by KT Belt
Eventually, she got close enough to see that it was man. He was built like a bear and even made the Constructs she’d fought look small. He hummed quietly to himself as he sat by the fire. Carmen considered leaving him alone in his peace before she thought better of it. She deliberately stepped on a twig, and its snap echoed through the forest.
“Who goes there?” the man said with a start as he stood. Carmen said nothing, and he gave another small jump of surprise when his eyes found her. “What are you doing here, girl? Are you lost?”
Carmen took a few steps forward and shook her head. “I don’t know where I’m going, but I’m not lost.”
The man looked at her with an eyebrow raised. His hair was trimmed short, and his body had the look of an athlete who had only slightly gone to seed. By the fire, he had set up a small camp with a tent, a pot, and a few bags. She didn’t think he had been here very long. A pile of wood had yet to be placed in the fire. As she moved a little closer to him, he felt none of the fear the rest of the townspeople did—surprise and confusion yes, but not fear. The contrast struck Carmen as unusual, but she didn’t dislike it.
“You hungry, girl?” he asked after a few seconds of silence. “I’ve got some beans. It’s not much,” he added with a shrug.
Carmen was so hungry that he could have offered his boots and she would have accepted. She nodded several times before taking a seat on the opposite side of the fire. She’d never seen fire out in the open like this, and she stared at it while the man sat back down and got comfortable.
“Name’s Eli,” he said.
“Edge,” Carmen replied as she studied the flames.
She could feel the heat, sure, but she could also feel the chemical bonds of the wood break down and change in the inferno. It was a strange sensation.
“Edge, huh?” he muttered. “You a Clairvoyant?” Carmen nodded and wondered, as usual, how people always knew. “Now, now, don’t get too close! You’ll burn yourself!”
Carmen smiled at that. Then she placed her hand on top of the flames. Eli marveled at the fire flowing around her hand, seemingly like water, to no ill effect.
“It can’t hurt me,” she said as she waved her hand slowly from side to side in the fire. “Our bioelectric field means it never actually touches us.” Her eyes shot open in shock as her shirt sleeve caught fire. “Shit! Shit!” she yelled as she moved to pat out the flames.
Eli broke out in uproarious laughter. Carmen could admit it was somewhat funny, but she didn’t even smile. Instead, she cradled her arm. She had been burned a little, and that sensation was also new. She grimaced from the pain. Eli noticed.
“A girl as pretty as you shouldn’t have such ugly words come out of her mouth,” he said.
Carmen couldn’t help smiling. No one had ever said anything like that to her before. To Janus, Kali, and everyone else at the facility, her face may as well be a block of wood.
“Here, let me see if I have something for your arm.”
Then he turned around and rummaged through one of his bags. Carmen walked over to him, still holding her arm. It didn’t hurt that much, at least not compared to other injuries she’d suffered, but this was all so fascinatingly new that she went along with it just to see what would happen. He eventually produced a small bottle.
“Let me see.”
Carmen sat in front of him and held out her arm. He slowly rubbed whatever was in the bottle into her wound.
“Old herbal remedy,” he said. “I never trusted all the dermal-whatever stuff, even when it was used on me.”
His hands were quite rough, but his touch was gentle. He looked at her and smiled, and it was so genuine that she could feel it radiating through her like ripples in a pond. She smiled back after wincing when he touched a sensitive spot.
“There. Now how does it feel?”
“Better,” she half-lied. Then she went back to her place on the other side of the fire and sat down.
Eli turned to get something else. “I’ll get started on those beans.”
Carmen nodded but said nothing.
“Where did you even learn words like that?” he asked casually as he poured the beans into the pot.
She glanced between him and the stars. She hadn’t seen them since she was a little girl.
“They give us books to read.”
“Makes sense,” he muttered. Then he noticed her looking at the sky. “Pretty isn’t it?” Carmen nodded. “I found this place a few years ago. No one knows about it. I remember the first time I saw the night sky here.”
“Is that why you’re here now?” she asked innocently. After a second or so, however, her eyes narrowed on him before he even spoke.
“Uh…ah, yes,” he stuttered.
She knew he was lying, but she didn’t know what the lie was. His thoughts weren’t completely clear to her, which was odd. They were muddled, not straying to any one thing as most people’s thoughts did. She didn’t pay it much mind, though.
“How do you know I’m a Clairvoyant?” she asked, changing the subject. “Seems like everyone does just by looking at me.”
“You kind of can tell just by looking at you.”
“What do you mean?”
Eli shook his head slowly and seemed amused by the question. Carmen groaned softly. It was mildly frustrating that the answer was so obvious to everyone but her.
“It’s how you move. You’re almost like cats or…or water flowing over rocks,” he said, searching for the right words. “You probably wouldn’t make a sound running on dry leaves, unless you wanted to,” he continued. “It’s even how you speak. ‘I don’t know where I’m going, but I’m not lost.’ Only a Clairvoyant can talk like that. And then the eyes….” His voice trailed off, and he appeared lost in thought.
“What about the eyes?” she asked to get him back on track.
Eli glanced at her and then gave his head a small shake. “They look right through you. It’s like you don’t even see me—like you’re studying my very soul.”
