My hand was on the door. Nurtic saw, so he quickly gave his seat to Ecivon and gestured for Tnerruc to get up, too. He slipped coins into both machines.
“Here, try a race,” he offered.
Reluctantly, I approached the glowing console. I felt incredibly out-of-place and foolish as I sat down and took the joystick in my small hands. Nurtic helped me choose a craft, race course and skill level.
“Let’s put it on ‘beginner,’” he suggested. He turned to Ecivon. “Go easy on her, okay?” he whispered.
Now, that really pissed me off. I survived attempted execution, deportation and nearly five ages on the streets. No well-fed, high-school, city-boy was going to play soft with me. Vindictively, I pushed ‘back’ and changed the skill level to ‘advanced.’
“Hey, what’re you doing?” Ecivon said.
Before he or Nurtic could stop me, I punched, ‘Start.’
Colorful targets darted across turquoise waves. Because I was unfamiliar with the controls and the settings of the game, Ecivon’s virtual shuttle easily took the lead—but only for the first thirty or so seconds. He tended to fumble with the joystick. It wasn’t long before I guided my ship right past his and across the finish line, annihilating every target in my path.
Nurtic and Tnerruc broke into peals of laughter as they pummeled a very pink-faced Ecivon.
“You didn’t just lose, you got creamed,” Tnerruc howled, “by a girl!” He then saw the fury that must’ve been in my eyes. “Chill, it was just a joke,” he murmured.
Nurtic looked thoughtful. “Have you ever played this before?”
I shook my head.
Ecivon slinked from his seat. “This round, you’re going down.” With a defying air, he handed a coin to Nurtic.
Nurtic may’ve seemed like a relaxed, easygoing guy, but when he was playing the game, he became very serious. His eyes narrowed as they focused on the screen, the knuckles white on the joystick.
So, I played against the ‘champion’… and won.
Ecivon and Tnerruc gaped at me as though I were some mythological deity. I stood up and turned to leave.
“Oh no, you come back here! Do you know what you just did, my friend?” Nurtic grinned his dimpled grin, breaking out of his trance. “You just declared war against me. No one dethrones the record-holding pilot and just walks away! I’ll play you two out of three.”
Why not? It couldn’t hurt to stay just a little while longer, especially since the rain had escalated into a thunderstorm, by now. I realized, with surprise, I was actually having fun.
Nurtic narrowly won the second round, and we tied in the third. The four of us were laughing and having a great time. At one point, Ecivon took a selfie of us with Nurtic’s phone, which normally would’ve irritated me to no end, but right now, I was too amused to mind. For a few minutes, I forgot I was just a lowly street kid from Conflagria and they were middle-class Nurians with homes and families. For a moment, we were just four teenagers enjoying a free afternoon.
“Miss, you’re still here?” a voice said.
I turned and saw my boss, standing in the doorway. As I rose from my seat and faced him, Nurtic and his friends watching, I felt that all-too-familiar, invisible wall re-form between myself and the youthful world.
“Yes, Mr. Eval?” I asked.
“Is it true you have no mailbox?”
Salaries and taxes were electronically ‘wired’ in Nuria and pretty much all other communications were disseminated via ‘email.’ It wasn’t popular to send around physical sheets of paper, like in Conflagria. Why would I need a mailbox?
“No, I don’t,” I answered.
“Well, I believe this letter is for you.”
He handed me an envelope. It was made of dark, coarse, woven parchment rather than seamless, perfect, white paper. I felt my eyelashes grow hot as I looked at the name at the top-right corner, in faded, berry ink.
Fair Gabardine.
“Th-thank you,” I stuttered to Eval before racing out the door, Nurtic Leavesleft’s eyes following me.
I ran behind the graffitied building and settled by my dumpster, cradling the envelope as one would a fragile dragon egg. I couldn’t decide whether to read the letter right away or destroy it without opening it at all. My heart warred with my code of life. I longed to know how Fair was doing, to read the words of the friend I hadn’t seen in nearly five ages. But, I wasn’t supposed to be attached to anyone or anything. I wasn’t supposed to hold onto any part of my past. I was supposed to be Nurian. If I read Fair’s words, I could get emotionally sucked back into everything I left behind.
