Web of Truth (Cadicle #4): An Epic Space Opera Series

by DuBoff, Amy

  Wil contemplated for a moment. “I knew I was Tenth Generation, but I thought abilities had always been on a cycle like that.”

  “Most do.” The Priesthood has rewritten history so most wouldn’t know any better.

  “And if people found out—or remembered—that everyone used to have abilities and the Priesthood tampered with their existence…”

  Banks inclined his head. “Revolts, civil war—there’s no knowing how people may react. But, it’s certain the Priesthood would fall, and self-preservation has become their singular driver. So the Bakzen, the war, and our common history has remained hidden.”

  Wil grimaced. “They change the entire course of history for our race and just pretend like nothing happened?”

  “Essentially.”

  “So there’s no solution to the Generation issue?” Wil asked.

  “Well,” Banks continued, “with the complete genetic map across all the generations at their disposal, the Priesthood was finally able to identify the anomaly causing the Twelve-Generation Cycle. Unfortunately, they found that the mutation was so embedded in the root of the genetic code that no nanoagent was capable of making the repair. The only way full abilities could be restored was through natural evolution—essentially, selective breeding. A report summarizing these findings somehow got leaked to the general public, and there was another uprising when everyone realized what the Priesthood had done. In an act of desperation to save their institution, the Priesthood decided to make the Bakzen the scapegoats.”

  Wil frowned, a crease deepening between his eyebrows. “How so?”

  Through unconscionable selfishness. “What was the best way to get people to forget why they were upset? To make those lost abilities into an evil. And who best embodied all those abilities? The Bakzen. The Priesthood launched what became a propaganda campaign to set a new cultural norm, where telekinetic abilities were something to be looked down upon.”

  Wil nodded, thoughtful. “My father has mentioned that things were different when he was younger, compared to how it is now.”

  The Priesthood has yet again changed the public consciousness to suit their needs. “Yes, there was another shift in recent years—beginning shortly before you were born. But several hundred years ago, the public denouncement was at its peak.”

  “So the Bakzen were ultimately driven away?”

  Banks hung his head and let out a pained breath. “Oh, it was far more than that. After a few generations of telekinesis being a thing of shame and people hiding any abilities they may have, the public sentiment reached critical mass. People called for the forced removal of the Bakzen. And the Priesthood had a swift way of dealing with the Bakzen issue: they simply outlawed cloning of full bodies. Of course, anything like an organ or limb was acceptable, as we do today, but nothing that could house a sentient mind. This law essentially disallowed the only reproductive means of the Bakzen.”

  “No wonder they hate us.” Wil looked sick.

  They have every right to. We started the conflict. “Up to that point, the Bakzen had been generous and accommodating. But, when their very existence was threatened, they stood up for themselves. When the political powers on Tararia sought to enforce the new anti-cloning laws, the Bakzen fled from the inner Taran colonies and found a new homeworld for themselves.”

  “So, then, how did the war get started? I was told the Bakzen attacked an unarmed freighter.” The crease between Wil’s eyebrows continued to deepen.

  Even I haven’t been able to find the truth about the beginning of the war. “I would tell you if I knew, Wil,” Banks said. “My best guess? That freighter was carrying a biological weapon meant to exterminate the Bakzen. And the diplomats that were supposedly murdered in cold blood? I suspect that they were dispatched to once again enforce the anti-cloning laws, and the Bakzen were sending a powerful ‘leave us alone’ message.”

  Wil looked horrified. “How can you go along with all of this? I—”

  “What choice do we have? This all happened hundreds of years ago. Hatred for Tarans has been engineered into the Bakzen ever since then. Whatever common ground our peoples once shared, that was phased out long before our lifetimes.”

  “That doesn’t make it right!”

  “No, but we have to think of ourselves.”

  Wil hung his head. “It was thinking of ourselves that led to this atrocity.”

  “I don’t deny that.”

