by Pam Uphoff
The professor thanked Ebsa for smothering the flames, and set the class to a review of safety procedures.
Thursday, the first Magic test was basic regurgitation. Except for the questions with ambiguous answers. It's all from different points of view. Ebsa made judgment calls, keeping in mind the professor's likely opinion, and sent it in. Heaved a sigh of relief.
I can do this. Clostuone is just a label. Generally accurate, but I'm an outlier, with an unusually high count. I don't care what the councilor said about most Clostuones dropping out the first year.
The usual stop at the coffee shop, discussing the differences between Oner and Fallen magic.
"It's frustratingly similar to mine, and then I trip over something so different." Nighthawk wrinkled her nose at her coffee, but sipped again. "Of course, the recessive power gene didn't help. You started with a first generation of powerless halfer women, and then, even marrying unrelated Prophets, only half the children had power. Halfers marrying each other, a quarter of the children had power. By the time you had reliably powerful children, the Prophets' culture had pretty well drowned in the Arab culture. And it never got better."
"Oh? And Comet Fall is better?" Ebsa leaned back and caught a glimpse of Ra's doodling . . . or in this case a sketch of Nighthawk on a broom.
"Yes. We started with the American culture, and a dominant power gene."
"That kills male fetuses."
"I think it's just male sperm, not the fetuses."
"A recipe for a population crash." Ra'd raised his nose.
"Only if we became a significant portion of the population. The mage gene is on the Y chromosome, so their power is passed through the male line, their daughters have no power, but plenty of the insertions. The mage gene is more powerful than your Priest gene, which is most like our wizard gene, that happens to be on the X chromosome."
"Ooo. A geneticist!"
"Actually, I'm taking a suite of sciences, before I choose a major. What are you Directorate guys doing? Well, beside learning how to be belligerent bullies, murderers and rapists?"
They all straightened indignantly.
Ra'd glared. "That is a minor problem with a small subset of the population."
"Really? So you deal with this minor problem by sending them across to do their raping and murdering where you can pretend it doesn't happen?"
Heak squirmed. "It's to spread the genes of the Prophets. In the long run, it helps integrate the world into the Empire."
"Once you've killed enough of those 'Natives' you don't even see as being truly human?"
Ebsa winced. "We have a bad image problem—and probably deserve it."
***
" . . . worried about you, up there in the north, so far from home."
Ebsa eyed his com. Two weeks, and she's missing me? "Hi Mom, no, it's fall here, but still quite warm. I haven't even unpacked my cold weather gear."
" . . . all alone." Not that she'd stopped talking long enough to listen to him.
"Made a couple of good friends, already. Hey did you know . . . "
" . . . and eating who know what sorts of foreign food . . . "
"There's plenty to eat, but they don't get the spices right. Nowhere as good as your cooking."
" . . . and have you met any cute girls?"
"I'm been hitting the books pretty hard, Mom. I mean, yeah I've met some girls."
Paer and Heak were grinning. His mother's voice had a certain carrying quality about it.
" . . . she pretty?"
"What? No. Wait, no Mom, no I don't mean she isn't pretty. I mean there's no special girl. I'm sure there will be eventually, but not yet."
Paer staggered away giggling as his mother's distressed tones leaked.
"No I don't mean I've broken up with a girlfriend. Just that I'd met some . . . prospects. Yes Mom."
". . .put on a good . . . "
"No Mom, I don't need . . . Love you too Mom." Ebsa clicked off the comm and tried to summon up a glare.
That just made Paer and Heak laugh harder.
Azko shook his head. "Man, that sounds just like my Mom."
Chapter Eight
19 Qadah 1402 yp
Two weeks of early warm ups were producing results. Heak was able to reach the third level of Speed without losing her temper. Azko was a natural, more impeded by physical timidity than anger.
Ra'd was smooth for a few levels, but had a tendency to snap into anger.
"I'm impressed." Arvi strolled up to the head of the room. "Are you going to do anything else to shock me?"
Ebsa grinned. "Can I invite a foreign student? A Comet Fall witch?"
