Gemini Ecliptic : : Chapter 16
Blood and destruction shall be so in use
And dreadful objects so familiar
That mothers shall but smile when they behold
Their infants quarter'd with the hands of war;
All pity choked with custom of fell deeds:
And Caesar's spirit, ranging for revenge,
With Ate by his side come hot from hell,
Shall in these confines with a monarch's voice
Cry 'Havoc,' and let slip the dogs of war;
-Julius Caesar by William Shakespeare
They buried Alona on a Tuesday.
A solemn procession in long, black coats walked slowly along the top of the foggy moor. The winter had released most of Lyrea, but it clung to New Edinburgh with frigid fingers. The breeze from the ocean sent the stygian cloth of their garb flapping like the wings of a murder of crows.
This part of the ceremony came about unexpectedly. Like the two lost pilots’ families, the Tals had resigned themselves to a simple memorial, the body of their daughter assumed to have been destroyed in the explosion on Tanae. However, Chad stumbled upon the location of the stasis chamber that held her, jettisoned from the ship immediately before it escaped with Jared, the small silver box in eternal orbit high above the planet. Now, they could return her to the land of her family and ancestors.
Ashes to ashes.
Jensen and Jared pondered the enigmatic hold that land had upon humans. The ancients had called their soil and their planet by the same name. Even now, worlds away from the ancestral home, something resonated deep within; a deep chime of rightness, that when we had no further need of our bodies, we gave it back to the land that nourished it. The Archons felt some slight primordial comfort through this act, in the middle of the crushing tragedy of her grossly premature death.
The cold mist fought valiantly against the sun, refusing to give up ground. The chill dreariness of the morning suited the occasion perfectly. The Padaleckis, the Ackles, the Tals, the officers and friends that had all loved her best stood among the heather which carpeted the cemetery where her father’s father’s fathers lay eternal. The Praetor Primus, moved by the pleas of Jensen and Jared, had authorized that the cadet would be buried with full military honors. Jeffrey had been so touched by their petition that he decided to incorporate it into the eulogy.
“Too often, I have heard the word ‘senseless’ tossed about regarding Alona’s passing. No, as it was so forcefully pointed out to me, no sacrifice is ‘senseless.’ And her’s was a sacrifice of the highest order. Had any one event in the chain that led from that Canyon to the Conclave been different, millions of innocents might have died. Senselessly. Did she choose the sacrifice? No. But for all who knew her, given the alternative, she would no doubt have chosen exactly this. Such was her strength of character, her compassion and her conviction. We will remember her, now and forever, as our dear friend, our beloved comrade. The worlds will remember her for paying the highest possible price to save untold legions, and the soul of humanity itself.”
The casket on its cart hovered silently by, draped in the Republican flag, the Phoenix crest proud in the center. The honor guard walked forward and removed the flag, folding it with precision to give to the Tals. The cart split in half, the anti-grav field slowly lowering its precious cargo into the soil of Lyrea, a glimmering crest matching the one on the flag embedded in the casket’s smooth surface.
Brylan, in his first-year dress uniform, stood silently between his benefactors, watching everything with sharp eyes. Jensen and Jared had explained that men who worked with McNally had caused Alona’s death. They danced around the boy’s question as to whether things he had done for the deranged man had killed the young woman. In truth, Brylan had tampered with Cindy’s mind, and the Adjutant Justicar had become the cabal’s line of information from Psi Min. She had accessed Jeffrey’s computer and sent the flight plans for all of A Squadron’s drills to the conspirators. She had no idea of her unwilling complicity. Everyone involved decided it would be best to preserve her ignorance. Jensen and Jared wanted to teach Bry that the things McNally forced him to do were forbidden and immoral. They chose to find a different object lesson. One that had less chance of scarring the child further.
One by one those gathered walked past the open grave, looked down at the casket, and grabbed a handful of dirt to drop upon its gleaming surface. Brylan seemed confused by the ritual, but followed suit. Raidon stood the longest, a fistful of dirt clenched in his hand. So many possibilities he had hoped for ended. In time, he would move on, but he would never forget. She deserved at least that from him. Nazomi took her customary place beside him, scattering the nearly black loam in her hand upon the coffin. She leaned her had against his shoulder, a small reminder that she was there and understood. Finally, with a shaking hand, he unclenched his fist, the dark particles showering down into the grave. Last came Jensen and Jared in the full dress of state. Taking a deep and shuddering breath, they scattered the soil on the final resting place of their beloved friend. She had returned to the soil that nurtured her.
