by M. Street
Raven caught my anxious glances and skydiving nerves. “What is this thing going to do?” Raven asked, less the politeness.
“It will tell us the makeup of her light and form a custom chain directly proportional to her ratios.” Luja stayed technical. “Quite harmless and painless,” she reassured me while still operating the cube at expressway speed.
“How does it work?” I asked nicely, drafting on Raven’s sharp inquiry. Curiosity struck me harder than anyone else, spinning my anxiousness into weightless willingness.
“The device generates a pseudo true mirror of exited plasmas within a quantum field. Energy is extruded and spliced into fundamental photons. The resulting field can divide the electromagnetic, hyperlight, and gravimetric spectrums,” Luja said with humble and happy accomplishment. “In short, it will dissect your light.”
Wonderment flowed through my mind, knowing I was going to discover more about myself. My intuition fluttered, unfolding more wings.
“The dimensional view generated is endless, accelerating your light, causing it to prism,” Luja said.
Irrefutable proof that I was more than my body was clearly evident in this reality. My mind weaved thick braids of possibilities, each building on the last, of what I was really made of. What I was really capable of. What I was to become. I looked over to Dev, automatically bringing my open hand to my chest. Besides being a Wisconsin girl, my infant mom said I was a genetic European milkshake. Answers to questions that I never pondered tripped me into suspense.
“The hypercube will parse the waves, combing the elements with atomic precision. The atomizers,” she pointed to the six jets hissing at high frequencies, “will solidify the respective metals weaving nano-chains to absolute integer resolution.” Her eyebrows rose again like a repeated ovation.
“A modern-day loom,” Raven mused quietly, stunned by the technology.
“Yes. The tailor-made metal against your skin should amplify the canceling effects of the gems.” Luja stepped closer to me, popping with hope. “Let’s find out.”
She led me by my arm, which held the tubular stone. With comfort and support, she guided me over the futuristic contraption. Oddly, the center of the swirling pastel light didn’t have a source. The impossibility ignited a firestorm of questions. Bordering on magic, a golf-ball sized sphere spun in multiple dimensions so fast it made Vantablack look brown. It was devoid of everything. My enhanced eyes and senses slipped, like trying to walk on waxed wood. The view inward was so indescribably empty that I had to turn away to keep my Vampacoti balance.
The instant the black stone wrapped in my pearl entered the space of the disk, grinding metal sparks spiraled, obscuring my hand. Dense flashes flooded the room. Like the wind from a boom, surprise hit everyone’s face. The spectrometer fiercely labored, switching and flashing. The computing cube pulsated white hot. Halos of clear light spun in multiple valences around the spinning darkness. Startling me, my hand was sucked with magnetic force, locking into place directly over the spinning abyss. The explosions, halos, and sparks of light were immediately consumed by the rotating sphere.
Like titrating blood, my glittering milky-white light drizzled downward into the machine. I prismed into multiple dimensional rainbows of melting color. My toes curled into the earth, watching as more of me was leisurely revealed.
The pearl and emerald pairs spun faster, emitting resonances feeding into the spectrometer. My attention narrowed, watching in great detail as lumens in my aura were anatomized. The unplanned public revelation caused icy drops of adrenaline to race up my spine as the high-tech devices computed. More and more of me sank into the blackness, forming distinct bands out of the infinite metallic spectrum.
Everyone leaned in, focusing their microscope sights. I smelled minty white rose behind me before I felt Dev’s heated touch. All parties were now present, watching closely. Silence reigned supreme while the spectrometer and computing cube sucked energy from our surroundings. The parsing stabilized, defining finer ribbons. Dev poured himself into me, giving me the support I needed to kick the jitters. I thankfully sank into observation and the calmness it brought.
Using my digital sense of portion, I witnessed my insides from the outside unfurl into a steady state. Without warning, flashing ratios and percentages blared on a gigantic hologram. I calculated the numbers in a single glance, bouncing my trusted view down to the bands draining from my hand. The unexpected results drew a gale of rushing excitement.
