He was more than happy to oblige.
Dee lost track of time in the rhythm of her training that extended over fast-paced hours. When Pollux called a break, it was with an underhanded compliment. "Hamal was trained well. His tutelage was a good start to your practice."
Dee stood still, afraid to acknowledge his words that it might force him to recognize what he'd said and retreat into the solemnity that was his norm when his brother wasn't around.
She knew she hadn't hidden her positive reaction to his words when his next statement was thick with the strange accent she noticed only after they trained especially hard, or when he was arguing with his brother. "Don't get cocky. I see their training influences in you—Hamal and Amalthea's people. Their strategies are too straightforward. In a fight, feel what is coming; know what your opponent will do. Sense it from the ground around you."
She ran his words over in her head. "You're not speaking in metaphors, are you?"
That sense of connectedness she'd found in meditation had helped her find flow on the practice field, but she sensed what Pollux spoke of now was something beyond that.
"Metaphors? No. The ground can tell you things your senses can not. Sometimes, in spite of your senses. Your eyes can be deceived. Your ears distracted. The Earth will never lie. I wouldn't try to teach this to any Soldier. They wouldn't have the talent, but you—" He shrugged. "Who knows what you can do."
She reflected again, mind struck by a thought she should have asked from the beginning. "Pollux? Why fighting? Why is this all I've learned since—well—since all of it?”
Seated next to her on the cold ground, he leaned back on bent elbows before looking at her. "We are at war. A war that started before The Ophiuchus bound us to this place. A war that has changed and grown. Sure, there's a truce, now, but the fighting will start again. Whether today or tomorrow, because of you, or despite of you, it will." He let his head fall back, eyes closed against the thin rays of sun poking through a break in the clouds. "We weren't always fighters." He snickered. "Well, maybe Castor and I were. But not the rest."
He opened his eyes, bringing his head around to look at Dee with a wink. "But it is all we are now. All we do is fight or prepare to fight."
Dee matched his posture, leaning back in the sparse grass, ignoring the cold from the ground seeping into her skin. She closed her eyes against the sky that swallowed the sun behind grey clouds. "All you know to teach me is to be what you are."
"What we are are survivors. What we are was once great, maybe even spectacular." His snapping words opened her eyes wide. She froze, barely breathing, waiting to see how far his anger would escalate. With him, one never knew. Her best training days were when he was angry, always coinciding with the days she had the most injury to recover from.
The moment passed. She relaxed bit by bit when he said no more.
When Pollux sat up, swinging his position around so he faced her in a cross-legged position, she sat up too, hand tightening around the bo laying at her side in case she needed to wield it. His face was stern, and her stomach flip-flopped in anticipation of what he might say. Or do.
"The others were leaders. Statesmen. Philanthropists. Only Castor and I were brought up knowing nothing but war. Even Atkins, bred with us to lead troops to battle, wasn't as single-minded. Imagine not being able to engage in the very thing you were born for. Imagine this thing you were meant to do, in your final moment, in that climax of your life's work, was failed. Imagine that failure chasing you through time. Imagine never being allowed your moment of redemption.
"Then, imagine finding the key that might leverage the very thing you want more than anything."
Dee was speechless. She felt like he'd punched her in the stomach. She crossed her legs in front of her and leaned forward so she could clench her hands in the grass. She wasn't sure what to say, though it was apparent Pollux expected her to say something.
She whispered, "You think I can start a war for you."
Pollux took one of her hands in his. "Not a war. The war. The war that will finally show them all."
Dee managed to keep her face passive. "What happens after this war?"
He cocked his head, confused. "After?"
She almost laughed out loud so overwhelmed with despair that had no outlet. "Yes, after." Her voice rose, but she managed to keep the shrieking bottled. "What do you do when this war is over?"
His incomprehension was answer enough.
She stood. She wouldn't run. She wouldn't rush away, neither to clue Pollux into how his words affected her and neither to give in to her fear.
"Beyond your typical level, you are troubled."
Dee's eyes snapped open, astonished the Rishi would interrupt her silent reflection.
Not that this quiet contemplation was actually reflective. Her silence feigned calmness while her mind raced, fixated on finding a way for Pollux's speech not to be the scariest thing she'd ever heard.
The matron took a crossed-legged position next to her. "Something was said. You are worried about your fate."
"I've always been worried about my fate."
“But something has fostered further disquiet."
Dee took a breath, held it, wondered how much she should tell the Rishi about her conversation with Pollux.
"Pollux told me he has plans to use me to complete some vengeance agenda."
Asellus went still. It is a long time to hold such thoughts. I had thought the Twins' thirst for redemption was long past.
That Asellus would think the need not to be overheard was important only validated the fear Pollux's words had on Dee.
The Rishi continued. Still, the pair are known for their fickle thoughts. I wonder if this is not just some fly-by idea that's come upon them.
The Rishi's words gave Dee hope. If Asellus wasn't taking Pollux's words seriously, maybe she didn’t have to either. She could pretend the conversation never took place under the assumption the Warrior might change his mind.
-It's not her life on the line. There's no risk to the one who sits on the mountain.-
Dee wasn't sure if this point helped her, even if it were true.
