Come to the Grace of Heaven's Eternal Fantasy
Author's Note: I feel it's my duty as the writer of this story to warn you that is probably going to be the most bizarre "Earth: Final Conflict" fanfiction story you have ever read. It may take more than one read to figure it all out because there is so much in it. I'm not going to give anything away by trying to explain the story or what I was thinking when I wrote it. Just know that above all else "Come to the Grace of Heaven's Eternal Fantasy" is a love story. It is a spiritual, philosophical, and metaphorical examination of love in all its forms. If you keep this in mind, you will realize why this story holds a special place in my heart and why it took me over a year to perfect it. Reviews are always welcome.
Chapter 1: Open Your Heart
Two voices no three four a male a female I don't remember someone came to me last night can't remember his face a child a little girl no a boy no a girl a boy I held him he was mine I loved him he can't remember his name he tugs my hand he cries he wants me to hear him I loved him but I can't remember a man the sound of footsteps a smell lavender maybe can't remember he is so beautiful that man who is he I am in his arms he holds me and rocks me to sleep a voice mine maybe not sure kill me please kill me but why so many faces with names I cannot remember those names who am I where is my face what do I look like am I a boy or a girl my boy in my arms but surely I am a mother who is that man the one who holds me no not him his face is different I cannot remember his name but he looks like me are we related but how cold it's so cold when I was a child my parent drowned me but why music playing in the background what music strings some kind of string instrument soft a flowing tune like a small steam maybe a cascade at the end it's so cold he is holding me under that man his face does he hate me I cannot breathe someone help me that scent of lavender my hands are reaching for what something solid but nothing here only air wind maybe yes a breeze then I must be standing I cannot feel the ground beneath my feet but I can feel that breeze but what temperature none can't sense it maybe a new scent cinnamon maybe mixed with lavender pleasant but not really strange oh heavy all of a sudden my legs dizzy can't breathe it's so cold I am freezing can't breathe please help me my twin please help me see me please see me hear me please hear me where am I can no longer stand the voices can no longer keep balance I will faint a faint voice a voice in the background he is calling to me my twin see me please see me what did I do how did I save you help me tell this man to let me go who is he can no longer breathe I will fade I will die.
When Ma'el awoke two strong arms held him. His vision was blurry, but from the order of colors he could tell he was in a room of some sort. There was a faint smell in the background of lavender and an even stronger smell of spicy cinnamon.
"Sire. Are you all right?" a masculine voice asked him and helped him sit on something soft and comfortable.
Ma'el could not shake the nauseous feeling in his abdomen. He had not had a vision that jumbled and violent in a long time. For as long as he could remember, his visions had been fairly kind to him. They were scrambled, but not too scrambled. The voices were always soft, and they always came to him when he was ready for them: during his slumber. But this time had been different.
"Sire. Speak to me," that voice he did not recognize pleaded.
His sight finally became clear again. The room was small but very comfortable. That lavender he had smelt came from several flowerpots standing on small pillars stationed at each corner of the room. They were kept alive with some kind of blue light coming from lamps standing next to each flowerpot. There was a rug on the floor weaved in a tapestry of blues, violets, and purples. The shapes were abstract but still very beautiful. He wondered who had made it for him.
"Sire. Can you hear me?"
Ma'el finally turned his head to acknowledge the male who was speaking to him. He was surprised to see how young the male looked. He was just a boy. He could not have been any older than his mid-twenties. His hair was black and his eyes were hazel. His skin was white but not pale. He had a tan. Perhaps he had been working in sunlight. His strong grip was straining Ma'el's arms and shoulders. "Who are you?"
The boy appeared astounded. He did not sense that the boy had been offended by the question, but he was definitely concerned. "Sire. You do not recognize me? It is I. Paul. I am your protector."
Paul. Where had Ma'el heard this name before? He felt like he should know. After all, the boy had explicitly told him that he was Ma'el's protector. Ma'el did not sense that he was lying. Something about this whole situation did not feel right. Ma'el felt misplaced. He felt like he did not belong. He had memories, but only a select few. He remembered enough to know who he was and where he had come from. He remembered enough to know that he was a telepath who also had visions of the future. But that was where it ended. Ma'el lifted his hand and asked for the boy's. The boy gladly relinquished his hand. Ma'el dug into the boy's aura and thus into the boy's mind. From this he saw images of him and the boy together. There were several with him in a multi-colored robe and the boy in thick brown slacks and brown shirt that had been stitched with thick and rough threads and a soft, silk scarlet and white overcoat. But the most powerful was of the boy pulling him from churning water to a small shoreline in pouring rain. A flood of his own memories came to him as a reaction towards the memories this boy had shown him. Ma'el now knew exactly where he was and whom he was with.
"Of course, Paul. Forgive me. I must have drifted."
