Kelerin was utterly confused now. “Well aware, how?”
“The Prophecy went around a few minutes ago. Apparently your Prophet managed to get through an offensive Wave Thought before she came a’tumblin down to join us.” Leaning over to address Analel, he said, “Hey, impressive job, by the way. If you ever get the urge to Prophecy for a real Academic, feel free to put in a request for my Card.” Analel offered Valix the most insincere smile she could muster as her answer. Valix didn’t seem to mind.
Kelerin was exasperated. “But you still kept fighting me?”
“Of course. I wasn’t going to give up my chance at a rematch after you cheated your way to victory the first time around.”
“I didn’t cheat, first of all - second, that’s insane.”
“Whatever helps you sleep at night, Kel.”
He couldn’t believe what he was hearing. They almost killed each other. And besides, how was it that Valix was so completely unaffected by the revelation that the Headmaster was a traitor. He always knew Valix to be self-absorbed, but to this extent? Orisius was much more of a mentor to Valix throughout their years at the Academy than to any other Student, especially Kelerin. “And everything about the Headmaster being a traitor, about his being responsible for the destruction of the Academy and all those deaths, it doesn’t bother you?”
“Why should it?” asked Valix, nonchalantly. “He already made me faculty. They can’t take that away just because the old man went nuts.”
Kelerin was speechless. Analel too was taken aback. Looking at Valix, she couldn’t help but ask, “Are you always this…”
“Self-assured? Yes, I am.”
“Mmm, not the words I was thinking of.”
*****
Orisius/Jonas/Another
Professor-Class Wave Whips doubled as both offensive and defensive weapons, and as such, Professor dueling styles were completely different than lower ranked Academics. Another name for it was Tangling, and Jonas, having just been promoted to Professor, was getting a painful crash course in the methodology. He knew he was no match for the Headmaster in a straight up duel, it wasn’t even close. But perhaps, he thought, he could use his disadvantage to his advantage.
Activating his Rippler, he pulled himself to his feet, standing and facing Orisius defiantly; both arms hanging at his side, Rippler pulsing out from his left wrist, Wave Whip dangling from his right hand, snaking slowly and menacingly along the ash ridden floor.
“A Rippler, Jonas? I know I didn’t pour my time and effort into educating a fool.” It was a small dismissive gesture, Orisius merely flicked his wrist, and yet the lash came out quick as lightning. Jonas sent forth his own lash a fraction of a second afterward. The plan was risky and he prayed he wouldn’t lose his arm for attempting it. His Rippler couldn’t stand up to anything above a Teacher-Class Whip, certainly nothing of the caliber the Headmaster wielded; a one-of-a kind. Still, he was told to stall and at the least he’d accomplish that. If he was lucky, and if Orisius was overly cocky, who knew? In that fraction of a second, while the Headmaster was attacking his Rippler, there was the smallest possibility that he wouldn’t be fast enough to react to a near simultaneous attack. But first Jonas would have to absorb his punishment for the attempt.
Orisius’ lash hit Jonas’ Rippler, cutting through the concentric rings of energy Waves as if they had no more substance to them than an optical allusion. The attack was pin-point, spearing through the face of Jonas’ Rippler band and destroying the device while opening up a deep, surgical slit on his wrist, so thin, Jonas didn’t even feel it at first. But he kept from flinching, waiting to see how his own attack would fair - not too well, as it would turn out.
After his initial flick, Orisius spiraled his wrist in a way as to create a loop at the back of his lash the same time the tip of it was taking out Jonas’ Rippler. The loop first deflected Jonas’ own attack and then wrapped itself around the deflected lash. With a sharp tug, Jonas’ baton came flying out of his hands, sailing through the air directly into the waiting grasp of the Headmaster.
“A commendable attempt, using your Rippler as bait. You think outside the box, Jonas. That’s why I like you. Of course, it was bound to fail.” The Headmaster tossed Jonas back his Whip. “If you want to be a Professor you’re going to have to learn to Tangle.”