"Did the Twins fight about me? Is that why Castor left?"
"Why is that any of your concern?"
Dee spun, cursing herself for speaking out loud. The challenge in Pollux's face, eyes boring through hers, clamped her mouth shut as real terror shot through her.
Asellus stood, drawing the warrior's attention. "Peace, Pollux. Her question is fair, given what you've revealed of yourself this day."
He scowled but didn't contradict her.
"Your ambition should account for the other's will, no? Was it not you who was created by a similar agenda?"
Pollux's frown deepened, his weighted stare now fixed on the source of barbed truths. "That was not the same."
"Would Castor agree with you?"
"Castor allows time to erase the past."
"Have we not spoken of the futility of these petty grievances that continue the fighting among us? Or did that only apply to everyone else, where you are allowed to indulge in these hangings-ons? Your time has taught you nothing."
Pollux's posture shifted, a subtle change that buzzed with violence. "I have learned too much in all this time, but the reemergence of The Ophiuchus has changed things. His presence among us again means we can not continue as we have."
"So, war is the answer? A war where you get to prove that you are not a failure?" The anger faded from her voice. "None of us needs such proof. There was no failure on the part of you or your brother."
The image of Castor's dead form, brought down by The Ophiuchus, flashed through Dee's mind. She remembered, through the eyes of the very ones who'd been there, what happened in that final battle. Bred to take down the one they blamed for the decline of all they were, the Twins had failed, and one of them had died.
Dee had never found the opportunity, or courage, to ask how Castor was now alive when he'd been so clearly dead
. Whatever had done it, he'd been linked to life like the rest of them.
Pollux's anger filled the room, but before the conversation could escalate, he was interrupted.
"Pollux? Making enemies of friends?" Castor's return couldn't have been more well-timed.
Pollux stiffened but didn't turn.
Dee frowned that she hadn't noticed Castor's approach, attention marred by her terror that Pollux might attack Asellus.
Asellus grinned, belying the tension that pressed on the room. "Castor! I'm glad you weren't kept away long."
He bowed his head towards the matron before strolling farther into the room. He studied Dee, still seated on the round meditation cushion as he bent to place a chaste kiss on Asellus' cheek.
Not for the first time, Dee tried to find some difference in the Twins' appearance, but even their expressions were exact replicas.
Castor's angry annoyance turned to his brother. "What did you say?"
"Nothing we hadn't discussed."
"Oh? The thing we discussed we wouldn't be discussing?"
Dee was relieved Castor didn't agree with Pollux about using her to start a war. Still, it didn't make her happy that the two were at odds about it. How easily could one be swayed to the other's side?
"We hadn't agreed."
Their conversation went silent, but Dee knew they continued to speak to each other by the way they held their eyes locked on one another.
Asellus laid a gentle hand on Dee's shoulder. "Come. We'll give them space to sort things out."
-Maybe they'll kill each other.-
At that moment, looking at Pollux's pinched face, Dee agreed it might solve a lot of problems.
5
"Are we worried he hasn't regained his memory?"
"Why would we be worried? Look at him."
He didn't know if he was meant to hear their words or if his hearing was better than they thought. Either way, the commanders' conversation didn't distract from his movements. He'd run the Test for the first time a week ago, and since then, he'd run it twice a day. As far as he knew, there was no greater training area than the testing ground.
The fact that everyone called him Hamal was good enough for him. He figured that's what his name had been, and if it hadn't, it was a good name, so what the hell. Unique and strong, he'd been curious about what it meant and why it was chosen, but not enough that he thought to ask. He got used to it and forgot his curiosity.
Any who survived and woke from Initiation took the Test. Whatever process he'd undergone to become this enhanced Soldier wasn't a perfect science. The Testing was designed to ensure the process was complete, as well as pinpoint precisely how that process unfolded. Physical strength, marksmanship, intuitive reasoning and tactics, communication, balance, any and all facets of human physiology had a marker in the Test.
He'd passed with flying colors on every front.
"Is there a problem?"
Kanchi, the chief of the small squad Hamal'd been assigned, arrived, interrupting the commanders.
Hamal paid attention to their response.
"He's more than any of us could have hoped for. None of us thought this is what we would get. But what happens when his memory comes back, and he runs off, half-cocked? He shouldn't have been put on a team."
Hamal's movements stuttered at the words. A shock to his back stunned him, ending the simulation with him panting on his knees as the holographic room evaporated around him.
They thought he'd run off when his memories came back? That wasn't something he could just forget he'd heard like so many other subtle hints and looks they thought he didn’t notice.
The hiss of a door opening, followed by two sets of footsteps fading to nothing told him the commanders left the upper observation area. Whatever Kanchi's response, if there had even been one, lost to the distraction of Hamal's failed Test. Not that they'd built the Test to pass, but rather to see how long one could last.
Springing to his feet, Hamal checked his watch. There was just enough time for a shower before meeting his squad for breakfast.
Hamal's insistence he be allowed to use the testing grounds as a place to train had been met with an approval that ran so deep Kanchi insisted the entire team use it as part of their weekly training regiment. That the chief was here now meant today would be this week's day.