Arvi eyed him for a long moment. "Is she an expert?"
"I have no idea."
"Then invite her, and we'll find out."
They changed and headed for the coffee shop. They spotted Nighthawk and scooped her up enroute.
Nighthawk brightened at the invitation. "Thanks! I've worried about getting rusty, but I've got so many classes, I didn't want to add another. Maybe I could come a couple of times a week?"
"Well, come and meet everyone." Paer eyed her. "They'll all want to see any difference in technique you've got."
Heak grinned. "Actually, they'll probably want to know if you can swordfight like Endi Dewulfe."
Nighthawk blinked. "Of course not. Men have a longer reach, and are stronger than women. I fight the way that works best for me."
She joined them in the early practice, flowing effortlessly into Speed. Ebsa tried to not imitate the rest of the drooling crowd. Paer laughed and said it was good for her ego, to not be the most desirable female in sight.
The kata she demonstrated included gymnastic flips and cartwheels. Somersaults and barrel rolls, all ending with her flowing back to her feet.
"You fight like that?" Edge stalked up and loomed.
"Of course not. That's to hone my balance. In a fight, my teachers said to stick to the basics and keep my distance."
"Good advice." Arvi snorted, and eyed the women students. "No. I am not teaching that kata. Take a gymnastic class if you want to jump around that much. Now, Miss Nighthawk, if you would step off with the women students for individual practice, I need to drill these male idiots . . . Wedge, I believe we'll try this with you."
Another square. This time the three of them with Wdge.
Gosh, an almost pronounceable name, with an obvious nickname.
Ra'd and Ebsa stepped to either side of Azko, gripped hands and reached out to the man now standing with hands on his hips glaring.
Ebsa held his internal shield, reached mentally for Azko, felt Ra'd beyond.
"You two freshers think you are going to be North and South?"
They refused to budge. After another glare, Wdge took their hands.
Experienced and strong, irritated. Reaching but not attacking.
Ra'd sent a flick of power to Wdge, who passed it, strengthened, to Ebsa. He added to it, lengthened it and passed it to Azko. Azko wavered. Ra'd pulled on the power, and Azko passed it on. Around. Longer and stronger. Faster. The power flowed, rushing and leaping through the circuit. Sinking as Azko floundered, rising as Ra'd took it. Leaping with Wdge's irritation. Ebsa tried to tame the flow, get it under control.
:: Just let it flow through, Azko, don't try doing anything to it yet. Wdge, don't fling it, just speed it. ::
Wdge flung it. Pure power, potential energy. Ebsa grabbed, squeezed it down to what Azko could probably handle. Dammed up the rest, felt Ra'd pulling from both directions . . . Something that was part heat and part push and definitely a mental scream hit the ceiling.
Ebsa blinked back to the sight of the real world, and staggered as someone jerked him off balance, away from the smoldering ceiling tiles as they crashed down. Ra'd was pulling Azko away, and Azko had hauled Ebsa along with him.
The sensei had Wdge by the arm, swatting at some smoldering bits, on the student's gi. Ebsa shot a glance at the rest of the students. No problem. Nighthawk w
as standing with her hands out and up, a shield sparkling in a wide circle.
"Perhaps this sort of exercise would be better held outside?" The witch looked a bit amused as she lowered her hands, sparkles gone.
Sensei Arvi gave her a dry look, then turned away as a fire team rushed in and started foaming everything in sight.
The students hustled out. They clustered on the lawn outside, and Arvi stalked out to glower at them. "I do not generally have beginning students fighting with the established students for control of exercises."
Ra'd snorted. "Don't you mean, winning control?"
The next class was held out on the lawn.
Despite the somewhat inauspicious start, Nighthawk returned.
Chapter Nine
24 Qadah 1402 yp
They managed a good circuit with Ogly as their fourth. The only problem was ending the merge to find Edge sparring with Nighthawk. She was keeping her distance, and using Speed. Cool and collected. Edge was clearly furious, and as Ebsa watched, was unable to reach the witch's level. And tiring.
