Rebecca's mother, Francesca Badeau, had an unauthorized affair with a man named Corbin Byrne. The affair resulted in Rebecca's conception. Rebecca had heard the story only once, right after leaving the Academy. She was made to promise that she would never reveal it to anyone. Her mother's confession was the shock of a lifetime and an embarrassment. Finding out that her father wasn't her biological father was devastating. Rebecca had never truly forgiven her mother. Her father's mantra echoed in her ears: Ministry first, family second. But Rebecca knew that she had to keep the disgusting offense a secret. An unauthorized affair was considered one of the highest crimes within the Ministry, punishable by death to the couple who performed the offense and to the infant. If the MSF ever found out about her mother's affair—Rebecca shuddered at the thought. She always took great pride in how the Ministry handled criminals. They were dealt the harshest of the harsh. And in any other circumstance Rebecca would have agreed that the crime fit the punishment. But this time it was her mother that had committed the crime. And I'm an innocent accessory. It was an internal tug of war between duty and family.
Rebecca looked down at the box. Of all things, having her mother's secret drummed up at that point in time was the worst thing Rebecca could imagine. Could this be a setup? she wondered. Had my mother told someone else about the affair? That seemed highly unlikely. It was obvious to Rebecca that if anyone had mentioned the affair it probably would have been her biological father. But why? She had never met the man so she had no idea what he was capable of doing. Francesca told her that the affair was a secretive yearlong relationship they had at the Academy. As far as Francesca knew, Corbin was assigned to a position in the Dioceses of Technology and sent to Sector 16. She hadn't seen or heard from him since.
Overhead a green light glowed and the railway began to slow. The whining wind on the outside gave way to the low rumble made by the wheels on the magnetic track. The people sitting next to Rebecca stood up and braced for the train to come to a stop.
The doors hissed open and the passengers flooded through. As everyone stepped out onto the railway platform they each glanced at the sprawling skyline of the finest architecture ever assembled. The Ministry treated Sector 27 as a jewel. They spared no expense with the Capitol City planning and placed many of the top manufacturing headquarters inside those buildings, including the Department of Historical Events. While the rest of the Dioceses held offices at the Ministry Commons, almost four hundred miles west and along the coast, for one reason or another they decided to place the Department of Historical Events in the capitol. Rebecca had ever so often wondered why that was but never complained. She didn't, however, like being away from the commons. It was her life's ambition to be granted the awesome privilege of working within the presence of the Minister. Rebecca realized that her marriage to Simon Wylde would bring her closer to that dream than ever before. But as the dream permeated in her subconscious, Rebecca was relieved to be as far away as possible today. She didn't know if the Thought Police truly existed and didn't care to find out. For as loyal as Rebecca was to the Ministry and to the Minister, the idea of men reading her thoughts at any given second caused chills to run down her spine. In her world, impression was everything. One wrong thought could give a false impression, which would ultimately end any aspiration she had. It was imperative for any member of The Collective to carefully guard their thoughts—to be masters of their mind.
The walk from the railway platform to the Department of Historical Events normally took about seven minutes. Rebecca had it timed down to the last second. It took her approximately seven minutes and thirteen seconds. Today, however, she made it in six minutes and six seconds. There was no time to notice the crystal blue sky overhead or the humming of railways zipping in and out of the station. Rebecca couldn't get into her office fast enough.
As she passed through the glass doors of the pyramidal building, Rebecca headed right by the reception desk and told her assistant, Diara Tresholl, to hold all calls to her office until 0830h. Diara simply said: "Yes ma'am," and nothing more. Diara was very young, just out of the Academy, and always did as told.
The Director of Historical Events – Sector 27's office was a clean sterile rotunda that housed a heinously oversized desk and a horribly uncomfortable Ministry approved hardback chair that made Rebecca's back form more knots than a box of wires. A few years before Rebecca left the Academy and took her position within the Department of Historical Events, the Ministry had concluded that workers were more productive when they were uncomfortable. They had replaced all of the padded chairs with ones that had no give. Rebecca cursed the day that piece of data came to light. Her young frame was in impeccable condition but it stood no chance when having to sit for long measures of time. She would often take to standing at her desk in order to complete her work, which she suspected was the Ministry's objective. If people didn't sit then they were likely not to spend large amounts of time corresponding with coworkers about non-work issues. Meetings ended sooner and productivity increased. It made sense to her despite her loath for the practice, but that was how the Ministry worked. Whatever could be done for the betterment of The Collective should be done.