“Considering you’re about to kill me, Headmaster, I think that’s a bit too farsighted a concern for me at present.”
Orisius rolled his eyes. “Don’t be ridiculous, Jonas, I’m not going to kill you.”
“You were about to kill that poor Child Prophet.”
“I had no choice,” admitted the Headmaster, gravely. “This is bigger than any one person.”
“What is? What is so big that you sacrificed scores of Academics for it, people who followed you, believed in you?”
“Opportunity!” Orisius’ eyes were fiery now. “We have a chance here, Jonas. An unprecedented chance to build a new society. Not one based on the whims of a fickle, uneducated electorate and their manipulative representatives, all too happy to indulge them. Not one based on the mindless loyalty of persecuted masses, blindly and fearfully following a tyrannical megalomaniac who rules them.”
“What in the Creator’s name are you talking about?”
“The Mandate, Jonas, I’m talking about the Mandate! For the first time in the history of our species we have the unique opportunity to manufacture a society. A new civilization, one based on knowledge and on the indiscriminate empirical reality that is the Wave of our universe. A society based on ambition and the scientific actualization of its full potential. A society designed, shaped and governed by the minds of those capable of bringing out its full potential.”
“That’s what we’re aspiring toward right now, with the system we already have!”
“Don’t be naive, Jonas. They use our knowledge to make money, our minds to design weapons and technology, and they use all of it to increase their own power.”
“A cynical viewpoint, Headmaster. Motivations of profit and power aren’t to the mutual exclusion of justice, fairness, morality.”
“We are but a shadow of what we could be.”
“And what? Just kill the rest?”
“Jonas, I’m disappointed in you. Why are you acting so obtuse? No, I’m not going to kill the rest. I don’t care about the rest. I only want the Mandate.”
“And you’ve lied, stolen and killed for it. That Mandate isn’t yours for the taking, Headmaster. Those lives certainly weren’t yours for the taking-”
“Necessary evils.”
“How can a utopian society be built upon necessary evils?”
“Every society is built upon necessary evils.”
“You’re pettifogging. There’s a difference between necessary violence and necessary evil.”
“And you’re playing semantics,” countered Orisius, dismissively.
“Not true. Some societies, like the Islands, are built upon the freedom to choose; good or evil, truth or lies, compassion or corruption. Some within the collective choose poorly, yes, but I believe the majority of the collective are good people.”
“The collective are CHILDREN!” Orisius roared. He was getting tired of this game. “Half of them can’t name a single member of Parliament. Most can’t name all the Islands. They don’t even know their own history. They’re ignorant children chasing after immediate gratification. Do you trust a child with freedom, Jonas? Do you allow a child to choose their own destiny, or do you choose for them? For the child’s own sake, do you choose?”
“So basically what you’re saying is you want to control everyone?” summed up Jonas, crudely.
“I want to create a society in the Academic image,” clarified Orisius, “for everyone’s benefit.”
“And you’ll control it.”
“I’m the most qualified,” he confirmed, unabashedly. “I wasn’t elected by an ill-informed public and I didn’t choose myself. I was chosen by the former Headmaster,
the most qualified person before me. Now I’ve been presented with a singular opportunity, not just to shape the current state of Academia, but to have Academia shape a new world. It’s an opportunity I have no intention of squandering.”
“Is he done yet? He’s always been so tedious.”
The new voice cutting into Jonas’ consciousness was not Erin’s, and something told him the Prophet behind it signaled a surprise advantage in his favor. Perhaps he could broaden that advantage even further if he could throw Orisius off his game. “In just a minute,” he responded under his breath. “You’ll know when.” Then, addressing Orisius he said, “You say you’re the most qualified - are you sure about that?”
“Of course,” confirmed Orisius for the second time, a little annoyed that he had to do so.
