Theodore

by Marcus LaGrone

  “Oh! There you are!”

  59

  Theodore took a deep breath as he entered into a large chamber easily fifty meters across and twenty meters high. There were crates spread around the far end along with derelict machinery showing their age and neglect. But it was the Taik in the middle of the room that had Theodore's attention. Edwin Blackford, easily two meters tall and well over a hundred kilos, he was a big big Taik and he had Theodore squarely in his sights.

  “So now we finish this,” sneered Edwin.

  “No,” began Theodore calmly. “Now you prove you even have Janice and that she is even alive, or I run like a rabbit back the way I came. I can rabbit quite well, assuming your memory still serves you.”

  Edwin laughed, “They said you'd say something like that...” He turned and pointed to a window to the side. With a flick of the remote a light came on showing the bound form of Janice Westmore sitting in a chair.

  “I half expected the room to be sealed and slowly being filled with water,” replied Theodore sarcastically.

  That prompted a sinister laugh from Edwin, “I was thinking piltch-rats, but my happy hosts wanted to keep her high and dry. Her husband wants her back intact... that is all their concern, mine is to flay you.”

  “Colm didn't do such a good job...”

  “You had help with Colm,” grinned Edwin. “Here, I'm the one with help. 'Bout two-thousand of their goons hang out in this complex.”

  “So now you are the one that needs help?” mocked Theodore.

  Edwin laughed, “Hey! There you go! Baiting! That is much more like it. So should we practice our trash talk like a kiddie play in spring or shall we skip to the main event?”

  “Goodnight! What type plays did they put on in spring where you grew up?”

  “Ask your father,” groused Edwin. “He snuck off rather than sticking up for the clan.”

  “Sorry, whatever history Uncle has with my father is beyond me. And honestly I could care less: I'm here for Janice and you are in my way!”

  “There's the attitude!” grinned Edwin as his armor exploded floor to ceiling in a wall of blue flame.

  Here we go! thought Theodore as he tried to stay calm.

  Edwin was in no mood to let Theodore try to find his center and he closed upon him in a blur. Their armors fought each other in a spray of sparks much like his clash with Colm. It was clear here, however, that Edwin was stronger and far more skilled than his brother, Colm. A whirlwind of attacks came: glaive to sword to mace and back again all in expert form!

  Theodore held his ground and held his own. He had never experienced such an exchange short of sparring with his father. And it was obvious that Edwin wasn't here for the practice, he was here for the kill. Parry after parry came from Theodore as he tried to press back the assault and gain the initiative. Dance! Theodore grinned as he thought back to all those metaphors his father had used to explain a true fight. Edwin had picked the dance and the tempo, that didn't mean Theodore couldn't out shine him at his own work and maybe cut in a time or two!

  Edwin seemed to beam as Theodore stepped up the game and the tempo. Things were a dizzying blur and that suited Edwin quite well.

  Endurance. Did Theodore have the endurance to outlast Edwin? He knew he could out run him, but this was very different. Swifting? Would that bring anything to the game? No, control and form would fail him even if speed was on his side. Time for something different...

  Pulse rifle fire erupted from Theodore. Not from one hand but from both and he relentlessly fired into Edwin. Edwin's armor held fast, easily soaking the assault.

  Edwin just smiled back, “Hey! A new trick! Here's mine!”

  Theodore's mind raced with pain as Edwin invoked a plasma lance that detonated on the surface of Theodore’s armor. His armor was holding, but his mind was clouded with pain. Edwin flashed a brief smile as he put another plasma lance into him and Theodore fought back hard, trying to simply stay awake as every nerve in his body exploded with pain and seemed to want to gnaw on his spinal cord. There in the back of his mind came clawing out his old foe, fear. Theodore might be able to handle a third strike, but a fourth? Something had to change, he had to do something!

