arkady down here with his comrades, making more and more Totality the “human” way. “What about women? Until this whole mess with Angel happened, I thought Totality couldn’t inhabit women at all. But, obviously, about half your colony is female.”
“We were offered slaves, remember? And we freed them and invited them to join us. We cooperated, lived together, ate together, suffered together, fell in love together, made families together. I am sorry to say that all of the non-Totality humans who lived with us perished long ago, but their progeny live on. Can you see no beauty in that? Totality and human, coexisting, surviving together, creating generation after generation of something new?”
“Sounds like some kind of abomination to me,” William recoiled. “I guess your children don’t live forever like you do?”
“No, they age normally. That was an unpleasant discovery, but one we’ve learned to live with.”
“Interesting choice of words,” Sasha noted, sounding unimpressed.
William gave her a coy smirk. Seems we’re thinking the same way about all this nonsense.
Returning to William’s earlier concern, Arkady elucidated that he had no explanation. “As regards your friend, I cannot tell you how one of us came to inhabit her body. For reasons we’ve never quite understood, it is highly unusual—virtually impossible—for a woman to host one of our kind. I could not begin to guess at the cause.”
That only confirmed for William that they were wasting their time. “If you can’t or won’t help Angel, then I don’t think we have any more reason to stay. We’ll head back in the morning, if it’s all the same to you.”
“And take Angel with us,” Sasha added. “We’ll figure something out ourselves.”
Arkady sighed, pacing through his room, his feet pushing around tiny stones. “Do what you must. I wish you would reconsider.”
“Elena also took some items from us,” Sasha mentioned. “I would like to have them back. Earpiece communicators and wristbands to lead us back to our ship.”
He nodded, stepping over to a wooden trunk near the back of his room. He opened it, bent over, and William heard him rummaging around inside. He pulled out a cloth sack and tossed it to Sasha, who caught it by making a basket with her arms and bending her knees slightly. With the bag in hand, she took a skeptical glance inside and accounted for the equipment. “Looks like it’s all here.”
“Of course. We are not thieves.”
Sasha didn’t offer a response, but looked at William. “I’m ready to go back to our room if you are.”
“Sure,” William shrugged. “I don’t think any more talking is going to help.”
As William turned to leave, Arkady stepped closer and took him by the arm. “If you don’t mind, I’d like to speak with you for a moment, in private.”
William saw the look on Sasha’s face and understood her apprehension. Why would Arkady want to talk to me alone? What could he have to say that Sasha can’t hear? There’s only one way to find out, right? “If you insist,” William agreed.
“That’s fine,” Sasha said, using a tone meant to indicate she was unbothered but which only betrayed her anxiety. “I’ll check in with Meren and Janus and see if everyone is OK—if anyone is awake, that is—and make sure our ship is still intact.”
“As a word of caution, don’t eat the purple berries,” Arkady advised.
She said nothing as she pushed the curtain aside with her free hand and left, taking the sack of technological supplies with her.
Arkady came closer to William and spoke quietly. “There is something different about you, William. I sense it.”
Not wanting to guess or give away more information than he had to, William played the unknowing innocent. “I have no idea what you’re talking about.”
Arkady looked him in the eye. “You’re like us. I can feel your presence the same way I can feel that of our children. You are something more than human.”
Is this some kind of trick to turn me against Sasha? What’s he trying to accomplish here?
“There’s no trick here, William,” Arkady said, reminding William that he could hear thoughts. “Have you ever manifested an ability humans would consider… unusual?”
William shook his head. “Not that I can think of. I’ve had some weird things happen in my life, but so have most people. Nothing that would make me think I’m like you, though.”
He knew Arkady sensed no deception there. “I believe you. I believe that you are unaware of your true nature. Perhaps you are unready for its full glory. Perhaps you’ve buried it somewhere deep, somewhere you can’t even remember it anymore.”
“How will I know? I’ll start hearing people’s thoughts or something?” William still wasn’t ready to buy into Arkady’s pitch.
Arkady shrugged. “There are many abilities out there. There are the Movers, whom you’ve encountered. The ones who can shake the ground and bend objects to their will. Elena and her scouts are Shadows. As you might imagine, they can move undetected anywhere they please. Those who can read thoughts, like myself, are called Scanners. There are the Fabulists, who can convince anyone of anything, no matter how outlandish; the Burners, who can provoke flames in any object; Siphons, who may draw energy from anything—or anyone—around them; and there are many others. Many of us have developed more than one proficiency, as you have likely witnessed in my ability to control Angel. What each of us is capable of may vary, but training, study, and focus can unlock much more than our most obvious powers. The same is true of our children who, while not ageless, are otherwise blessed with the full potential of the Totality.”
“Well, that’s fine,” William said dismissively. “Good information to have. It just doesn’t seem directly relevant to me.”
Arkady stared into his eyes more fiercely now. “Perhaps it will, one day. One day, you may see the clouds gather, and feel the forces within rising to the surface. When that happens, give yourself to the storm.”