Jonas continued in a skeptical tone. “Because on paper I see it, I really do, but as you’ve always taught me, an Academic has to look at the empirical evidence.” Orisius was now eyeing his former pupil with suspicion, trying to figure out where Jonas was going with this.
“Look around you, Headmaster, and what do you see? Your first pivotal decision in establishing your utopian Academic society, and what happens? You wind up destroying the very heart of its physical manifestation, wiping out your own Faculty.”
“I didn’t kill anybody,” objected Orisius, defensively. “The raiders didn’t follow my express orders.”
“Ah, ah, ah - A true leader doesn’t make excuses. Besides, a raider going back on his word? How shocking. You should have anticipated that possibility. If you did, and went through with your plan anyhow, you might as well have killed them yourself, and if you didn’t, you’re incompetent and not qualified to head up the Academy, let alone an entire new society.” Orisius’ face was beginning to turn red with anger, a vein Jonas had never seen before, disturbingly pronounced, bulging out his forehead. Almost, he thought. “In fact, just from empirical evidence alone, you may very well be the least qualified person on all of Osmos.”
“I think I’ve changed my mind, Jonas,” Orisius’ measured tone, eerily threatening, “I think I will kill you, after all.”
“Well, that seemed to have done it. Brace yourself, young man.”
The attack came in a ferocious arcing lash from high to low. The speed should have been blinding, the power, overwhelming, but much to Jonas’ surprise, he could see the lash coming before it ever got close to reaching him. He spun past it, using the spin to launch a lash of his own. Orisius entangled it and tried to send a rolling Wave across the connected streams that would have cut Jonas in two, but Jonas was able to see all the potential arcs for this attack, their probable outcomes and secondary options that could emanate from its current vector. It was almost as if he could predict the future, or futures, as was the case. He countered Orisius’ loop with one of his own and the competing forces blasted the two streams apart, sending both Orisius and Jonas skidding backward, kicking up ash.
A sly smile spread across Orisius’ lips. “Hello, Shasah,” he greeted. The revelation took Jonas by surprise. He knew Erin must have swapped places with a powerful Prophet but he never expected to be receiving the Sight of the Grand Mother herself! His senses were never more potent, his situational awareness, never more clear.
With that disconcerting smile still on his face, Orisius launched into a complex combination of attacks, lashing out with several arcs from various directions, entangling and breaking free, and then entangling again. Jonas held his own at first but the attacks kept coming, ever more frequent and ever more complex. He could see them all but was unable to adjust ideally to each, and the slightest imperfection in his reaction to one left him that much less equipped to deal with the subsequent one. He was in an ever increasing state of disadvantage and it was only a matter of time before one of the Headmaster’s lashes hit their mark. He was going to lose, which meant he was also going to die.
Then, without warning, a third lash came streaming toward Orisius’ rear. The Headmaster parried just in time to avoid being cut down, but the distraction was enough for Jonas to seize the initiative, spiraling his arm, entangling Orisius’ Whip and sending him spinning through the air, landing hard and flat on his back.
Quickly he rose to his feet, a look of disgust on his face, roaring, “HALBARD!” the single utterance echoing notes of betrayal off the walls of the crater.
Standing behind him was the ever stone cold Professor. “You lied to us all,” was Halbard’s flat response.
Orisius assessed his predicament: Jonas and Shasah to one side, Halbard to the other. For the first time in as long as he could remember, the odds were stacked against him. He let out a sagely sigh and for a moment, to Jonas’ amazement, transformed into that brilliant, bookish educator he always knew. Addressing Jonas, he asked, “Do you remember the lesson I gave you on bravery?”
Jonas did remember, from back in the cruiser before they attacked the Habitat. “The enemy of tactics,” he summarized.
The Headmaster smiled again, this time sadly. “I told you, I always liked you, Jonas.” Swirling his whip around himself, circling its stream along the floor, and then raising his baton so that the swirling stream rose up over his head, engulfing him in a subatomic vortex of his own making - the Headmaster whipped back down with sudden force. There was a brilliant flash of light, Jonas and Halbard had to shield their eyes before it, and then nothing. Orisius had vanished.