Carmen looked away as her thoughts turned inward. She never realized that even how she looked at people was different from everyone else. It really was true. She was a Clairvoyant, and every single thing about her reflected it. She wrapped her hands around her knees and shivered.
“I am a monster,” she said softly to herself.
She glanced at Eli in that moment. She knew he’d heard her. His eyes widened slightly, and then his face became very dour, but he didn’t say anything. Just then, Carmen felt suddenly uncomfortable, like her skin had been turned inside out. She winced as she resisted the feeling, and was unable to help a small moan.
“Edge, you all right?” Eli asked quickly.
Carmen took a deep breath as whatever she was being assaulted by suddenly went away. “I’m fine,” she said. “Maybe a little hungry, though.”
He nodded sharply. “Beans should be ready by now. You can have them all, if you’d like,” he said, handing her the pot and a large spoon.
“Thank you,” Carmen said.
She took a few spoonsful and sighed contently, unaware of just how hungry she was. Eli watched her but didn’t speak. She glanced at him, trying her best to make her eyes not look right through him.
“Why are you so nice to me?” she asked softly. “I know you’re not afraid of me.”
“Clairvoyants can read minds. Why don’t you just read mine for the reason?”
“We can read minds, but it is a matter of degree, and I can’t fully read yours. If I focused on it, I probably could. But…it seems like you’re distracted.”
He met her gaze for a second and then looked at the fire. As he rubbed his hands roughly together, she felt uncomfortable again.
“Why are you being so nice to me?” she asked again.
“I know Clairvoyants don’t like repeating themselves,” he said, prodding a few embers with a stick from his wood pile. He still didn’t look at her.
“Yes, it is a little annoying,” she admitted. “But
why?” she asked, focusing back on her question. “Everyone from the town was utterly terrified of me.”
“And that’s a damn shame,” Eli said, finally looking at her. “You seem like a nice girl.”
“Thank you,” she said.
She remembered from long ago that her mother told her to say “thank you” whenever someone said something nice. She blinked a few times, surprised that the reflex had stayed with her. Carmen still considered what he said curiously, though.
“My handler said it was because the townspeople weren’t used to Clairvoyants.”
“Handler?” Eli asked in a disgusted tone. “They give you a handler like a beast in a zoo?”
“Not exactly,” she said, shaking her head. She had never thought about it that way. “Do you have experience with Clairvoyants?”
He held completely still for a long while. Carmen’s hands were on her knees, and squeezed them hard to keep from moaning again as she felt her question race through his mind.
“Yes,” he finally said. “Once.”
His thoughts were crystal clear now, but they didn’t coalesce into any one thing. Part of him wanted to say more while, in equal measure, he also wanted her to leave. He ultimately said nothing. Despite his silence, Carmen was besieged by flashing images and feelings of pain. Her heart raced as Eli’s memory slowly took hold. There was also something else. It was hard to identify at first, until at last she knew. It was shame.
“But that was another lifetime ago,” he muttered, throwing the stick into the fire.
“It doesn’t feel like it,” Carmen said softly. He looked at her and paused, his face betraying shocked defensiveness. She hadn’t meant to say that. She was even tempted to pretend she hadn’t and drop the subject. Yet she felt tasked to continue. “You want to tell me about it,” she remarked, well aware that he also didn’t.
“It’s not a story worth telling,” he muttered, looking away.
Eli picked up another stick and started poking the fire again. The motion of the stick was rigid and hesitant. He seemed more like he was trying to distract himself than accomplish anything constructive.
For Carmen, her skin felt like it was on fire while daggers stabbed her skull. Even so, she looked nowhere near as uncomfortable as he did. Actually, she decided he seemed more at war with himself than uncomfortable, and in this war, there was no victory, only causalities. His demeanor now as opposed to when she first arrived took her so aback that the only thing keeping her from walking away and leaving Eli in peace was that, despite it all, he really didn’t want her to go. Carmen looked at this giant bear of man maybe three times her age and eventually understood that she needed to take the lead.
“Tell me…. Please,” she said, forcing herself to give him a reassuring smile. It seemed like the most…compassionate thing to do.
He chuckled lightly then, but there was no mirth in the noise. “Everywhere I go, everyone knows,” he said. He chuckled again. “Figures I would meet someone like you here who doesn’t.”
Carmen opened her mouth to say something, but Eli continued.
“I was a Phalanx Trooper during the Sorten War, all the way from the beginning. It’s hard to think we had no idea what Clairvoyants were. It wasn’t even twenty years ago. There were rumors of sortens training terrans to have special abilities, but they were too fantastic to believe.”
Carmen listened closely. His words were clear but monotone—a forced lack of emotion. She bit her lip, well aware of the thoughts and feelings underneath Eli’s words.
“I was with a battalion sent to secure Earth’s moon. Luna was the effective high ground for the invasion of Earth. Reconnaissance passes showed that the sortens had a small base there,” he continued. “The base had no defenses, no soldiers. We didn’t know it until we landed, but it was a remote Clairvoyant research and training base.”
He seemed unstressed as he spoke, but Carmen’s mouth was dry and her hands trembled.