I lifted the envelope to my face, ready to incinerate it. But, then, my eyes lingered on the way both of our names were scribbled in Fair’s familiar, squiggly cursive.
I scrunched my lids shut, folded the letter several times over and tucked it into my pocket, next to my crystal. Then, I curled up on the ground and went to sleep.
The next day—Sunday—passed without my daring to touch the letter. When my shift ended and I punched out and headed for the door, I carefully avoided looking in the direction of the arcade. I ignored Nurtic’s voice calling out to me, inviting me to play again. Playing with them once was an incident. Playing with them twice was a habit. I couldn’t make friends.
When I got back to my dumpster, I saw a box of cereal sitting on the ground, where I usually slept. A whole box. Sealed. Free. Hungrily, I snatched it up, tore open the cardboard and the plastic bag, and grabbed a handful. It wasn’t stale or mealy, but crisp and fresh. I was halfway through my third handful before I paused to wonder how the box even got there in the first place. It wasn’t near the opening of the dumpster, so it was unlikely someone tried to toss it in but missed. Who would throw away a full box, anyway? Nurians were wasteful, but not to that extreme. That would be criminal.
The following Sunday, I found a couple cans of soup, in the same spot. The Sunday after that, a package of beef jerky. And, then, a loaf of bread. The pattern went on, cycling through the same handful of foods. On the seventh Sunday, the week of my fifteenth birthday, while sipping cold chicken-noodle soup straight from the can, I finally drew Fair’s envelope from my robe, sliced it open with a squint of my eyes and slid out the single scrap of parchment.
Dear Scarlet,
It’s hard to begin. What do you tell your best friend after three ages of separation?
I blinked. It’d been five ages since my deportation, not three. It took two ages just for this letter to arrive?
I know it’ll be forever until the System lets this through, so by the time you read this, who knows what I’ll be up to. But, no matter where my crazy life takes me, I do know one thing will always stay the same: I love you, miss you and am grieved I never got to say good-bye.
I have a confession to make, Scarlet. On July 25, 87, the System forbade me from showing up for our regular Sunday visit, as a way of luring you outside. They used me as bait. I’m really sorry. I hope you’ll find it in your heart to forgive me, one day. It hurt me, to follow that order, but, of course, I had no other choice. Sometimes, it’s hard to accept the System doesn’t make mistakes.
I’ve had quite a few, major life changes since you left, but unfortunately I can’t elaborate. My training has taken me to places I never could’ve imagined, and I only wish you could share it all with me as you’ve shared my childhood. You’ll always be my best friend, and I’ll always remember your beautiful, rosy face.
Love,
Fair Gabardine
July 25, 90
Scarlet July
It was a breezy, August day. Autumn was on the horizon—I could smell it in the wind. I hated autumn because it was the teasing introduction to winter. Winter meant I had to go back to the motel. Going back to the motel meant less money for groceries—and, while I still received anonymous foodstuffs every Sunday, it wasn’t nearly enough to tide me over for the whole week. What a sick, twisted cycle my life had become. So, I knew how to use my magic, by now; I’d
taught myself, without the System’s help. I had elastic hair, invisibility, excellent vision, an eidetic memory, the ability to heal fresh-wounds with hair-spectrum and, last but not least, the capacity to generate several different kinds of eye-fire, from water-catching to benign. I’d make an awesome warrior, I supposed. But, there was no one to fight. From my studies, I assumed either Nuria abstained from the wars of this Earth, or war only existed on First Earth, back when people were stupid and didn’t know any better.
As I peered over an early-seventh-era history book at the Nurian National Library for the third time this age alone, my eyelids began to droop. What was the point of studying anymore when I already knew it all? I’d visited every library, lab and university in southeastern Nuria (I tended to stick to the warmer regions). There was nothing left for me to learn. I was the reigning expert on everything. My life was so pointless, so boring.