  “Yet, you are one of the insiders.”

  I only accepted this assignment because it was the one way I could infiltrate the Priesthood. Banks looked Wil in the eye. “I serve the TSS.”

  “Which reports to the Priesthood.”

  “Yes, but not all roles have clear distinctions.” Banks folded his hands on the desktop. “Wil, I’m even older than your father. I grew up in a time where anyone with telekinetic gifts was an outcast. I was fortunate to be accepted as an Agent trainee with the TSS, and early in my career I discovered the seldom-acknowledged fact that the TSS reports to the Priesthood. I thought that by serving the TSS I could make things better for others like me.” Except the higher up I got, the more I realized that the Priesthood wasn’t in it for the people. But, there’s still hope. His years of service were made worthwhile by having had the chance to mold Cris from a young age—from back when he was still just a rebellious High Dynasty heir who had already spoken out against the Priesthood. That opportunity to help shape the thinking of someone with real influence was a chance to enact true change.

  “And what have you accomplished?” Wil asked, snapping Banks out of his reflection.

  “It’s not all about the present.” Seeing what you and your father are positioned to offer—we have a shot. “But we do need to focus on the war right now. What it comes down to is the modern Bakzen aren’t the same Bakzen that Tarans created all those centuries ago. Now they’re merciless killers, and not one left among them would negotiate a peaceful end to the conflict. Our history of fighting is far too long, and they have changed their genetic makeup to be purely creatures of war.”

  “And so Tarans needed their own engineered killer.” Wil looked down. “Me.”

  “You are so much more than that, Wil. Despite what we are asking you to do, you are also the salvation for us all—our hope for a new beginning after all this horror.”

  “That sounds like something the Aesir said,” Wil murmured.

  “What did they say?”

  “They told me that I was the ‘first of what Tarans can become.’”

  “Yes.” You can be our savior in more way than one. “I was getting to that… All of the careful orchestration that led to your creation also means that your genetic line holds the key to repairing the anomaly that causes the Twelve-Generation Cycle.”

  “It does?” Wil perked up ever so slightly.

  “The Priesthood was exacting with their methods. The High Dynasties, having the strongest genetic lines and the un-tampered samples in the Genetic Archive, were used to start the process. It took hundreds of years, but eventually those lines were refined—leading to your parents, and then you. Those same traits that make you able to stand up to the Bakzen are also the gaps in the genetic code that were damaged through the Priesthood’s manipulation. We need a Generation Thirteen, bypassing the reset of abilities that happens after the Twelfth Generation. Your great-grandchildren should have the code to enable a patch for the rest of the population.”

  “Which is why you needed to find—or create—a perfect genetic match for me. Saera.”

  “Yes.” But I’m so glad you have her, for far different reasons. “However, I don’t think the genetic manipulation is confined to just the Dynasties. I suspect some of the Priests are the results of experimentation themselves.”

  Wil bit his lip. “What do you mean?”

  “I believe the Priesthood might engage in the very cloning practices they outlawed—it is the most secure way to ensure information stays within the organization.”

  Wil sat in
thought for a moment. “Who else knows about all of this?”

  “Beyond select members of the Priesthood and the Aesir, just Taelis and myself as High Commanders.”

  “No one else?”

  Banks looked down. No one left alive, as far as I’d known…

  “What is it?” Wil asked.

  “This is dangerous information, Wil. You can’t underestimate the ramifications of such knowledge.”

  “Clearly.”

  “Just be careful,” Banks cautioned. “The Priesthood can’t suspect a breach. They will protect these secrets by any means necessary.”

  Wil evaluated him. “What are you talking around?”

  Banks swallowed. “There is something that not even Taelis knows, and even fewer members of the Priesthood. I think that the Dainetris Dynasty learned of the Priesthood’s actions all those years ago and that is what brought about their fall.”

  “The documentation around that fall has always struck me as suspicious.”