Rebecca quickly entered her office and hurried over to her desk. She placed the safebox onto the desktop. Despite the bitter cold air conditioning filling the room and nipping at her skin, Rebecca's hands were sweating from anticipation. Do I contact the MSF? It sounded like lunacy in her mind but she didn't know what else to do. Do I accuse Jillian of framing me? Rebecca had considered using reverse psychology and reporting the box along with Jillian Heddington. She considered that it might be a better move to pretend that Jillian was making up lies in order to sabotage her forthcoming marriage. Who would suspect that the lies are true if I report them? But the longer Rebecca weighed the option the more unconvinced she became that it would work.
Rebecca sighed and began rotating the box on her desk, checking it out from every angle. She lifted the box and tilted it away from her body so that the ten keys were clearly revealed. At that moment they read:
YETFKSHGRE
She then considered what harm could come from opening it in order to see what was inside. Rebecca meditated on the ramifications and found none. She started with the first letter and tapped it until the digital "Y" became a "B". Rebecca then tapped the second letter until it became a "Y". She continued this until the five letters revealed her biological father's surname.
BYRNEXXXXX
No noise was made, not even the slightest click could be felt. There was no indication that the password worked. Rebecca then slid her right hand over the touch sensor next to the five keys. To her surprise there was a click and the lid cracked open.
Rebecca held her breath and quickly glanced toward her office door out of paranoia. With a cool exhale and a deep inhale, she slowly lifted the lid, opening the box.
Laying in the alloy container was the one thing she didn't imagine she would find. Inside was what looked like, at first glance, to be a bunch of large dead leaves piled high and densely packed. But as her eyes focused more on the contents, Rebecca suddenly realized what she was seeing. "A book?" she said softly to herself. A paper book? The use of paper books had ended almost two hundred years ago. This one looked a lot older—thousands of years older—like it might date to the First Time. How odd, she thought. Rebecca reached inside and gently felt its texture. The paper was very brittle and stacked quite deep. She figured that there was close to a thousand handwritten pages laying inside. There was nothing binding them together except for the pressure time had applied.
Rebecca carefully extracted the mammoth text from its metal captor, barely able to wrap her hands around it. She then placed the behemoth text on her clean desk and cautiously flipped through its contents. She saw that it was indeed close to a thousand pages. The language, however, was nothing she had ever encountered before. The characters were very elegant in design with large loops and breezy lines. What is this? she thought as she
examined the writing further, getting her face very close to the paper in order to see the ink clearer. All feelings of worry and forebode had lifted and were replaced with intrigue and excitement. It wasn't often that the Department of Historical Events came across something so—new—to them. Rebecca knew that the term new was a bit ironic considering that the specimen was far from the definition of new but at the same time it carried the mystique of wonderment that accompanied things that were new.
But wait a second, she thought, this can't be authentic. Rebecca had suddenly remembered how it came to be in her possession. Jillian said her guest, Ben, told her where to find it. How would he know? Her excitement stalled. Something was far from right. She pondered the possibilities while reexamining the text. It seemed the more she looked at it the more it looked familiar. But she didn't have the faintest idea as to how.
Suddenly a light went off in her head. Rebecca realized why it was given to her. It had to be given to me, she thought. As acting Director of the Department of Historical Events – Sector 27, Rebecca had access to the finest analytical tool ever conceived. TRNSLTR 559 was the newest achievement in linguistic technology for the Diocese of Earthly Affairs. All one had to do was scan a document in question and TRNSLTR, through character frequency and the laws of probability, took care of the rest. It was capable of breaking down any coherent language in a matter of hours, pending on the size and complexity. It didn't matter if the documents were hand written, typed, lasered or holographic, TRNSLTR produced translations with 99.993 percent accuracy. And like almost all things Ministry controlled, TRNSLTR provided a carbon copy of every single translation made to the DEA's Quality Control Department for review and logging. Once TRNSLTR finished the translation it would notify the Quality Control Department of the results, ultimately red flagging unusually large translations, which would then be read by one of the higher tiered officials within a 24-hour period. After that, it would only be a matter of minutes before Quality Control members would arrive and confiscate the material for further, undisclosed, testing. That was what Quality Control did. They analyzed every piece of historical, informative, artistic and scientific data created to ensure that nothing sent conflicting messages to the people living within The Collective.
Benjamin wanted me to have this document translated, thought Rebecca. She wasn't sure as to why but was now certain that a translation was his ultimate goal. It didn't, however, answer how he knew who her biological father was. Rebecca was afraid to discover the answer. But how did he discover this book? she wondered. And where did he discover it? If it is—in-fact—real. But Rebecca knew she could easily answer the latter. TRNSLTR 559 was fully capable of not only translating foreign documents but also dating and authenticating them. If she wanted to know whether or not the book was legitimate, all Rebecca had to do was run it through. It sounded logical enough, but something in the pit of her stomach was warning her that there might be more to it than she realized. The book was clearly archaic, which meant that it had a huge amount of historical importance no matter the message. And it was her job as Director of Historical Events – Sector 27 to oversee the discovery and logging of any item or thing deemed historical by the Ministry. Surely the book in her possession fit the description.