Dust to dust.
The Republican Archives cut an imposing figure in Celestus’ skyline. Tall, straight of line, and seemingly hewn from obsidian, it rose for hundreds of meters. The only edifice in the worlds to have been painstakingly renovated, instead of razed, its infrastructure replaced to accommodate upward expansion. The reason for such difficult efforts lay deep within. Vast vaults held small stasis cubes, each holding an irreplaceable artifact from the first millennium of the Republic, and no small assortment from Terra. The Magna Carta, the Dead Sea Scrolls, the Constitution of the United States and more legendary texts than could be counted lay in state within, their fragile paper leaves protected from decay. Two figures, in long black robes, walked purposefully toward the massive structure.
The building had few windows, the interior passageways dimly lit. Purified and treated atmosphere filled every corner, a preventative of decay for the documents. The darkness and its effect on those who worked in it had spawned the colloquialism “pale as a Pontifex.” The people they passed once inside the edifice only supported that stereotype.
They traversed corridor after corridor toward their destination. The secured lift admitted them without protest, depositing them in the upper floors of the building without so much as a blip on the security grid. The upper floors of the archive housed the eight Pontifices, their offices and their personal quarters. Some had homes off-site, but frequently stayed in the archive’s cloisters as their duties demanded. Others lived only in the archives, a monastic existence in harmony with the history of their title.
The corridors of the inner cloister, all in dark stone from floors to columns up to ogival arches, remained eerily silent. Even their footfalls did not reverberate off the high walls due to some acoustic trickery of the architecture. At the end of the long, empty hallway, they faced the floor to ceiling doors of the office they sought. The doors swung inward at their approach. Apparently, they were expected.
“Oh, yes! Do come in.” Once inside, they saw the man hunched over his enormous desk, apparently reading a scroll. As they got closer, he folded it back up, rose from his chair and walked toward them.
“You are a bit early, but you two have always been a few steps ahead of the game. Yes, let me look at you!” The wizened features of the Pontifex Maximus with his white, wild, flyaway hair, peered at them, looking for what, neither knew.
“Yes, yes. Madam Edina did wonderfully well by both of you, didn’t she? Quite imposing and powerful-looking the two of you are.”
They were wearing their formal dress uniforms: solid Adept black, except for the royal blue piping and consisting of many layers. A high-collared shirt, then the waistcoat, buttoned up the side and to the shoulder covered in intricate embroidery in black silk thread, the inner coat which was a simpler affair, the lapels and sleeves set off in the blue piping. Finally, their outer coats hung long and heavily all the way to the floor, the back panel inset had more embroidery but this time it was a massive, complex representation of the phoenix seal. Their collars sat upon their shoulders, the enormous squared stones sparkling even in the sparse daylight of Tolliver’s private chambers.
“You are most assuredly everything I could have hoped for and more,” he said amiably. “Just what we needed, I think. And in perfect time, too.”
“Pontifex,” Jensen began, his voice hard and cold. “This is not a social call, nor a sartorial inspection.”
“No, quite right,” the elderly man replied. “You no doubt have a long list of questions, and you deserve any explanation that I can offer.” He gestured for them to sit in the chairs facing his large desk. Tolliver sat and then stared off into the distance with a strange wistful expression upon his face. He looked as though a cascade of memories washed over him, most of them unpleasant. For a moment, Jensen and Jared wondered if he had forgotten they were there. He appeared to age, second by second, the weight of the past settling heavily on his bent frame. All of the exuberance with which he greeted them gone; he spoke softly, slightly more than a whisper.
“It was never about cloning. No, that was a fool’s errand. Wasteful. Doomed to failure. Not to mention a repulsive business. McNally’s madness blinded him, but it provided the very powerful lure needed, something that would appeal to those in power, draw them toward it. The potential extinction of our species drives people to do things they would never otherwise consider. The Tectractys coalesced around it. No, it was never about clones. It was always about you.”
Those bright, keen blue eyes fixed them in their gaze.