  “The Priesthood was quite thorough with their rewriting of history. Only their position of supreme oversight for all Taran scientific information and cultural knowledge enabled them to attempt such a colossal cover-up. But physical records—those are more difficult to search out and destroy. The propaganda campaigns after the revolution took care of much of that data cleanup, but it’s possible the Dainetris had a vault that some unsuspecting descendant opened a hundred years ago and learned the truth.”

  “And so they were silenced.”

  “Perhaps. I have no evidence to support the theory.” But it would seem that the Aesir feel there is something related to Dainetris worth recovering.

  Wil sat back in his chair, grating his teeth.

  “I know this is a lot to take in.”

  Wil let out a laugh that was closer to a cry. “This one day has changed almost everything I thought I knew.”

  Banks frowned. “I truly wish that there had been another way. But this revelation doesn’t change what we need from you now.”

  “I know. Even the Aesir are convinced the Bakzen need to be eliminated.”

  Is that so? “Thank you, Wil. We put so much weight on you, and you continue to bear it.”

  “Don’t thank me yet. I still can’t perform simultaneous observation.”

  Something tells me that you will be able to now, since meeting the Aesir. “It will come in time. You’ll get there.”

  Wil rose. “Forgive me if I can’t look at you for a while. I understand why you did what you did, but that doesn’t excuse you from lying to me for my whole life. That’ll take some time to get over.”

  “And forgive me for continuing to push you, even when I know you already hate me.”

  “Banks, I could never hate you. Not when you kept these things from me as a little kid, when there was no way I could understand how history can change and the present isn’t always what it seems. You did me a kindness. None of this is either of our faults. We just have our roles to play. But right now, you’re the messenger. Play dead for awhile.”

  CHAPTER 27

  How could they keep the truth from me? Wil felt even more adrift than when he had first stared into the void only hours before. I thought that learning of the Bakzen war in the rift was the extent of the secrets, but this… it casts everything in new light, and yet it can’t change anything.

  Wil trudged into the quarters he shared with Saera. His wife was waiting for him on the couch in the main room.

  She stood when he walked in. “Wil, I heard you got back a while ago. Where have you been?”

  What can I say to her? Wil closed the door and looked down. “I’m sorry for not coming to see you earlier. I had to talk to Banks. I… learned some things that needed to be discussed.”

  Saera came to Wil. “I’m glad you’re back safely.”

  “Physically, anyway.” His mental state was another matter.

  “What did the Aesir do to you?” She searched his face.

  Wil shook his head. “No, it’s not that.” They only helped me see what’s been right in front of me all this time. “There’s so much…” He couldn’t find the words.

  Saera put her arms around him, holding his head to her shoulder. “I’m here for you. Anything you need.”

  Wil took a minute to gather his thoughts. “This war… We’ve been set up from the very beginning.”

  “What do you mean?” She held him at arm’s length, looking him in the eye.

  If anyone else can handle the truth, it’s her. But it wasn’t safe to talk out loud without the security system in Banks’ office. “The Bakzen were manufactured by Tarans. Rather, by the Priesthood,” he told her telepathically.

  Saera took a sharp breath, her eyes wide. “Manufactured?”

  “The Priesthood intended them to be a forced evolution of the Taran race.” An affront to the natural pattern that the Aesir have been so careful to respect. Wil ran his fingers through his hair. “But when things didn’t go according to plan, the Priesthood drove them away. They made them into the enemy.”

  “Wil…” Saera took his hand.

  We’re the clean-up crew. He swallowed. “Me—us—our place in all this. It’s about much more than the war. The Priesthood also attempted gene therapy in the general populace, and that manipulation resulted in the loss of telekinetic abilities for all but a few. We’re the remnants. The denouncement of telekinesis, the outlaw of cloning, the war with the Bakzen—it’s all the Priesthood trying to cover up their past.”

  Saera shook her head, struggling to comprehend. “How did you learn that?”