I'll do it, she thought, I'll have TRNSLTR process the pages. Rebecca was certain that despite however Benjamin or Jillian knew her and her mother's secret, it would have nothing to do with the document sitting on her desk. There's no possible way, she thought.
Rebecca had no idea how wrong she could be.
CHAPTER FOUR
It took Rebecca nearly the entire morning to scan in each page. She had to be delicate with handling the brittle paper. Fortunately the text was not as delicate as she feared. Whatever cave Jillian had found the book had done quite a sufficient job in preserving the text.
After the entire text was scanned in, TRNSLTR 559 had estimated a finish time to be seventy-four minutes—the longest Rebecca had ever seen. Most translations took somewhere in the neighborhood of fifteen to thirty minutes to accomplish, the longest being forty-one minutes. When TRNSLTR estimated a time it was rarely off by more than a minute.
"Director," said Rebecca's assistant Diara through the desktop screen, "your translation is complete."
Rebecca nodded and thanked her for the update. "Please ensure that the results are not viewed by anyone outside this office. We need to be cautious when dealing with materials that the Quality Control Department may deem sensitive."
"I concur Director," said Diara. "Would you like me to provide a hard copy for you to view?"
"That won't be necessary. If I want one created I will do it myself at a later time."
"As you wish," said the young brunette assistant before signing off. It was comforting to know that when Diara said: "As you wish," the young assistant meant it. Diara was part of a class of academic graduates that had gone through the newly established Obedience Orientation. It was similar to the obedience classes Rebecca took while in the Academy but was reportedly more cognitive and involved actual neural-stimulation exercises that guaranteed properly programmed allegiances to discharge for any situation that required them. In other words, Diara had no choice but to be allegiant to Rebecca. Her brain was programmed to be so. And when Rebecca left her position as Director of Historical Events – Sector 27, Diara would automatically become allegiant to the next Director. And in the instance she became the director, Diara's allegiance would change to the next person in the Ministry hierarchy. It would be automatic, like breathing. Diara would have no knowledge of the change and would never question it. She would never have a choice in allegiance, which was exactly what the Ministry wanted. Thus far, the newly established program was a success. There were even rumors that eventually everyone in the Ministry would be forced to participate in this obedience programming. Rebecca wasn't sure how serious the rumors were but felt if the Ministry wanted her to be programmed, like her loyal assistant, then she would submit.
Rebecca closed the message window with Diara and then using the mind sensor attached to her office terminal, she quickly signed into TRNSLTR's database and located the translated file by simply thinking. The mind sensor, which had only been around for two years, read people's brain waves in order to decode their message and allow the computer to perform whatever task desired.
Open file TRN—1152393—DEO—1123h, she thought. The computer did as requested and the desktop screen refreshed with a visual report along with mini-views of other reports waiting to be accessed. Rebecca pulled out her digital notepad and attached it to the desktop screen before removing the mind sensor from her head. She then placed her right hand onto the report and slid it from the desktop screen to her digital notepad. Rebecca repeated the process several more times for the mini-views until the entire file had been moved.
Let's see what we have here, she thought to herself. Ever since Rebecca had joined the Ministry as the Assistant to the Director of Historical Events – Sector 13, six years prior, she had a difficult time controlling her strong curiosity. It was something her mentor, Morlan Haggins, had fueled by asking seemingly simple yet rhetorical questions such as: How historically accurate is history? and When was The First Time's first time?
Rebecca viewed the questions as funny riddles instead of actual inquiries. She had always taken historical records as fact. If the Ministry had approved texts stating it so then it had to be so. "But does it?" asked Morlan one time.
"What do you mean?" returned Rebecca.
"I mean, does the Ministry approved declarations truly make history so? In other words, are we to truly believe everything we are told by this government?"
Rebecca realized the questions weren't silly riddles after all but actual thought provoking inquiries—inquiries that could land the Director into serious trouble. "I think it's unwise to question the accuracy of the Ministry, Director."
Morlan gave her a soft grin and patted Rebecca on the shoulder. "That's a good girl. Now re
turn to your duties and we will reconvene after 1500h."
Rebecca always did as ordered but the questions left their mark. Her mind never left wondering what Morlan had meant by them. Were they true inquiries or were they Ministry assessment tests designed to grade the loyalty a new member of the Ministry had for the government. They were audits in a sense. Rebecca had heard of them occurring in the past but never had one performed on her—at least not that she was aware.
The Sinner King: Book of Fire Page 4