  Relax! came the voice of his father in his head. With all the screaming going on in his mind, Theodore was amazed he could pick out any of his father's words, much less something as trivial as “relax.” But it was the comfort of his father's voice more than anything that he used to try to fight back the pain. He had to regain the initiative! Relax! came the voice again. This was the time for action, not meditation! Pain started to wash over him again as the futility of the situation seemed to engulf him. Visions and faces seemed to fade from view as he started to lose the fight for consciousness.

  “Hey Theodore,” grinned Tim casually. “Just do me one favor, listen to your father.”

  “I tried...”

  “There is still fear in your eyes and hesitation. Just do me a favor and trust your father. No matter what...”

  Relax. How could he relax when a murderous brute was pummeling him with plasma lances? Relax. Well... there wasn't much a choice left... Theodore struggled through all the voices he heard in his head and set them all aside as he listened for one thing: his heartbeat. Slow and steady... slow... must slow it down... The fog of pain started to clear from his head as he got his breathing under control and felt his heart slow. A third plasma lance struck and a new wave of pain hit as did a rolling sea of nausea. Too slow! Too calm! You can't be effective if you black out! Fear danced on his mind as the nausea seemed almost as bad as the pain. Fear. He had fear. If he still had fear he wasn't relaxed. Relax further... let the fear go... If he blacked out at least he wouldn't be aware of it all when Edwin struck him down... Slow... relax... Just trust Father... Theodore collapsed to the floor from the nausea but just let it roll past him... the fear... it was gone...

  Theodore's eyes flashed as he looked up and saw the fourth plasma lance. It was hanging there in space, halfway through detonation... He tried to make sense of what he saw: the lance hanging lazily in space, Edwin's motionless form. He laughed to himself at the obviousness of the situation: his heart hadn't slowed down, his awareness had sped up. There was no way he could possibly be making sense of any of this: brain activity was a chemically rate limited process. Thinking harder didn't make the brain actually work faster, and definitely not fast enough to see things like shaped charges halfway through detonation. He was sensing, feeling, from outside his normal plane.

  Was he dead? Was he a ghost watching all this from the other side. No. He wasn't dead. He laughed at the echo of the voice in the woods from that summer. Not a ghost, not yet. A guardian, maybe, but not a ghost! He was on the other side, where Live Steel lived... all around him he could see his Live Steel arsenal hanging in a ghostly blue glow. His first sword his father had given him, the one he had stripped from Karl, all the ones he learned from his father, even Bill's 'lost' carbine was floating in space around him. He was walking in both realms. He looked down and noticed his fur was gone. Not shaved, just not there. Where ever his fur was he could see, sense, straight through him... He wasn't changing color like Edwin, like a Silver... he was....

  Time returned to normal as the fourth plasma lance harmlessly detonated, doing little other than seriously scarring the floor. Edwin's eyes went wide. “Your fur! Only High Silvers can do that!”

  60

  ·

  ·

  ·

  Theodore nodded to Edwin and offered a feeble smile, “I guess that is what my friends had been trying to tell me for some time. Fighting doesn't get you there... that isn't how Live Steel works. You have to be willing to let it be part of you,” he laughed lightly. “I guess the Guardians are a little picky about who they will let do that.”

  “No way! No way in hell!” groused Edwin.

  “Just step aside and let me retrieve Janice...”

  “Retrieved,” grinned Ross as he stood next to Janice at the
far end of the room. His fur coat danced with his voice, rendering him transparent as he talked.

  “You! You were the... voice talking to me in the woods! And the one following me in the tunnel! Why didn't you show earlier?” groused Theodore.

  “Hey, melodrama runs thick in the family. Besides, if you didn't stand down Edwin, I didn't think you'd ever step over. Had to make sure you could take care of little Meagan without me around. Each time you hit the boundary, you always stepped back.”

  “There fighting the gunship and then fighting Colm,” mused Theodore. “You could have warned me, prepared me!”

  “I did,” frowned Ross. “If I had done much more, it may not have taken.”

  “And you'd risk my life and Janice's life to push me like that!” snarled Theodore.