  Wil let out a pained laugh. “That’s the worst part. Banks has known all along. But it was all so clear once I met the Aesir. I just didn’t have the right vantage to see it.”

  Saera exhaled slowly. “Maybe that’s for the best.” Then out loud she asked, “Would you have gotten this far if you had known all along?”

  “Probably not. But should I have? Should I even move forward now?” Could I walk away, even if I wanted to?

  “Did you learn anything that changes the present?”

  “I’ve gained a whole new perspective.”

  His wife stroked his hand. “But does it change the facts?”

  “Everything stems from a false history—”

  “But what about the hard facts of the present?” Saera pressed.

  My reality has certainly changed, but I suppose this information doesn’t alter present circumstances. “Not materially.”

  “Diplomacy has failed with the Bakzen,” Saera stated. “Regardless of how things came to be this way, they have made themselves the enemy. It may not be the moral right, but their defeat is the only way for you to keep the Taran people safe.”

  “I wish I could be as objective as you.”

  Saera rubbed Wil’s back. “You’re a good man in your heart, Wil, no matter what actions you may need to take. I believe in you.”

  “And I believe in my abilities. But I don’t believe in the validity of the task that’s been set before me.” Yet, the Aesir insist this is the way things must be.

  “You haven’t been asked to pass judgment.”

  “You sound just like Banks.”

  Saera paused. “What did the Aesir say?”

  Wil hung his head. “They said the Bakzen need to be destroyed.”

  “Well, then—”

  “I know. I just wish it didn’t have to be me to do it.” Even though the Aesir also said it had to be me.

  “Whatever happens, it’s on all of us.”

  “But me most of all.”

  Saera took his hand. “Believe what you want. Personally, I’d rather focus on the lives that we’re saving through our actions.”

  Maybe I’ll be able to see it that way in time, but I can’t yet. Wil nodded.

  Saera hugged him. “I love you no matter what, Wil.”

  “Thank you. At least one of us will.”

  “It’s not just me. You have an amazing team that will support yo
u through anything.”

  “I’m so afraid I’ll let everyone down. That I won’t be able to do what’s necessary when the time comes.”

  Saera looked him in the eye. “You can do it.”

  The words were little consolation, but Wil latched on. I can do it. I have to.

  * * *

  The moment had finally come—the test for all Haersen had worked toward all his years in allegiance to the Bakzen.

  He savored the energy flowing through him, his skin tingling and his core on fire. When he yearned for more, the power came to him. A barrier was there, but so much farther away than it had ever been before. He pressed further, stretching, until he could take no more.

  As he pulled back, a smile spread across his face. He had done it. The limits of his past were finally broken. His eyes glowed with red luminescence—showing all the power he now possessed. His transformation was complete.

  Tek nodded with satisfaction—a rarity in their years together. “So it worked.”

  Haersen’s transformation had changed his appearance to nearly match that of his Bakzen comrades, but, more importantly, it had also changed the abilities he had always sought to grow. After years of waiting and hoping, he had been able to break through the limitations on his abilities that were once holding him back. More than a personal accomplishment, it meant that Tek’s plan was coming to fruition.

  “The former Tarans will be more than just weak slaves,” Tek said, satisfaction bringing a smile to his face. “They can be enhanced, just as you have been.”

  “A new race for the future.”

  Tek nodded. “Indeed.”

  “It’s all thanks to you.” Haersen’s eyes stung with tears of gratitude, but he didn’t let it show. He was stronger than that now.

  “I’m only doing what should have been done long ago.”

  “They’ll thank you, once they know the gifts you can give them.” Haersen knew that other Tarans wouldn’t understand the Bakzen ways at first, but they would in time. Tek was the leader they needed—they all needed. Regardless of the previous Imperial Director’s doubts, Tek had proven that Taran transformation was possible. Above all else, it would ensure a Bakzen victory in the war. His first two years as Imperial Director would set the tone for a new era.