“Make no mistake; we are in the fight of our lives. You had the right of it when you said this war can only end with genocide. And you two are the only hope we have of surviving. But this victory, should we be able to attain it, will require more, cost more and hurt more than anything humanity has ever faced before. And even if we win, the battle to secure future generations doesn’t end there.
“I fear for you. I really have no idea how you will endure. I only know that you must. When this entire affair began, years before either of you entered the Academy, I had no idea what the end purpose would be. I only knew that at some point, two young men would emerge whose powers, when conflated, would fundamentally alter our prospects. Frankly, it took years before I would even believe that much to be true. But I dutifully prepared, as instructed. I have no delusion that I will be viewed as hero. No I am damned. But you, you exceeded all I had hoped for. The most difficult days, here toward the end, when I toyed with the idea of ending it all, I could think of you two and I knew I had to carry on.
“You see, every trial you underwent had to be precise, in timing and location, each one significantly more difficult than the one before. The attack on Utopia Planetia was I think the first. I find it terrifying and awe-inspiring that leaking the deflector specifications to the silicates some ten years before the attack could not have been delayed any further than a few days from when we sent it. Any later and you would not have been prepared for the attack here on Lyrea. I remember that day, my despair, that with that transmission, I could very likely have ended us all. But no, the silicates received it at the precise right moment. Of course, I couldn’t have known that at the time. Just like I could not know that the transmission would be received or understood. The time delay really was onerous. Only a month or so before I had to send the next message for another event ten years in the future. It required more guile than I ever thought I could possibly possess to sabotage the graviton generators, but the attack on the Academy required it.
“You must understand that I have no skill at tactics. Certainly, I possess nothing like foresight. No, I did as instructed. Which of course is no excuse. The events had to move in a precise sequence, timed just right. Too quickly, you wouldn’t be prepared. Too slowly, and vital windows of opportunity would be missed. Thankfully, I had no part in that intricate orchestration. For that, I am grateful. I fool myself into believing it lessens the blood on my hands.
“Once you had successfully vanquished the attack ship above the Academy, all depended on the next step. So very much at stake. The death of your friend was not planned. No, I deeply regret that. Had I been more active in the planning of the kidnapping, perhaps I could have intervened. Though to have been more involved would have jeopardized everything. Truthfully, I had not expected the two of you to be separated. None of us did, but once again, the plan worked. With each ordeal, you became stronger. Much stronger. You see, the entirety of this most recent horror distills down to one thing, a single change that can save us all.”
“Fold-space,” Jared whispered.
“Yes. I knew you would tumble to that sooner rather than later. Even if the war is won tomorrow, humanity’s course is still set toward extinction. So long as we are hobbled by the limits of the FTL conduits, we will be restricted to this one, tiny corner of the cosmos. Eventually, the violence of our universe will wipe us out. But if we could spread across the vastness of space, our survival will be assured. You will give us that. I do not know the hows or the whys, but I know that you will. Unfortunately, one obstacle remains. And, I am sad to say, it is the most difficult one yet. You will either be destroyed by it, or you will emerge stronger than you were before. Precisely as you have done every step of the way. What a harrowing road this has been.
“Oh I feared terribly for you both. I still do, though my part in this play is done. I find it strange, this ability to shed the concerns for the species as a whole and replace it entirely with concerns for you. Though, I suppose your success is the only way our race will continue. So much is at stake and the weight of it falling on shoulders so young. I regret so many things. This odious burden has plagued me waking and sleeping for decades. To know that, at least for me, it is at an end. I would say it is a relief, but no, it isn’t. It will be the albatross around my neck for however many hours I have left to me. I suppose I would have gone as mad as McNally had I not had the vicarious pleasure of watching the two you grow and shine. Yes, soon I will rest. It cannot come quickly enough.”
“No, I will not be alive to see you face that last test, but you have grown more powerful than I could have ever imagined. You will do well, I think. I can only guide you one last time. Those baubles you wear. Study the commendation carefully. I built into it everything you would need, for the war and beyond. You have the power and the authority to do what needs be done.