William forced himself away from the man’s penetrating gaze, moving toward the exit. “Thanks for the advice. I’ll take care of myself any way I have to.” Before he had a chance to move the curtain out of his way, Sasha slammed into him from outside. Both of them hit the ground, and Sasha’s earpiece rattled as it tumbled past Arkady’s feet.
“William!” she gasped, out of breath. “We have to get back to the ship!”
Still dazed, he put his hands on her shoulders, trying to get her to hold still for a moment. “Sasha! Just slow down and explain. What’s going on? What’s wrong with the ship?”
She stared at him with eyes glazed over in terror. “Totality! They’re all over the ship!”
Chapter 29
Mix and Match
Sasha said the words as if uttering them would sap them of their power. “Janus is in the middle of a firefight on the ship. He said several people—he doesn’t know how many—started going crazy just as Angel did. They raided the weapons and started tearing the ship apart. I can’t raise Meren’s team, either.”
William looked at her like he didn’t believe her. “Are you sure Janus was telling the truth? I thought you didn’t trust him.”
“I’ve never heard him sound so terrified, William. I don’t think he’s that good a liar.”
&
nbsp; One by one, they scrambled to their feet. Sasha knocked the dust from her ragged Totality uniform. She reached down and helped William up, too. “Go get Fred,” she told him. Her voice was not commanding just then, more desperate. She didn’t know what was happening on her ship, exactly, and there was no way she could get back quickly enough. Unless…
“Arkady,” she said with a snap, looking at him. “Is there any way you can get us to our ship quickly? We have to assess the situation there. We might need your help, too.”
“We won’t raise arms against our own kind,” he protested, taking a step back, which made Sasha think he was truly afraid she’d hurt him.
What kind of person does he think I am? Someone who was thinking about killing him and all his people quite recently, I suppose. “Then can you get us to our ship??” she reiterated.
“Elena can guide you. She’ll give you the quickest route through the tunnels and the forest,” he promised. “But if the Totality have taken your ship—”
Whatever he said after that was lost in the intense, thunderous boom of something striking the ground above them. Everything shook violently, and the walls of Arkady’s chamber crumbled. Dust and grit fell into Sasha’s eyes, stinging them. She stumbled out of his room, feeling at the cracking, disintegrating walls with her hands. Did they already get control of the ship? Are they bombing us now? A wise tactician would have remembered, in that moment, the full armaments of their cargo transport. Only in Sasha’s best moments did she consider herself a wise tactician, and this was not one of them. Instead of careful contemplation, she felt her way blindly from Arkady’s room, fighting against the dust and debris that occluded all light sources, and moved her hands at a level where she was reasonably certain she’d come across the rail before going over the edge into the cold, dark waters at the base of the ravine.
Her hands soon found the wooden railing, so she stopped long enough to wipe the debris from her eyes. She blinked and squinted, taking a look around. Thundering bass rocked the ground around them every few seconds, making the whole settlement tremble again and again. Memories of the Totality bombing her homeworld rushed back, and the image of her father being shot in the back as he tried to crawl away demanded her attention. Not now. I’m not going to end up like that, she swore to herself. People of all ages rushed around her, aimless and confused. She didn’t know what to tell them—she didn’t know anything. William bumped into her, and Fred crashed into him, sending the three of them to the ground again.
“Fred!” Sasha shouted, squirming out from under them and regaining her upright posture. “Everything’s falling apart here. Janus says Totality have taken the ship. They took most people on the ship. I don’t know how.”
“That should not be possible,” he shook his head. “They cannot take bodies that quickly. It is much more… random,” he said, sounding as though he truly believed it.
“Well, something is happening!” she shouted. She glanced around, trying to find anyone else she recognized. She saw Elena approaching.
The woman stopped in front of them, looking unbothered by the chaos swirling around them. “Arkady tells me I’m to get you safely to your ship.”
Sasha took a peek behind Elena and noticed who wasn’t there. “Where’s Angel? We’re taking her with us.”
“I sent her ahead. She’s in the tunnels. Let’s hope they don’t collapse before we get through.”
“You sent her by herself?” Sasha couldn’t believe it.
Elena scowled. “I doubt she wants to stay here, now. If she knows what’s good for her, she’ll keep moving. We’ll catch up to her.”
Sasha was not at all confident about that. What if she panics and tries to run? But there were more pressing concerns at that moment.
Arkady rushed over to them. Sasha could see the terror in his eyes—wide open and white, eyelids caked with dirt, breath heaving. “It’s Cylence,” he said so softly she had to strain to hear him.
In fact, she was so sure she’d misheard she made him repeat it.
“Cylence!” he shouted, this time. “He’s here!”
How can you tell? she wanted to ask, but that didn’t matter. It only mattered that the enemy she sought was now within reach. Even if this whole place collapses into the river that runs beneath it, I can’t miss an opportunity to kill him. “We have to get out of here! We have to get to Cylence!” she declared.
“He’ll come to us,” Arkady vowed. “He wouldn’t have come here otherwise.”