I closed my eyes, laid my head on the smooth pages and silently recited the paragraph beneath my cheek:
‘Samitor Cul was arrested on July 7th of the 7th age for illegally attempting to cross the Briny Ocean and North Septentrion Sea. He was a stowaway on the first vitreous silica ship, commanded by the Diving Captain Terminus Expiri Lechatelierite of the North Ichthyosis Island…’
The water pressure was intense! Every muscle in my body fought incredible resistance. And, it was far colder than the coldest winter I’d experienced yet. Tiny shards of ice pressed into my skintight, white suit. I held onto the sides of a metal sub, racing through the frigid sea faster than the nimblest dragon could gallop. Where was I? How did I get here? Fighting panic, I peered up, through my helmet’s visor, toward the surface. My stomach knotted when I saw how far it was. There was no escape. My fingers ached from holding the handlebars so tightly. Cobalt blue stretched endlessly in every direction… except one. There was small light ahead. It flickered and twisted. No. It couldn’t possibly be what I thought it was, because I was underwater.
Let go! I silently screamed, but my body refused to obey. Let go, or you’ll die! I insisted, and, alas, my white-gloved hands finally uncurled. With the blink of an eye, scarlet fire engulfed the sub. I tumbled wildly into the tide—
I woke with a start, head snapping from the page. I panted as a shiver ran through my hair. What an incredible dream! I remembered each moment vividly, as though it were a real memory. Or, a vision. No, that’d be crazy. I wasn’t old enough for visions. It was just a dream, a figment of my imagination. I should really continue studying, now.
But, I couldn’t. Because this wasn’t the first time something like this happened. Growing up, I sometimes saw what Fair or my siblings were actually doing at the moment in time I was asleep. I never told anyone about it, because normal mages weren’t supposed to be capable of experiencing visions until their late teens or early twenties.
Then again, normal mages didn’t have multiple sources.
Oh, Tincture, how I wished this wasn’t a vision, but only a dream. My heart went out to the poor man on the sleek, grey warship. He was probably dead.
Warship? I sat up straighter. Warship? Yes, it was. What I witnessed was a glimpse of battle. Someone launched that underwater-fire with the intent to destroy the sub. War existed on Second Earth, after all. I couldn’t believe it. A flicker of suspense and fear struck my eyes and curled the edges of my hair. Thanks to the Isolationist Laws, I really didn’t have a clue what the rest of the world was up to. Since absolutely none of the books here mentioned wars, I knew Nuria wasn’t involved. What other nations were there? There were seven-hundred, but I didn’t know very many names. The only maps around here were of Nuria or the northwestern hemisphere. My mind raced. I looked down at the open page. So, someone named Samitor Cul once tried to stowaway to the North Ichthyosis Island. What did I know about the North Ichthyosis Island? Not much. It was arctic. It originated as a Nurian colony. It still received most of its resources from Nuria until this very day. It had a lot of technology, mostly because its habitants wouldn’t survive without it. And, lastly, I knew a completely useless factoid about a long-dead sea captain of theirs named Terminus Expiri Lechatelierite, who somehow managed to excel at his job despite left-eye blindness.
Who else was in the northwestern hemisphere? There was Nuria’s closest neighbor, Oriya—a democratic nation that religiously followed the Isolationist Laws. Oriya wouldn’t be involved in any wars; it was the current Order Authority Nation. Its Chairman was none other than Mr. Arnold Link, an Orion who, amusingly enough, did something as anti-isolationist as marry his Nurian college-sweetheart, Noij Rehtegot, and father two of the only documented ‘mixed’ children in history: Nurtic’s old science-fair teammate, Arrhyth, and his little sister, Linkeree.
For an hour, I sat there, pondering the little I knew about the nations whose names I’d read at one time or another. I considered the possibility of each participating in war, then usually ruled it out. The only one my thoughts kept circling back to was North Ichthyosis. I wasn’t sure why, but every time I considered Ichthyosis, an alarm went off in the back of my mind. But, who would the ice-island fight and why?