“I spent my life studying and preserving history and yet, I only wish to be omitted from it. I am a villain of the worst sort. Maybe, if my name should survive oblivion, maybe some might understand why I did what I did. I suppose it is too much to ask. I will have to go to my rest knowing I did what was required of me, even though no one else will likely see it that way. You, however, my dear boys, will be long remembered. Revered, I think. You will walk the golden path before humanity, and they will follow you. Yes, that is enough for me. It has to be.”
The Archons sat in stunned silence, uncertain how to wrap their minds around all they had heard. Finally, Jensen seized on one detail. “You said you were following orders. If you aren’t Pythagoras, who is?”
“Oh, my boy, I am the man behind Pythagoras, have no doubt. I hesitate to tell you this, because it sounds outlandish even to my ears, but I suspect you might understand. The invisible hand that has guided all of this, that used me to facilitate its plan, I can only describe it as a voice. It had no substance that I could determine. No, it was the strangest voice, too. Like choirs, but the sounds were not words, they somehow translated directly into thoughts. It is that voice I have loyally obeyed. I can only hope, in time, that loyalty will be proved well-placed.”
With a thought, the high stone walls of the Archives became the bright blue sky over the Academy. The bright sunlight could not have been a more startling contrast to the darkness form which they had just emerged. They walked slowly toward where their friends and family were waiting. The confrontation with Tolliver had left them shaken. The only decision they had been able to make afterward was to keep Jeffrey ignorant of the deeds of his beloved mentor. Tolliver would die soon. Even as he spoke, they had watched as his life force ebbed slowly away. They didn’t care to guess how long it would take him to pass, but he eagerly sought death. They would not interfere.
The building which held their quarters for the past year and not much else, had become a hive of activity. Now they had a sprawling suite of rooms, from a dining area to a study to offices and conference rooms. Samantha and Jeffrey had determined the necessity of these changes to match their new ranks. Guest quarters for families and visitors had been prepared, and Samantha had outfitted a room adjacent to theirs for Brylan.
The metabolic damage done to the boy in McNally’s haste had, thankfully, been undone. They saw no reason why the child should not life a long, full life. He would require a great deal of support and help to deal with the atrocities of his short life thus far, but as the door to the newly created common room opened, Jensen and Jared were greeted by the sight of Tom, Mike, Chris and Raidon wrestling with Brylan on the floor of the living room. Their mothers, and most of the other females in the room, watched with fond expressions. Brylan was clearly winning, having pinned Chris to the floor by the mere act of sitting on his back. The boy’s laughter filled the room, and that alone helped drive away the shadows of the day.
Brylan turned suddenly and cried out, “Jensen! Jared! I beat up Chris!”
They laughed and gladly accepted welcome hugs. His three seconds of attention to his benefactors fulfilled, he dove back into the dog pile. Jensen and Jared moved to a sideboard off to the side that held refreshments, and grabbed something to drink.
Erica and Nazomi came to join them.
“I have to say, you both dress up nice,” Erica smirked at them.
“I must protest any man who has nicer jewelry than me,” Nazomi prodded them, fingering the Jared’s collar.
The four of them leaned against the wall, watching the rigorous contest, which Bry was still winning. The only thing that pleased them better than the boy’s laughter was seeing Raidon laughing as well.
“He will be okay,” Jensen whispered to her.
“I know,” she replied. “I fear that he has lost more than the woman he loved, though.”
“Not lost,” Jared assured her. “Changed. We have all been changed by this.”
Sasha called out for one them to please bring her a drink, and Erica and Nazomi both responded. Jensen and Jared stood for a few minutes, and then moved even further back into the room. The revelations of the afternoon had left them reeling. They needed time to process.
Morgan looked around for them, spotting them in the back. He raised an eyebrow in question, and apparently, the wan smiles he received assured him not one bit. He stood and slowly walked toward his charges, his boys, returned to him once more.
“I take it your errand went well?” he asked.
“‘Well’ isn’t the word I think I would use to describe it, no,” Jensen answered dryly.
“Trouble?”
“We found what we were looking for, and more than we ever wanted.”
Now Morgan looked concerned.
“What’s going on?”
The Archons exchanged meaningful looks, and decided that if they would not share with their friend all they had learned, they should at least share the very last thing Tolliver said to them.
“We have a great deal of work to do and we have about three years to prepare.” Jared said, cryptically.
Morgan stood stock still and waited for an explanation.
“They are coming.”
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