Starblade

by Rodney C. Johnson

  Frederika was glad it was she the who found Nadia. It would not have been prudent for one of the palace guards to stumble upon their Queen in such a sorry state. “Are you all right my Lady?”

  “Never think that he will love either of us more than he loves the woman with him now,” Nadia sobbed. “Do you know what she did to him? Aria broke him. She destroyed Sharr once and she'll do it again. I know it.”

  “I'm sorry for all the trouble I have brought to you und your family.”

  “No.” The Queen touched Frederika's face. “This is not you're doing. The weakness is his.”

  “Is one woman so powerful she could unmake a man the likes of Sharr Khan?”

  Oberon once told her that Sharr had one weakness that they knew of: Women. Perhaps what he really meant to say was that there was one woman that was his weakness?

  “Yes, Aria is that woman. The fixation, he can't help it, that drove him to build this empire is the same passion that made him lust for her.”

  “Surely you can warn him, keep him from failing?” Hoped Frederika.

  “Do you really think that I can act against Aria without consequence?”

  “You're saying that if you attempt to dissuade Sharr of his affection for Aria you will only put a wedge between the two of you.”

  “As if her mere presence weren't enough to do that?” The Queen nodded. “I cannot act against her. His love for her overwhelms his judgment. Worse still, in her womb is his child. It will be a male. I am sure of it.”

  At this information Frederika gasped, held the Queen closer.

  Mention of Aria's baby caused the Queen's hand protectively to fall over her own womb. She felt the life throb within her. It had been so very long since she had experienced such a connection. Frederika did not miss the gesture.

  “Und you. You are also pregnant.”

  “How do you know?”

  “There’s a glow about you. But since you touched my mind, I just know. I think you unlocked something psychic in me.” Frederika smiled. “Does he know?”

  The Queen turned away, shook her head.

  “Aren't you going to tell him?”

  “Of course.” Before they left Kuras, Nadia knew she had quickened. It had been difficult to keep it silent this long. “I’d meant to do so after the Rashalon started. These things must be handled in the right manner.”

  “How can you tolerate being in Aria's shadow?”

  It was beyond the blonde's comprehension that such a noble woman like Nadia would allow the dream of a hopeless love to come to mean more to her mate than she herself.

  “Because,” said the Queen, “my mother forced me to make a choice. Sacrifice my beliefs and dreams by giving up on Sharr knowing he ached for Aria, or accept him as he was, flawed so that together we could build an empire. My choice was to be with him. To Sharr, I am fully devoted. And it will always be like this.”

  Frederika nodded.

  “Have you picked yourself a Falcanian name?” Nadia had at last gathered herself, once more and remembered that she were Queen. She now stood tall, proud.

  “I have. A good, strong one.”

  Nadia winked. “Feel lucky. Usually Sharr bestows them. You at least got to choose.”

  “So I've heard.”

  “Well, I must go reconfigure the Rashalon Engine to accommodate the Morningstar matrix. Good thing I created Falcanians to be like us.” With motherly affection, Nadia touched Frederika's cheek. “I can't believe you never questioned why you have a heads-up, retina display streaming with data, or the ability to switch to night vision. Among many other none-human qualities.”

  Frederika felt overwhelmed. “It just always seemed natural. I never needed help in order to understand the information, it's innate, so of course Oberon never talked about it. I'm not sure he knew.”

  “He thinks of you as a glorified, recombined clone. A mistaken grasp of Turhan's Radiun90 technology.” Nadia stated emphatic. “You are not a clone. If you'd ever gotten a look at your own organs, or had a severe injury, you would have realized you were not quite human. There's a reason you've never been ill. No human disease could harm you. You're more likely to contract a computer virus then the chickenpox.” She added. “Your heart-lung capacity should have clued us in on your arrival here, that you were a Morningstar, we register as baseline perfect.” She smiled. “Turhan was a genius who bridged the gap between genetics and biorobotic engineering.”

  Both women embraced one another.