Nuria was the closest country to Ichthyosis, only separated by the Septentrion Sea. Barely a thousand miles, from shore to shore. Land disputes were a common cause of conflict on First Earth. Ichthyosis revolted against Nuria in the past; maybe Ichthyosis still had a bone to pick with its mother? Perhaps. But, why wouldn’t the Nurian public know about it, then? Perhaps because the war was new, or just on the horizon? Or, maybe, the public did know but I didn’t? For the past five ages, I studied and studied and studied, but I made one big mistake. I didn’t watch the news, or keep up with current events, or even chat with any Nurian city folk. Though I spent each day in public facilities, I kept to myself. Those twenty or so minutes I spent with Nurtic, Ecivon and Tnerruc at the arcade were the longest I ever interacted with anyone since arriving here. How could I be so stupid? I kept myself completely isolated from the modern world, burying my nose in some era-old references. It was possible Ichthyosis was at war with Nuria, and I was oblivious. I jumped out of my seat and slammed the book loudly, alarming a patron at the end of the table. Anger at my own stupidity made my hair shudder and my eyes flicker.
I marched out of the library and into the cool, late-summer breeze. There was war on Second Earth. War, very possibly between Ichthyosis and my adoptive homeland! I quickened my walk to a run. There would be no sleeping tonight. I was on a mission to verify all the conclusions I so wildly jumped to.
Cease Lechatelierite
When I opened my eyes, all I could see was a blur of white. I couldn’t move a finger. I was dimly aware of the bandage around my head, the brace around my neck, and the tug of needles in my arms.
Bandages and needles. I was in a hospital.
No. I was supposed to be in battle. My pulse quickened. I couldn’t be in here when my men needed me out there. When exactly did I get knocked out and how? What happened to Inexor’s task force? And, unit seven? Did crystalline shuttle seven transport the unit to the dragon ship in time? Crystalline seven…
The fire. So, it was true. The Conflagrians finally did it. They managed to bring their most powerful weapon underwater. Inexor badgered me months ago about a dream he had about the System’s new ‘secret weapon.’ He said, his dream was as sharp and memorable as reality. He said, if Nordics could have visions like mages, this most certainly was one. He dreamt that a young, white-haired Conflagrian spectroscoper engineered fire that could burn the sea itself. Frightened and freaked out, Inexor didn’t have the courage to share his thoughts with anyone but me. But, when he confided in me, I laughed at him. I brushed him off. Nordics didn’t have visions, I said, we didn’t have a place in the spectral web.
I underestimated my second-in-command and I underestimated the enemy.
We lost the battle and it was my fault.
It was the first battle I ever tanked. At the age of seventeen, I’d been through dozens of fights as commander and always
won. Always.
I heard the creak of a door. I tried to focus my eyes on the face of the man coming in, but all I could see was a peach blob. I blinked repeatedly but the fog wouldn’t clear. My incredible vision, like my perfect combat record, was gone.
“Commander Lechatelierite.” I recognized the voice of Colonel Austere.
Though decades younger than my former teacher, I had authority over him, now: I was the Leader of the Ichthyothian Resistance. But, he was my elder and he taught me everything I knew; I always showed him the utmost respect.
“Sir,” I replied immediately, wishing I could sit up. It felt strange and rude to address the Colonel while lying in bed.
“Dr. Calibre and Nurse Raef said, if you didn’t wake up within seven days of the accident, you probably never would. It’s a relief to see you conscious.” His words were kind, but his voice was as cold as the Septentrion.
I could imagine the critical look in his sea-blue stare. I was used to being studied by my teachers throughout my life, especially him. But, this time was different. This time, I wasn’t his star pupil. I was a negligent failure.
The Colonel didn’t ask me how I was feeling. He didn’t give me my medical prognosis. He cut straight to business.
“The underwater fire annihilated shuttle seven. You fell off before the crystalline went up in flames. The rest of unit seven, however, wasn’t so fortunate.”
He paused to let that sink in. Ten of my men died an unnatural death because I was too arrogant to take Inexor—whom I supposedly trusted more than anyone—seriously. One by one, the face of each unit seven diver flashed through my mind. I only survived because I listened to a crazy voice in my head screaming to let go of the crystalline.
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