Ra'd nodded. "Cool Speed . . . I have got to learn how to do that."
Ebsa winced as Edge got in a solid blow. He wasn't much slower than Nighthawk, and heavier, with greater reach. Nighthawk hit the ground hard, rolled and sprang to her feet, lashing out to kick Edge as he closed in for the kill. The hard blow to the crotch was probably more luck than aim, but even with the box they all wore, he staggered back bent over and entirely on the defensive for a few breaths.
The timer chimed and they both stepped to their stations.
Edge forced a grin around his sweating pain. "Hey, if you wanna get at my assets, just come to my place—anytime."
Nighthawk raised an elegant eyebrow. "Not interested."
Edge's eyes narrowed. "Oh you just need to get to know me better, Cutie."
Her eyes narrowed, but she didn't reply.
In the new history class, the professor returned to Earth, and its history after the Prophets had departed.
The two years of the experimental children's increasing expertise with the gates were offset by surging prejudice against the experimental animals the media had taken to calling gods. Calls in Congress to stop all genetic engineering. And from the opposite direction, calls to open new worlds to colonization, to mining.
And so genetic engineering was outlawed, and not just the test kids—or animals, as Professor Ivy kept calling them—were exiled, but anyone with any genetic engineering. Only a hundred 'Tellies' were exempt—necessary parts of the gate equipment. With no more rights than a piece of equipment. When they started testing direct brain implants with the Tellies kept in medicated sleep . . . they rebelled. The still loose Tellies escaped to the fourth Exile World. Leaving just the thirteen that were wired into the gate computers.
"They were the most dimensionally able magical beings. They are the people who made the Prophets' Bags. They attacked, mentally, the medical staff, bubbled themselves and held the gate long enough to force the medical staff to send them through the gate."
Professor Ivy looked around the room. "That last world is the world we now call Comet Fall. Those thirteen last Tellies are the thirteen 'Old Gods' of Comet Fall. All this information was collected from them, and from the sole surviving Tellie from the Fourth Exile World by Info Teams."
He scowled down at his notes, then up at them. "Wake up and write this down. These are the names of the Thirteen Gods of Comet Fall. "
He had pictures, short vids of several of them. "The tall man on the right is Wolfgang Oldham, the God of War. The man on the left is General Rufi Negue. Make note of him, as well, he's their King's brother and may well be more powerful, politically."
Beside him, Ra'd geometric pattern stopped framing sparse notes.
"This is Harry Murchison, The God of Travelers."
Ebsa noted the dark old man and wondered if he was an ancestor of Nighthawk. The Prophets had lots of children. No doubt these old gods did as well. And with so many of them still alive, they probably still are. Something to ask Nighthawk about.
"The God of Love and the Goddess of Health and Fertility." A vid of a handsome man dressed up like an actor from one of the more florid periods of history, and a gorgeous woman. "Jason Rombeau or Sir Romeau Ayres and Dr. Gisele Heath."
"The God of Just Desserts. Go ahead and snicker. You wouldn't believe the accidents that happen to the people and their equipment when we try to get a picture of Lord Hell. And there's a Goddess of Logic." He flashed up a picture of a statue.
Ebsa scribbled madly. Hope there are pictures in the new material.
"The God of Chance apparently doesn't have a known residence, and is seen only infrequently.
"And the last five gods are missing, possibly dead. The God of Virtue, Barry Sigma and his brother the God of Vice, Edmond Sigma. Marty Beta, the God of Art; Richie Xi, God of Youth; and Mercy Green, the Goddess of Mercy." Still photos of statues, copies of sketches.
"Paxel Gamma, the God of Peace." The last vid was of the God of Peace, dressed in something almost Turkish, talking and gesturing dismissively to a woman in native garb, but the facial cast of a Oner and the shaved scalp favored by the few Action Team women.
"We had quite a few interactions with Pax. Action Leader Kael Withione is still with the Directorate and will come and discuss him—extensively and negatively—in the advanced classes. The Info Leader who took the majority of these vids is . . . on the Director's shit list and is rarely home long enough for us to gain the advantage of his experiences."