Staring uncomprehendingly at the empty spot where his mentor-turned-traitor had stood only moments before, Jonas asked, hesitatingly, “Did he just...”
“Teleport? Yes.”
“He can do that?” Total disbelief characterized his tone, despite what he’d just seen with his own eyes.
No answer was forthcoming, however, as Shasah had disappeared herself.
Chapter 41: Guest
The Prophecy, Caras 1
“I made sure the majority of our Prophets would be attending a party back on Castious,” related Shasah over her shoulder as she led her distinguished guest through the uncharacteristically deserted halls of the Prophecy, “so we should have complete privacy throughout your visit.”
This assurance drew no response from the cloaked figure who followed her, which didn’t surprise the Grand Mother in the slightest. Since her guest arrived she’d been talking nonstop, like an enamored Child Prophet meeting a senior member of Academy faculty for the first time.
“It’s unprecedented,” she continued, “that we should have so many Prophets off premises, and at a party no less.” Shasah allowed herself the release of a short and nervous laugh. “What the Mother’s and Children must think of their Grand Mother, right now? No doubt that I’m getting older, losing a bit of my strength of conviction.”
Still no response.
Shasah was not one used to feeling uncomfortable, and she abhorred the way she was acting, but she couldn’t help it. Her guest had a penchant for only speaking when necessary, and when someone like that is walking behind you, silent and superior, there’s an undeniable urge to fill the void with needless chatter. At least now she knew how her own Children must feel when finding themselves forced to spend a period of time in her company.
“So, they seem to have met each other earlier than your people anticipated.” The words continued to flow from Shasah’s mouth like the discharge of a Wave Whip in the hands of an amateur, this last unsolicited observation being just plain insulting. She dug her nails into her palm as a discreet way of chastising herself for her continued foolish behavior. To her surprise, though, her guest responded.
“That is not where our Sight fell short.” Shasah didn’t expect an elaboration on where exactly their Sight did fall short, but again, to her surprise, it came anyway. “We never anticipated a when, but we also never anticipated the strength of their connection.”
This tacit admission of error caught Shasah off guard. For nearly two decades, on the very few occasions her guest came to visit, the flow of information had always been unidirectiona
l. She would relay updates on progress and development while the guest listened quietly. What Shasah was hearing now was the most her guest had ever allowed her to peek behind the curtain of inner workings and thought processes for things she was involved in, but not privy to.
The guest continued to explain while Shasah continued to lead the way, fearful that any sudden change of behavior might bring an end to this rare turn of events. “The belief had always been that we would one day have to orchestrate their meeting ourselves. Clearly that will no longer be necessary.”
“Why keep them apart in the first place?” asked Shasah, regretting her interruption immediately but not being able to hold herself back. There was no need to fear, however, as the guest continued to field her queries.
“One thing we do know for certain is that it is imperative for their connection to be actualized in stages, and at the right times,” the guest explained. “Otherwise their connection would most likely foster a premature relationship that could lead to an improper characterization of what each side means to the other. The damage of such an eventuality would be potentially irreparable.”
“Was it too early, then?” Shasah pressed, feeling more emboldened by her recent successes.
“Time will tell, but it’s difficult to argue so when, despite all efforts at preventing a meeting, it happened anyway, and of its own accord.”
Shasah felt pursuing this issue any further would be irresponsible but she couldn’t think of what else to say to keep the conversation alive. Eventually she settled on offering a postulation. “The connection they share must be born of a very deep running sub-current within the greater Wave.”
No response. Her nails dug in once again.
They walked on in silence the rest of the way, Shasah finally succeeding in holding her tongue. When they came to the door of their destination, the Grand Mother never broke from her stride, nor did she appear to make any special effort as far as gathering her concentration. The door simply opened before them upon approach.
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