“Whoa.” I saw myself from a different perspective. The outer, first third of me was a metallic rainbow of equal rivers. Nickel, silver, gold, copper, bronze, and a color I had never seen or heard of before. The mystery band resonated close to silver and platinum, almost appearing titanium. Together, the family of colors formed the most peaceful, pleasing harmony. The combined veins were held in a higher valence of pure, June-day sunshine.
The middle third of me was solid platinum. The white metal flowed fast and deep in my core. Like the other metals, the band was composed of many cords, but two stood out prominently. My strong resemblance to Mom caused my heart to swell. However, the secondary platinum patterns inherent in my light prodded my eyes to water. My soul instinctually recognized the signature woven by nature. Seeing Cal, the father I never touched, in my own light tugged my heartstrings taut.
The final third band rose chills in my imagination. I blinked and mulled, but still came up empty with where to start. The band appeared to be alive, never settling into a steady state. Infinite strips of color flowed perpendicular to the threads of metal light. The hues were dynamic, casting hyperbolic rainbows too fast for the machine to see.
The six jets audibly cooled upon a sizable clicking noise from the quiet, cloudy computing cube.
“Something is wrong,” Luja muttered, shifting quickly through the setup. Thinking bees collided, zipping around her head in every direction.
“What is it?” Sabina asked. The Avian queen stood closest to me, like a mother. We anxiously waited for an explanation.
“Piper is inconclusive,” Luja said swiping through the lit screens of flashing data, digging for clues. Her backlit blue eyes buzzed back and forth so quickly they lost their definition.
“What?” Dev and I said at the same time. We looked at each other first. He took my wrist, reassuring me. Safe moved directly across from me. His strawberry halo tilted forward, blurring fuzzy in the surging energy.
“Only two-thirds of Piper can be accounted for,” Luja stated unbelievingly, moving her examination to the spectrometer. She ran her finger down my arm to my hand holding the sensor. “Everything looks correct.”
“What do you mean?” Safe asked like a concerned father at the doctor’s office.
“As you can see,” she pointed to the last third band of metallic colors flowing in a perfect reflection within the black ball, “incredibly, she contains all of the race frequencies in a third of her light.”
Luja reached, enlarging a holographic screen displaying a magnitude of fractional numbers. “Although the metallic spectrum registers in equal proportions, the sum of the light is irrational. That is simply not possible.” Her eyes opened to owl-size, tagging me with possessive wonder. “The superset of frequencies could explain Piper’s ability to cast metaphysical spells and her aptitude to hear within each of the formulated races. Your capabilities are undefined.”
Lights around Luja’s head accompanied her private thinking. “But that is the least of her anomalies.”
“Oh great,” I blurted out sarcastically.
“Another third of her aura resides in the platinum valence,” Luja said nodding her head at Safe. “This is expected considering her royal lineage. Most perplexing is the last third.” She pointed to the arcs of dynamic color. “It’s blank.”
“Huh?” I asked, confused, watching my chameleon colors change.
“This is first-time technology. There must be something wrong with the spectrometer. Namid, please run diagnostics and setup for anot
her run,” Luja requested firmly.
“Of course.” She snapped into action.
“You don’t see the prisms of color?” I asked, bewildered by the empty stares. I pointed with my other hand to the waving final third. The band stood out bolder and brighter than the metallic portions. Like the flash of a camera, they were impossible not to notice.
“Is that what you see?” I asked Dev directly. I could tell by his expression and lack of response I was alone in my view. I chuckled, growing younger. The room pleasantly filled with light flakes swirling around us, floating upward. I didn’t know why I was the only one in the room that could see the braids of chromatic strings, but I knew they were real. Despite being in a den of silent light, I could feel each and every soul surrounding me.
For the first time since I was birthed into this world of light, I stood calm in the midst of confusion.
21
League of Eleven
I
banked sharply, pivoting in the sky just shy of the strictly imposed jet stream training boundary. For a nibble of a nanosecond, my eyes netted a grander view of a living miracle. Seen from high above, the Great Barrier Reef off the coast of Australia sent balloons of pastel, hypercolored light through the sea and far into the sky. A multitude of life formed the grandest bubble-like auras. Tiny tendrils of slow-motion lightning traversed through the billowing conglomeration, creating an ultrasonic ditty. I could never grow tired of experiencing the enchanted wonder at such an exceptional advantage, blooming with billions of heartbeats.