  Nadia whispered in Frederika's ear. “Three days from now, you shall be reborn a Falcanian valka.”

  “Aren't you scared, Rika?” Mia asked.

  Admiration glimmered in the younger woman's eyes. Mia had come to respect Frederika since the Duchess volunteered to take the punishment which had been rightfully meant for her. When she learned the blonde was also a spy, it only added to Frederika's mystique. Late into the night she remained with her friends Mia and Sabina in the apartment which had been furnished for her within the Imperial nodor.

  “Not at all. I've been in more frightful situations.”

  “No doubt,” Sabina commented, in reference to Frederika's profession as an operative for the Teutonic Dukedom. She now looked on Frederika in an entirely different manner. The German girl’s compassion had won her over. “Thanks a lot for getting us into it.”

  “I think you'll enjoy life as a Falcanian, Sabina. Und think, then you can have the Shotar's attention whenever you like!” Teased the Duchess.

  “Not if the rumors about that girl your 'uncle' brought here are true.” Sabina had kept her ear to the gossip of the harem. News traveled quickly in the palace. “A lost love, the women say.”

  “Sharr craves women. He'll be in your skirt soon enough,” Frederika laughed. She couldn't imagine Sharr Khan putting aside the pleasures of his harem, even for Aria. “Don’t doubt it.”

  A chime rang at her door, Frederika got up from her place among the elaborate cushions to see who was there. She expected Sharr might come for a visit.

  “Sitara!”

  “May I come in?” The Princess asked.

  “Of course. It's your palace.” The blonde stood there and gaped at Sitara, very surprised to find her here. “I must admit I did not expect to see you.”

  The Princess nodded and almost looked embarrassed. “Rika, I must apologize to you.”

  “Don't, Sitara, I understand. I had no desire to use you.” Frederika was amazed to have heard the apology at all from the Falcanian Princess. “I respect you und your people, but I had to act for my own.”

  “My people are now also your people,” Sitara pointed out and licked her lips to reflect on how to explain her presence here. “That's why I’ve come. My mother thinks that since I let you know so much about who we are, I should stand with you now on the eve of your Rashalon.”

  So the Princess's contrition had not been of her own accord. Queen T’Kara had sent her child here to see that Frederika be fully prepared for the dawn. The Duchess welcomed it all the same. Frederika wanted to be Sitara's friend.

  “Here.” Sitara offered the blonde a small wooden box.

  Frederika opened the container and found one of the triangular crystals she had seen other Falcanians wear. Her brow raised in question. “What is it? I never asked, though I notice everyone has one.”

  “It's a trikir,” the Princess said. “They bind us to our over-soul. It’ll begin to attune to your biorhythm, merge with you, and allow for you to access Char, our cybernetic afterlife. Upon your death, the trikir shall record your essence so it’s never lost to us.”

  “A soul catcher of sorts?”

  “You might call it that.”

  “Does this device imply resurrection?”

  Abhorrence sparkled in Sitara’s violet eyes, and she shook her head. “You noticed revulsion at the reboot. Our forerunners debated linear resurrection, such arguments even motivated high theater. To fully appreciate life, one must confront the abyss and enter that gulf betwe
en here and there,” Sitara explained. “Changeless linear resurrection it had been realized could cause us to fall into an irrevocable stagnation. Falcanians are proud sexual creatures. The DataStream is setup so our sparks are recycled within each new generation.”

  The Morningstar girl giggled. “Sexual creatures indeed!”

  “I should go and let you and your friends enjoy yourselves.”

  “Don’t leave.” Frederika stopped her, took her by the arm. “Come sit und eat with us, unless you want to get back to Kulcarin.”

  An embarrassed, girlish smile came over Sitara's falcon-like face. “If you really want me, then I shall stay.”

  “Your Rakja won’t miss you I hope?” the blonde asked. “I wouldn’t want to keep the newlyweds away from their honeymoon nest.”