Kanchi met Hamal on the way out. "Hamal. Early start."
"I like to get in the extra time when I can."
Kanchi's face was void of expression, eyes boring through Hamal's like he could read all that lay beneath the surface. If that were true, Hamal wished his CO would give him some insight into his forgotten past. "Just remember, recovery is as important as training."
"Of course, Sir."
Kanchi harrumphed, knowing the Soldier was just appeasing him. It was fine until it wasn't. The stern look Hamal received before the chief dismissed him said as much. Hamal even agreed. He didn't want to overextend himself, but so far, there wasn't a hint of nearing that threshold.
Daniel watched Hamal stride through the line of Soldiers, giving in to the rare moment when he could study the new Soldier without risk of being caught. Hamal's brown hair matched his own, but it was the only similarity the two shared. That and the shared hooks of one Desiree Galen. It was because of her he was even here, taking an interest in how the human fared with his Initiation and the grueling days of assimilation.
Hamal's face, marred by a long scar that moved from his left temple to the corner of his mouth, held a more rugged aesthetic than Daniel's more jovial mannerism. Hamal's dark brown eyes contrasted Daniel's lighter green coloring, and their skin tones told that Hamal spent much more time in the sun than him. Both had bodies sculpted from hours of rigorous training, lean muscles allowing agility and quickness over strength.
Despite being the youngest and newest, a rank and title stripped from himself when Hamal woke from Initiation, the latest Soldier walked as confidently as any of the veterans. Daniel might have considered jealousy at how quickly Hamal assimilated to this world, except for his forgotten memories. While it worked in Daniel's favor at the moment, he didn't envy it.
"Lēza. Nathan. Daniel." Hamal nodded at each in turn before taking a seat across from him, next to Nathan. "I was hoping you, my team, could help me out with something."
Daniel lifted a brow, curious that the typically monosyllabic newcomer would start the day off with conversation. Lēza and Nathan looked up from their trays, as surprised as Daniel.
"Who was I before?"
All eyes dropped to the food in front of them, suddenly too hungry to engage in conversation. All but Daniel, who held Hamal's gaze to search the face that didn't remember their long acquaintance.
"What makes you think any of us know anything about you?"
Hamal didn't flinch from Daniel's stare. Instead, he held the gaze as a challenge while folding his hands on the table with deliberate motion. Daniel's eyes flickered to the movement, not oblivious to the contained violence in the concentrated action.
Daniel kept his smirk to himself. Where before he might have egged on an altercation, now he wasn't sure if he'd be the victor. Still, it was a struggle to contain himself. It wasn't that long ago he’d purposefully pressed this one's buttons to get a rise out of him.
"You remember something?"
Hamal gave a short shake of his head.
Daniel sat back in his chair, mannerism nonchalant. "You'll need to give me something so I know how to answer your questions."
"Is that an admission?"
Daniel took a mouthful of food, his eyes glinting with amusement that tightened Hamal's stare. "An admission that I knew you before? That any of us knew you before?"
He swallowed the food he'd been talking around, stalling. He felt Lēza's eyes on the side of his face, knowing what she was thinking. They all knew to avoid answering Hamal's questions about Dee. But, since Hamal hadn't asked about her, Daniel thought vague responses might satisfy.
"We knew ea
ch other. Worked together once, even. Well, not together together. We were assigned to the same—project."
This piqued Hamal's interest. "We knew each other before we were Soldiers?"
"No. I knew you before you were a Soldier. You were one of the few humans that lived with all this crazy. You only recently decided to up your game."
Hamal's eyes shifted so he was staring over Daniel's shoulder. Daniel watched him process the information, pointedly keeping his expression indifferent.
Lēza and Nathan sat tense, eyes darting around the cafeteria as if on lookout. Daniel wanted to kick them. Their odd attention on the room would draw more attention than a conversation with a teammate.
"What was the project?"
Daniel shrugged while taking another large bite of food. It was too much to hope that the first question would be the last.
Hamal's folded hands splayed flat across the table. Daniel tracked their movement with raised brows. The trembling in Hamal's arms from the tension he pressed into them brought Daniel's attention back to Hamal’s face. He wasn't about to be intimidated by the new guy.
"What was the project?" Hamal asked again, words clipped.
Daniel feigned nonchalance. "Relax. It's not important. And I can't tell you anyway. Clearance levels and all that."
Hamal's eyes pinched in frustration.
"What did you think I would be?"
The question caught Daniel so off guard he set his fork down and leaned over the table, not caring that he was pressing his shirt into his bacon. "What do you mean?"
"Why will I run off when I get my memories back?"
The breath of the table sucked clear. Any question that the others didn't know anything answered in this reaction.
The up-turn of Hamal's lips was anything but warm.
Daniel mentally cursed the others but managed to keep his expression from betraying him.
Hamal was asking another question before Daniel found the right words to respond to the former. "What was expected of me?"
"Expect? We expected a damn good Soldier, and that's exactly what we got."
We Are Forever (Rishi's Wish Book 2) Page 4