Paer whispered. "I've heard about him. He gets pretty blunt when the Council asks for a briefing on Comet Fall."
Ra'd was staring expressionlessly at the screen. Rolling his pen in a hard grip.
If it's not religion, what is it? Ra'd is from Makkah, with a priest's gene. What did he say? 'My father was born on another world.' Comet Fall? Umm, no, no one from there came here until Endi Dewulfe.
And the Prophets died a long time ago.
What world did your father come from? That fourth world? One of the others?
Note to self: Ask the professor if we ever discovered any of those other worlds.
Organic Chemistry. "Why does carbon have to be so . . . "
"Important for life?" Azko grinned.
"And a bunch of stuff that isn't alive. Complicated. At least it's the last required chemistry class. I took a bunch of the biological sciences, for the rest of the science requirements. Maybe I should do some advanced classes. Or pick up some geology. I wish . . . well, next semester we'll get solidly into the Info track. That's what I want to see. I mean, what if I'm not any good at seeing what's different about a new world?"
Ebsa led the way into the Old Library. The third floor was quiet, a good place to study. So much information had gone completely electronic, searchable from anywhere, that the stacks were silent, and this nook was usually empty.
"Sociology. And analysis. And comparative cultures . . . " Azko looked worried. "At least I'm just a freshman. You two and Paer are going to get it all in three semesters."
Ebsa pondered the future. "But next semester could really get intense."
"Maybe you actually need these basics for the advanced classes?" Azko suggested.
"Somehow I doubt I'll find a use for the Latin, though."
"Don't bet on it. It's the basis for a lot of other languages."
"I know. That's why I keep tangling it up with Spanish. I've already got the North and South American native languages intro. And German."
Azko grinned. "No Hindi? No Cantonese or Mandarin?"
"No. Nor Zulu. Nor TecTalk. I can't do everything. And I don't want to be such an expert in one language that I'm stuck in a narrow specialty and never get assigned to explore really strange worlds."
"Oooo. Ambitious. But you have to learn enough to be useful, not a tourist." Azko sighed. "I expect I'll be stuck at home. I have too many issues, starting with being a scaredy-cat. My parents never let me do anything da
ngerous. And now I'm not sure I can." He looked away.
"Huh. You ought to work on that. What's your worst problem?"
"Heights. Well, not looking over them, but I can't jump off them. Even little ones. I just can't!"
"Right. This afternoon we'll start working on that."
"Ebsa!"
"What? Just because I'm a fellow student and completely ignorant of desensitization training, you don't trust me? I'm wounded." Ebsa looked around the library. "The steps up to the biography section. Get on the first step and jump off. Bend your knees like in all the parachuting scenes in action vids."
"For one step? You're joking."
"Nope. That'll develop good habits for when I make you do higher jumps. Do it ten times."
Azko looked at him in disbelief. Looked at the stairs.
After a long moment he got up and walked over. Stepped up, turned . . . stared down . . . jumped off.
And hesitated before he did it again.
Ebsa kept his head down pretending to be reading, not watching the boy wrestle with what must be a hell of a phobia. I'd better stick to one step for at least a week. When he doesn't even notice, I'll find something higher.
Ra'd breezed in and thumped his backpack down. Shot Azko an odd look.
"Shhh! It's an exercise in trust."
"You are a strange man."
Ebsa sniffed. "Compared to who? You?"
"Nah. I'm normal—for what I am." Ra'd grinned.
"Which you're not about to explain. I figure a traveling circus acrobat." Ebsa sat back and grinned at Ra'd's indignant expression. "Although I haven't entirely ruled out Space Aliens."
Ra'd scowled at his comp. "You are almost as strange as all these damned political parties." He glanced at Ebsa's Chemistry homework and snaked out a hand to tap one. "Start over. You've got the wrong number of Oxygen atoms on the far side."
Ra'd flipped through his note book . . . slowed.
Ebsa glanced over. No doodles. Excellent pencil sketches of the Comet Fall gods.