  “I got Janice. That just left you and Edwin. I knew you could do it. We all did.”

  “Everyone but me...” he laughed softly. Theodore cleared his throat. “Edwin, stand down and no harm will come to you.”

  That removed any shock from Edwin and transferred it into pure hatred! He snarled as his armor flared and he charged Theodore.

  Theodore breathed softly as he reached across the realms and yanked Edwin's Live Steel armor and then arsenal from him. It had been the source of much stress to disarm Karl that time in the parking lot. This... This was more like taking a toy from a spoiled child. It was loud and unpleasant to be around, but the result was the same: Edwin had nothing left to play with. Theodore invoked a Live Steel sword that had, moments earlier, belonged to Edwin.

  “You wouldn't kill me,” gulped Edwin.

  “No... no more killing.” Theodore rammed the sword into Edwin sending him to spot stasis on the floor.

  “Disarmed and unconscious. Good work!" grinned Ross. “The only problem now is getting out of here. There are, like he said, about two thousand very grumpy people with pulse rifles that are about thirty seconds away from saying 'hi.' You take the thousand on the left and I take the thousand on the right?”

  “Pulse rifles,” grinned Theodore.

  “Pulse rifles,” grinned Ross.

  Theodore grinned. “I've an idea: I did it by accident back at the university facing down the gunship. I'd like to see what a Forest Wall is like when done properly.”

  “And no one has to get hurt,” grinned Ross.

  Oh! There you are, young one. Are you coming home?

  No. Not just yet. I'm bringing home here...

  That will be very nice then...

  The sound felt wonderful as it echoed through his skull and then beyond. It was life itself; life in a barren and inhospitable land. Forest Wall... Theodore could feel Ross beside him, feel Ross calling out as well as the pair reached beyond the turbulent waters that were the boundaries of the two realms and just let the energy flow... all that wasted, bound up energy was free...

  The entire building shook. The foundation where they stood shook the worst. Overhead the building was collapsing in a most unnatural way. Well, at least highly atypical, way. Upper levels gently collapsed into each other, softly depositing their inhabitants on the next lower level while steel and concrete became soft and malleable. Trees, great trees of ancient size rose up from the ground and carved holes letting in the precious sunlight. Bushes and ferns, long stretches of moss all quickly supplanted the walls. Rock, granite from the living planet replaced the concrete there in the basement floor and soon a gentle brook was gurgling away.

  When things finally came to a halt, Janice bolted over to Theodore and hugged him warmly. “You came back for me. And you did it without anyone else having to get hurt...”

  “Hey! Those plasma lances hurt a lot, thank you very much...” grinned Theodore as he hugged his future mother-in-law.

  She laughed lightly, “You know what I meant! I'm very proud of you. Proud you took the harder way but the path that meant you didn't compromise your beliefs.”

  “I... I wouldn't have been 'me' otherwise...”

  Janice cringed from the sound of gunshots overhead.

  “Those are Shukurae firing,” grinned Ross. “Don't worry, they want to take prisoners if for no other reason than to embarrass the local government.”

  “How did you find me?” Theodore asked Ross.

  “Well, I was close... and it helped that Tim had put a bug on you. Once things went in motion, I just followed your trace on in.”

  “I was bugged?” scoffed Theodore.

  “Tim needed you to behave naturally so it seemed the best method. It was a given they were going to do something to separate you from the group. That happened a little sooner than I had imagined!” laughed Ross.

  “How did the Shukurae find us so quickly,” asked Janice thoroughly amazed and honestly a little creeped-out.

  “Um, the epicenter of a multi-gigajoule EMP burst or the center of a forest with a hundred and fifty meter tall trees in the middle of downtown... I wonder what was their first clue...” grinned Ross.

  Janice laughed at the obviousness of it all, “Um, in this town, I'll go with the 'trees!'”

  “Hey down there, need a lift?” came the booming voice of Line Centurion Damesk.

  “If it isn't too much of a bother,” laughed Theodore back toward the top. “Let's say we get out of here and get people back home.” He offered Janice a hand as they started to thread their way upward into the sunlight beyond.