The nineteen maneuvers, drills, and practices slipped in over the last twenty-nine days in hiding had given me precious time to develop my symphony of powers with martial art grace. My instructors were tip-top professionals, perfected from centuries of evolution. Although the excursions were under heavy guard, it made everyone sky-high nervous since I was using light openly. The chances of Eli picking up my pulse were risky, but we did not have a choice. I was beginning to blow the cover of the Black Forest herself.
The rainforest next to the reef was the best place to practice our attack-run since it was similar to where the ivory to complete my mask rested in the Congo. I loved getting away from the Canite’s den to use, hone, and perfect my abilities. I could have never imagined in my wildest fantasies the joy of flying on the power of unbounded thoughts.
The pearl in my aura surged in brilliance, holding my body together while pulling downward through a hundred g’s easy. Every training session included multiple simulated escapes. I thinned, boosting my acceleration. Piercing the water-laden sky, I broke away from a trailing Ozwald. Twisting to make eye contact, I purposefully whistled past him, ruffling his crest with my lightning break. Although his golden-white wings packed thrust, they couldn’t move as fast as platinum. Fully fanned, his grand feathers matched the cauliflower-like cumulonimbus clouds as he braked his mass acceleration. The Avian prince shockingly blasted a Hail Mary spell from his sharp beak, breaking out of the chase, knowing I fatally outflanked him … again. Flexing my fists, I flipped earth-bound, polarizing the backside of my shell against the potshot pitch.
“Hey!” I screamed, sequestering the colossal blast of golden energy. My shell ballooned like a mainsail, matching the bulbous reef auras. The force behind the sore-losing prince slammed me into supersonic speed, turning me red. Ozwald wasn’t using blanks. The sawed-off charm could have knocked me unconscious for days. He didn’t believe in practicing, only performing. It was his excuse for piloting and casting hard. Being a prince definitely gave him a golden dispensation in his imaginary court. I didn’t believe it, but Dev said he paid me too much attention.
Focusing on dissipating the gold charge mercilessly trying to eat through my shell, I arched my back and extended my arms. Spinning fast, I dispersed the heavy-duty spell like a blender into the storm clouds above the choppy seas. Gold embers lit the sky, electrifying the tiny waterdrops floating in the air. I curved coming out of my descent, staying in the waves of orange ocean spirit.
Out of play, I dipped my toes into the choppy waters of the world, taking a big sniff. Like buying a lottery ticket, I randomly cast a feeler in the vast oceans of the earth, trying to pick up Ahnah with my inner nickel. The Cetacite queen was in high demand. She was out there somewhere, totally capable of evading the Arbitri decade after decade. My expectations climbed with each legendary accounting of the orca queen and her pods. Her abilities of foretelling were unexplainably accurate and her integrity was something revered by all. Like the Avians and Canites, Ahnah and her son, Prince Malik, were loyal to Mom, despite the horrid genocide of their kin. My intuition told me I would meet her someday. My heart readied her room.
My senses clocked Ozwald rocketing downward into the dense rain forest. I looked forward to discussing the caliber of his spells postmortem. My peripheral whiskers detected Dev, Safe, and Namid changing positions to rendezvous before exiting back to our hidden den in the woods. My unmasked, heightened senses connected me to all things. I flew through the reef aura, soulfully inhaling one last exhilaration of union before banking toward the beach. Solo and slowing, my attention divided, drifting my dutiful mind into daydreaming over our serious state.
My perspective had expanded greatly in a short amount of time, not giving me a chance to digest the meaning, implications, and repercussions. My innate, instinctual ability to bond to others grew my senses and abilities in magnitudes of crispness. Oneness was so wonderfully real and extremely useful.