  “Kul barely noticed I left our apartments,” she said. “Kulcarin's getting to know your Blackeagle Knights. I think he enjoys the new command. He says he has plans to incorporate them into his Skatha battalion.”

  The notion of the Blackeagle Knights under the command of Kulcarin Aranskrai disturbed Frederika. She couldn't quite place why and shoved it off to ponder later.

  [Tahru Temple: Rashalon Vault]

  It was fitting she should be dressed in a simple white sari on the dawn of her Rashalon. White, in Asian cultures symbolized purity, death and mourning. Frederika wore nothing more than this white garment which she had been ritually dressed in after bathing in a temple pool. Her honey colored curls flowed freely unadorned down her back and her feet were bare. In effect she had been stripped of all that she had been before this moment. The warm water had refreshed her and she could feel her heart pound as the Rashalon neared.

  Sitara, Mia, Sabina, and ISG Shuriken Kra stood beside Frederika in an antechamber within the Tahru temple. Each gave Frederika looks of encouragement, yet they remained silent and waited for the start of the ceremony. The ritualistic nature of the event demanded this, but more so it was done out of respect for the fact that not everyday one stepped into the Rashalon Engine to be reborn.

  The morning had brought with it a bright welcoming sun which beamed through the slanted windows of the temple. A fiery-orange glow filled the vast chambers, an illusion of a Phoenix fire.

  A gong rang three times.

  “Are you ready?” Shuriken asked Frederika and placed a gentle hand on her shoulder.

  She nodded at the general. Shuriken Kra had been very supportive of her since they met. Frederika exhaled and proceeded ahead to the vault containing the Rashalon Engine. Her friends followed. It was a tiered array of platforms and at the center of the temple, a statue of Falcania stood guard. In her hands she held aloft The Phoenix Heart which glowed and thrummed with life.

  Queen T'Kara and the Shotar waited beside a bank of controls of the great machine. Each held a key that would unlock the reformatting engine.

  Frederika noticed Oberon and 'her' Blackeagle Knights standing in a corner of the vault. The Drakorian Kulcarin Aranskrai waited with them looking very self-satisfied.

  “Today we bring new blood into the brood,” the Queen stated. “Frederika Gisela von Gotha, come forth into the Rashalon Engine. Become reborn.”

  Frederika walked toward the platform. Small tremors coursed through her. She gave the Queen an uncertain glance, but Nadia returned a reassuring smile that relaxed her.

  “You’re key, my Lord,” Nadia said.

  Sharr Khan produced a triangular modeled key from his belt and inserted it into the proper slot. As he did so, his mate inserted her own key, together the Shotar and his Lady activated the Rashalon Engine which now hummed with vitality and filled the vault with a low roar. Nadia then pressed a number of crystal buttons on the bank of controls to ready the transformation program.

  The platform which Frederika stood on began to fill with a green gaseous mixture impregnated with nanotechnology. All around her, she felt the air become heavy, thick with gas. She could see the aerosol forming into a liquid and change to a soft-shell substance around her. The microscopic nanites began to spin the neutral gas into a protective and transforming shell, an egg from which she would emerge as a new being.

  Her vision went black, the outside world gone. Frederika wondered if she had drowned, suffocating in the green gas? She felt out of her body, as though she had become a disembodied consciousness which floated about on a rapid stream. Other voices and awareness's joined with her like little sparks. Time became a meaningless concept upon her entrance into the void.

  “Welcome to Char, child of Turhan.”

  A beautiful, dark-haired woman greeted Frederika in the void where her consciousness lingered while her body under went a transformation on the microscopic level. Even now the nanites reshaped Frederika’s flesh and bone. They entered her vital systems, reworking her nerves and muscles, pushing around her molecular construct. Some of these nanites would take up residence in organs built to house them and from there they would rebuild bone and muscle or destroy viruses and diseases for the entirety of her life. Falcanians were as much machine as they were organic.

  “Who are you?” Asked Frederika.

  “I am Falcania. Who are you? Now that is the question,” the AI stated. “I have come to guide you and watch over you as you undergo Rashalon.”