  ·

  61

  The bells on Anna's boots jingled and danced in the flame light of the great braziers spread neatly across the dance floor. Meagan had been right, of course, the fluffy snow sparkled beautifully in the light, adding a sense of life and hope easily overlooked on the longest night of the year. Meagan giggled (did she ever stop?) as the three of them made their way to the side of the dance floor.

  Hugs were aplenty and came fast as they hit the sidelines. Hot cider quickly made its rounds and then Anna, now warm on the inside, quickly took to her mother’s offered fur hand muff. With only her nose left cold, she snuggled Theodore's cheek much to his amusement.

  “Mrs. Westmore,” asked a doe eyed girl of maybe sixteen.

  Anna and Meagan both launched into a giggling fit when they realized it was Anna being addressed and not Janice.

  “Call me Anna, please!” she laughed. “What can I do for you?”

  “May my sister and I dance with your family on the next set? It's a line of four and there only seem to be two of you...”

  Anna blushed quite thoroughly, there was no risk of her ears becoming cold even if her nose was still nippy. “Um, we aren't married yet. But sure, please! If you’d like to join us, that would make for a wonderful time.”

  “Are you still worried about your daughter fitting in?” asked Aidden with a grin.

  Janice just smiled, “No, and I never was.”

  Introduction to the races and cultures:

  There are four major races in this family of stories: Human, Taik, Shukurae and Gelkin.

  Human: It is assumed the reader is well familiar with the human race. Their home world is located in the Orion-Cygnus minor arm of the Milky Way and has subsequently spread far and wide, often managing to colonize worlds others had left as “too harsh.” The rapid expansion of human planets and colonies has helped accelerate the decline of the Gelkin Empire. Humans are universally revered for their creativity and tenacity alike. The human realms are politically fractured and home to thousands of languages and cultures.

  Taik: Taiks are a felinoid race who have spread across thousands of planets and colonies with the planet “Afon” being their home world. Physically, they walk upright and average a height of 1.80m (5’11”) and 80kg (176lbs) for the males, while the females average quite close at 1.75m (5’9”) and 70kg (154lbs). They have tails ranging from 80cm to 110cm (31-43”). There are four major super-political units: Kulpgurie Republic, Altshea Confederation, Draeka Empire, and a fourth, fairly small group, commonly just called the Highlanders.

  Kulpgurie Republic: this realm is
a large expansive culture with a strong central government. They are socially progressive and tend to have more joint colonies with other races than the other Taik governments. They are a driven, active, motivated people who are always eager to expand their knowledge and understanding. Historically they consider themselves the protectors of the Highlands, a thought that amuses most Highlanders.

  Altshea Confederation: this realm consists of thousands of different cantons and colonies. Each one operating independent of the rest, but sharing a common base set of laws, open trade and free movement amongst all the constituents. Local realms may be democratic, theocratic, feudal, socialist, free market, or any possible combination so long as the basic laws are honored. Some are male dominated societies, others are dominated by females. Others yet are gender neutral in governance. The cultural identity of the various inhabitants is that of “Altshea” first, and local secondary. As a result, it is quite normal for people to be born in one canton, but choose to live and work in another realm.

  Draeka Empire: this realm is a closed militaristic society that has chosen to make themselves equal at all levels, most of this by genetic engineering of their own people. There is very little difference between people’s physical builds and there is also very little outward difference in their gender. Their genetic tinkering combined with the nature of their society make them prone to paranoia and emotional instability. It is unclear what their genetic alterations have done to their lifespan as most people die from “accidents.” Their Empire is very small and has been self-limited due to internal conflict and total suspicion of all outsiders. They are the smallest of the three colonizing Taik governments, and their total expanse is smaller than some Altshea cantons. They have had several border wars on the home world of Afon with the Highland regions. Their most recent war with the Highlands being almost 500 years earlier and resulted in a humiliating defeat.