“In a panic, their scientists set them upon us.” He paused for a short moment before he continued. “Most were about your age. Some were….” His voice trailed off. Despite that, Carmen knew exactly how young the younger Clairvoyants had been. “We were trained for every eventuality of battle. On Luna, though, it was like we were hit by a force of nature…. We did everything we could to survive.”
Eli stared straight ahead and spoke evenly, seemingly lost in the memory. Carmen remembered every detail with him. The wounds and stress of the battle lived with him still, no longer visible but all-pervading nonetheless. She held herself, her face fixed in sorrow as she listened.
“I remember every Clairvoyant that attacked us. I can still see their faces,” he said slowly, looking off in the distance as though he was doing just that. “How they looked right through you…. I remember how we killed each one of them too.” He took a deep breath. “Out of the twelve hundred troopers in the battalion, less than fifty survived. The Clairvoyants fought to the last man.”
Carmen shut her eyes and groaned to keep the image from her mind, but it didn’t work.
“When we attacked the sorten base, all the scientists there immediately surrendered. That was when we read their training methods—how they compelled the Clairvoyants to do anything they wanted. We forced the scientists to bury our dead and the Clairvoyants—what was left of them.” He paused again for a few long seconds. “There are rules in war…between civilized honorable people. These scientists,” Eli reflected as he shook his head. “It would be like accepting the surrender of maggots. We went slowly with them. Every time they begged for mercy, we made them read aloud what they had done to their research subjects. When we were…finished with them, we destroyed the base and all the research,” he said, finally looking at Carmen.
“Why?” she asked.
He choked something back, which made her shiver. “After what we’d seen, we didn’t want anyone to continue their work.”
A chill spread from the pit of Carmen’s stomach to every inch of her body. Eli could no longer look at her, and she watched him as he shifted uneasily.
“Everyone called us heroes after the battle, but we knew we were not. We were monsters,” he said. “There are only a few of us left now. A long time ago, people believed there was a supreme being who could forgive you for your sins. I beg every day. I get no reply.”
Carmen had no words. Her mind and body were frozen. As she closed her eyes and brought her hands to face, his words, the images—everything—existed before her like a waking nightmare. When she looked at him again, he was fiddling with the fire. He still didn’t look at her.
“I’m sorry,” she said, at a loss for what else to say.
Eli didn’t acknowledge her, but he did stir up the fire with slightly more vigor. “It’s getting late,” he finally said. “I’ve got a sleeping bag and some blankets, if you’d like.”
“I don’t need them. I’m not cold.”
His look said he didn’t believe her, but he didn’t challenge the statement. “You should go to sleep at least. It is late.”
Carmen had no idea what time it was. She opened her mouth, but Eli cut her off.
“We can talk in the morning. I need some time by myself.”
She nodded slowly and then lay down, facing away from the fire. He said nothing to her and she said nothing to him while she tried in vain to purge the memory of the past few minutes from her mind. There was no sound at all, other than the crackling fire. Yet, once or twice, she was sure she heard him weeping.
12
Numb
The young Clairvoyant slept through the night, though not serenely. Her normal nightmares, which caused her usual fidgets and whimpers, were bolstered by her conversation with Eli. She had never been to Earth’s moon, fought Phalanx Troopers, or met a sorten, but from his memory, the sights, pains, and even smells from the battle could be recalled with disquieting accuracy.
She knew sortens didn’t look like Janus, but he appeared as one in her nightmare, and it w
as strangely fitting. He didn’t speak to her via voice or by thought; nevertheless, she knew her mission, and she resisted.
“It’s time,” he said, and she felt pain.
The pain couldn’t really be described, but it still made her scream. She knew she was sleeping, but she was also well aware that no one could hear her. She was desperate to wake up—to be rid of her reality.
“It’s time,” Janus said, and there was more pain.
The next thing Carmen knew, she was on the surface of the moon. The vast, desolate expanse extended as far as she could see. Somehow, she didn’t need an excursion suit. Kali was with her, but it wasn’t really Kali as she knew her. She looked the same, but she was younger, about the age Carmen was now. Her handler—now her peer—had none of her usual confidence and poise. Everything about her was weak, like a beaten animal. The two were flying just above the surface with dozens of other Clairvoyants. Their army seemed about as fit to fight as a rented mule. Most were covered in bruises, and she could see burns on several, as well as missing limbs. Kali’s cream-colored skin was bubbled, and her black hair was on fire. She laughed out a pained wail like a banshee as the fire slowly consumed her, but she didn’t die.
Carmen brought her hand to her chest, and when she looked at her fingers, they were covered in blood from a gunshot wound. She screamed again. It felt like the bullet was still ripping into her—like it was doing so continuously. But she hadn’t been shot at, not yet. She could see the army arrayed against them, though, and it was ready.
“It’s time,” Janus said, and there was more pain as the attack began.
They swarmed the troopers like bees. The troopers’ shrill, pained cries somehow carried over the airless void of the moon. She killed, reveling in each death. Kali was right with her, on fire and covered in blood but having the time of her life. Each trooper felled looked like a Construct, her parents, and the nice man who’d mussed her hair and given her an ice cream cone.