I refined movements with machine-like precision on the ground and in the air. Having full latitude and longitude of the earth, I was capable of leaping anywhere. I mastered materializing inside structures, requiring incredible concentration. Gunning for a record, I was up to seven consecutive leaps in a row, all while carrying Dev. The size and diversity of my banks kindled contagious hope despite the unspoken odds. The more I discovered about myself, the more our chances grew. Like a parched pumice stone, I absorbed light of every metallic color, learning everything about anything I could perceive.
Without hesitation, everyone helped me to discover and develop my undefined self. If a double agent was among us, he—I paused my continuously bursting thoughts—or she, was incredibly stealthy, possessing great patience. A silent communication to Eli or any Arbitri, already snooping, would bring an instant game over. Suspicion was thick within the alliance of eleven. Everyone kept their light up with cards face-down.
Dev’s occasional, random suspicion of Safe drew fights fast. Common heart and sense made it impossible for my platinum bodyguard to be working with Eli and any question of it was intolerable. Other than me, Safe was the only person who was capable of summoning my brother without a crystal. He had had countless opportunities to turn me in, especially when I was incapacitated in Madagascar. Most importantly, his Guardian heart was open to mine. I argued against each of Dev’s accusations. I did not believe the traitor was any of us. Having love for all, my internal compass spun wildly.
Like playing notes on different instruments, I cast precise spells within the frequencies of silver, gold, and copper bands. Although Safe was completely polarized, he succumbed under my incantations after a moment of resistance. Many spells had Eli’s name, etched with worn practice. Luja couldn’t analytically prove my spells would work against Eli. There was always random chance in nature. He could be immune to my metaphysical lumens. The zealous researcher spent all her waking hours drawing and dissecting samples of my light. The connective properties of my pearl exponentially advanced her proofs on the nature of the universe, spinning new sciences.
I mastered Canite copper spells over the emotions like it was second nature. Raven and Jeremiah had been uncontested in potency until me. My crippling copper spell could render the most bull-headed being to their knees, while an orangish copper incantation elicited answers with ease. The pitch amplified nerves of fear, scaring the truth out of its prey. A happy, warm, tangerine copper recipe of sedatives was capable of lulling the most difficult to slee
p, even if the spellbound was in pain. It would have worked wonders on Charlie when he was a baby. He had cried nonstop for six months straight.
The copper Canite spells controlling consciousness were compelling, and so were the golden Avian spells over the physical body. Strangely right-handed, the golden light of the Avians was very familiar. Not only did I learn the delicacy of stopping and starting a heart with Sabina’s precision, but I could freeze every muscle below absolute zero with the skill and might of Ozwald’s punch. My golden touch drove the white kite prince crazy. He acted as though my natural casting skills trampled on holy ground. The stronger and harder Ozwald cast at me, the more my battery of golden spells grew. Mom had once said to pick a better opponent because I’d learn more in the long run from the loss. She was right. I graphed to every one of his high-emotion concoctions, reversing them into a win.
My golden link with Sabina started when we first raised our voices together in song. Like Italian marble, her voice was century-aged and silky smooth. She was a beautiful poet and songstress. I loved the way her eyes accentuated her notes. Smoky lids rose and fell like curtains to her backlit blue-on-blue, conducting her sentiments. Besides being the long-respected reigning Avian queen, she was the mother to our troop. She remained older and always formally dressed, despite the greening of the group.
Singing Stevie Nicks’s songs with Sabina kept me from falling backward into missing what I used to call life. I missed playing with The Tailcoats and harmonizing with Lisa. Sailing with the Avian queen’s voluptuous voice bound our hearts, cushioning her intense maternal sternness. Our night sessions under the North Star drew all eleven parties and any nearby Canites. The intimate audience was as wonderful as mainlining Summerfest.
Without hesitation, Sabina had sidestepped into Mom’s shoes. As a result, my royal stature with her was dismissed, especially when it came to Dev. She skillfully placed her objections against the Vampacoti prince, underwriting sour opinions stitched with artificial niceness. She continued refuting my unchained heart, sparking a visible tension. Thankfully, we came together when we sang. Making music always eased our disagreements over my heart.