  Frederika indicated that she understood, at least she thought that she did. The embodiment of Falcanian culture had come here to teach her about what she now became.

  “Look,” Falcania said. “The souls of our kind dwell here.”

  The AI pointed to blue-white orbs, compressed DataStreams, sparks of each Falcanian mind that moved in Char’s cybernetic latticework even while awake in the material world a Falcanian mingled here.

  A shadow hovered among the radiant orbs. “What is that?”

  “Our darkness,” Falcania told her. “It threatens us, yet we do not know where it is for the Shadow knows we seek it out. Perhaps you’re our hope?”

  The cybernetic world changed. All around both women, data rushed in a flood of exotic symbols. Bits and bytes opened a pathway into Frederika’s neural network, a flashcopy was being mapped of her personality.

  “Come, see the beginning.” Falcania pointed at a spark, larger then the others, like some kind of juncture point for all the rest. “We stand now in the memory core. Watch Sharr Khan set alight the Phoenix Fire.”

  Memories that were not Frederika's own overpowered her. The zeitgeist of a species poured into her being, filled her very fiber. Not only did she physically transform but she had begun to understand what it was to be a Falcanian on a primal level. This natural understanding of who and what they were bonded Falcanians in a way most humans could only envy.

  Frederika watched as two boys stood on an old broken down stonewall in some tiny New England town. She recognized them as Sharr Khan and Shuriken Kra. Kra wore big awkward glasses instead of his signature goggles, Even then, he had the sense of a playful trickster about him. Sharr carried himself with a serious air. They were respectively about ten and eight years old.

  “You know all that Falcanian stuff?” Sharr asked his younger companion.

  “Yeah.”

  “Its real, at least I want it to be. There's no reason it should just be fiction.”

  He'd been pondering the idea of telling his best friend about his idea for the Falcanians for a while now. Shuriken looked at him curiously. Kra enjoyed writing about it. Writing about the Falcanians was fun and cool and had the chance to show some awesome action.

  “Really? You think so?” he asked.

  “We can do this,” Sharr spoke with conviction. “Make ourselves stronger and better. Humans must change and evolve. Genetic engineering is the future. We can augment ourselves give ourselves wings, longer life-spans... Anything we can dream of!”

  It was interesting to Frederika to note that in the original plan Falcanians had bird-like wings, not the mammalian stylized aileron they would come to be designed to have.

  “Our society is corrupt and
someday it will die,” Sharr declared with an unintentional prescience. “Where will we be when that happens? A civilization built on honor and family is important let's build our own. Will you help me Oswald?”

  Oswald?

  Shuriken Kra's given name had been Oswald! Frederika beamed. She must tell him how cute she thought that was.

  It struck Frederika that most children did not have such deep thoughts about the nature of life and of science. What Sharr was talking about would not enter the public conscious until decades later when genetic engineering would rise as a topic of debate, but this was the early eighties. Years before genetics became part of the public discourse.

  “Just tell me how to breathe in space and I'll be there,” Shuriken said with his usual wit.

  Frederika smiled. The Phoenix Project was born from the idealism of a handful of children wanting a better world and a better human. These were deep thoughts for such young people thoughts way beyond their years.

  Shuriken Kra began his recruitment of the first generation of Phoenix Project members not long after having spoken with Sharr. A silent network spread within the local school systems. Whisperings of the Phoenix Project and Falcanians began to be sought out by other youngsters disenchanted with the society they were in.

  Like so many dreams, the Phoenix Project needed a little work before all the bugs in the system got ironed out. There were of course many false starts and new beginnings. After all, the idea of the Phoenix Project had been conceived by children. One shouldn't have expected success at the start. The idea itself was revolutionary.

  The memory moved ahead to cover the rise and fall of the Phoenix Project. Frederika beheld Sharr undergo his own personal transformation. How he had lost faith in his chosen mission turned it aside to pledge his troth to old gods, though the Aesir and Vanir ignored his righteous devotion.