“Isn’t he the one bombing us?!” William yelled over the shattering noise of another volley.
Arkady nodded. “It’s to flush us out. If he’d wanted to collapse this whole ravine, he would have done it by now. He’s trying to shake it apart so we have no choice but to flee to the surface.”
I think it’s working. I don’t want to be stuck down here. “Come on,” Sasha said, turning to William and Fred. She started to leave, then Arkady snagged her by the arm.
“Wait!” he cried. “Please. You can’t leave us here. You can leave me, but not the others. There are children here. Innocents. You must take them with you.” He looked to Elena. “Gather everyone you can. I want all of you to go with Sasha.”
She hated the idea, yet she was repulsed by the thought of leaving all of them here to die, at Cylence’s mercy. Knowing how the Totality treat their slaves, how must they treat traitors? Cylence can’t be happy with them if he’s here, now, dropping bombs on their home. Or maybe he lured Cylence here himself, and this is all a ruse to get us out in the open so he can kill us once and for all. I wouldn’t put it past Arkady.
“Stop this!” he shouted so close to her face she could feel droplets of saliva scatter over her face. “I have not betrayed you to Cylence! Don’t you understand? He knows you’re here! He knows we’ve tried to help you. I can sense it. He’s angry. Vengeful. He will take great pleasure in making us suffer for this.” He let go of her and turned away, darting off in another direction, muttering. “I should have known better,” was the last thing she heard before the rumbling of the ravine swallowed the rest of his words.
While she and Arkady spoke, Elena gathered as many people as she could. A group of them were already filing out of the ravine through the same tunnels Sasha had been led down in the first place, or so she assumed, considering she’d been blindfolded at the time. “Isn’t there an emergency exit?” Sasha asked above the din.
“There was,” Elena nodded. “We already checked. It’s been caved in. This is the only way out.”
But that means Cylence knows exactly where we’ll emerge, Sasha thought grimly.
Tossing the launch fob to Fred, implicitly understanding that his immortality made him the best option for getting everyone out, she then ordered him and William to track with the rest of the group—Arkady’s people, once exiles, now about to be refugees. She opted to bring up the rear. The chaos had abated somewhat, turning into a more subdued if somewhat raucous rabble. She heard crying and wailing, some shouts of anger, people yelling at each other. She imagined blame being passed around, surely some of it heaped upon her and the other interlopers. But we’re their only way off the planet and they know it. Assuming Cylence hasn’t destroyed our ship, or that it isn’t overrun with Totality by the time we get back. There were so many variables to account for and yet there was no choice in terms of what they did next. She imagined they could try to flee into the woods, hide away from Cylence’s soldiers and scanners, simply wait until they lost interest and went home. She suspected Cylence wasn’t so easily discouraged. And what about our ship? Maybe his vessels won’t notice a single, solitary craft fleeing the planet—or maybe they already found and obliterated it, and all we’re doing is fleeing right into the line of fire. There was no way to know.
Before entering the tunnel, she took one last look at the ravine she’d entered just the day before, the shards of sunlight peeking in from abo
ve, made all the more visible by cascades of dust. Then, a high-pitched scream in the distance grew louder, its volume and tone increasing rapidly, and though Sasha couldn’t have guessed exactly what it was or why it sounded that way, she instinctively knew it was a harbinger of death, and her last thoughts were of how rude she’d been to Arkady, and how she shouldn’t have been so hard on Fred, and that trusting William hadn’t turned out to be such a bad idea after all. She closed her eyes and braced herself, arms across her face, anticipating nothingness, but something else happened instead.
The ground beneath her feet blew apart and fell away, and she was in free fall. Her limbs came away from her face and she saw the ravine for a few seconds before she hit the water with an impressive splash. She coughed and gagged, thrashing with her arms and legs, instinct taking over while confusion addled her higher functions. Her ears filled with a constant scream that, after a few moments, she realized wasn’t truly there. The sound of the explosion, it occurred to her. She couldn’t hear anything else at that moment, and she decided that was a mercy. She didn’t see anyone else fall next to her, but it was also quite dark down here. Her feet bumped against rocks that moved around easily, no doubt pieces of the ledge she’d been standing on moments before. From her vantage point, she couldn’t tell just how much of the settlement had been destroyed by that projectile, or how many people were hit. She was only grateful there was no subsequent rain of body parts around her, at least for a few moments, then she felt desperately alone.
Am I going to die down here, forgotten in a black pool at the bottom of a ravine in a forest on a planet in the middle of nowhere?
She moved her feet and arms in a slow but steady rhythm as she learned what worked best to keep her afloat while conserving energy. She shivered constantly, which made her limbs jerk and interfered with the swimming, but she made do. She recalled spending time in a nearby lake as a child, and she wasn’t much better in the water now, after so many years in Totality captivity. It was enough just to keep her head above water, using her legs to push the water beneath her. She bobbed up and down in a way she might have found funny under better circumstances. She soon concluded that, after the last blast, the bombardment had stopped. She couldn’t decide if that was a good thing or a bad thing, yet.