"You appeared in peril," Paul said. "Are you certain that you are all right?"
Ma'el had not relinquished Paul's hand back to him because he realized that the spicy scent of cinnamon was coming from Paul's hands. In fact, it was coming from all over his body.
"Cinnamon," Ma'el said, finally letting go of Paul's hands.
"Yes, sire. It is an oil that Sonya made for me," Paul explained dismissively. "She thought I could use something different from the lavender oils I use. It is of no matter to me, but Sonya seems to like it. So I wear it for her."
"I like it. It smells pleasant," Ma'el said. "Paul, if I ask you a question, will you be offended?"
"Of course not," Paul replied eagerly.
"What was I doing before I collapsed?" Ma'el asked uneasily. His abdomen still carried that nauseous feeling that had blurred his sight before.
Paul understood why Ma'el could see him being offended by such a redundant question. But if Paul had not been offended when Ma'el did not recognize him, this would certainly not offend him. "You were meditating. You told me that you must meditate in order to locate the perfect spot for the gateway."
"Gateway?" Ma'el whispered sharply. That term ignited a whole series of thoughts and feelings.
"Yes. You said that only the most powerful telepaths are able to sense the location of the gateway and only the most powerful prophets can predict where it will appear. You have been searching for it for quite some time."
Ma'el wanted to be alone, but he could not shake that face that showed nothing but concern for him. "Paul. I believe that I have had an extremely powerful vision, one that has temporarily robbed me of my memories. Please leave me in this room and give me some time to recover."
"Of course," Paul said leaving at once, but Ma'el could still sense the urgency in him.
Ma'el looked down to observe the garments he was wearing. The silk of the multi-colored robe felt soft and smooth under his fingers. It felt so light on him that he felt like he was not wearing it at all. He was wearing a piece of the wind rather than a garment. He brushed his hands over his head. Something as soft as the silk but slightly rougher in texture caught his attention. They were strands. Short strands of hair on his head. Upon that discovery, he searched quickly but not frantically for a mirror. He found one under the cushioned blue cot near the corner. It was inside a box, a box that looked very familiar to him. He lifted the mirror to see his face. His hair was short enough to have small curls running through it. The hair was as red as a flame. He waved his free hand over the curly hair. Instantly it straightened. He decided he looked better with it straight. His eyes were a brilliant cerulean color. He had a slender, but not too slender, nose and lips full enough to be a girl's. His brows were thick but not too thick, and his eyelashes were so thick that he could have curled them upward if he cared enough to do so. His skin was white like ivory and wound tightly on his face. But it was not the small features that astounded him so much as the overall look. He expected to find an aging old man or at the least a bulbous alien face. Instead, he had the looks of a boy no older than Paul. He recited his name a few times and found that his voice sounded just as youthful. The only indicator of his true age and his true form was the flash of blue that circulated through his body when he blushed. He wished that he had a larger mirror at hand so that he could see the whole of his body.
He searched the contents of the box that looked so familiar to him. Inside he found several small data crystals. He took one and inserted into a holder he found on a desk that was closer to the door. A large three-dimensional screen appeared in front of him when he inserted the disk and Taelon symbols appeared in front of him floating in all directions in a pattern that only he could understand. This was an entry of a diary. Using his hands he scrolled through the Taelon texts to find more entries. He inserted the other disks and found more entries until he found the oldest entry that had been written when Ma'el was only three years old.
He then spent several minutes reading through the entries learning about himself. These entries triggered memories that told him more about himself. His name was Ma'el Amo'qui. His mother died in childbirth after having his twin sibling Da'an. Ma'el was a telepath. His sister was a telekinetic. Their powers alienated them from their remaining parent Bel'lie, who despised Da'an even more than he despised Ma'el. He feared her, and Ma'el could sense that, so he told Da'an to beware of him. One night Ma'el had a vision of his sister dying in a pool of water at Bel'lie's hands. He warned Da'an of Bel'lie's plans, but she panicked. She didn't want to be anywhere near him, and she screamed in terror every time he tried to touch her. One night, Ma'el awoke and found that his sister was missing. He searched for her all over the house, but she was gone. Bel'lie was gone too. He used his telepathy to call out to her, but she was still slumbering. Afraid that his vision had come true, Ma'el rushed out into the night to find water in the closest place he could think of: a small lake in the woods near where they lived. He ran as fast as he could, and eventually he found Bel'lie bent on his knees over the water with something struggling in his arms under the water. Ma'el edged nearer to find out who it was, but by the time he realized that it was his sister, the struggling had stopped, and Bel'lie had lifted his hands out of the water. In a blind rage Ma'el used his powers against his parent. He belted him with his mental abilities for quite some time. He wanted Bel'lie to suffer for what he had done, but he stopped suddenly when he saw a brilliant white light rise from the water and solidify itself into his sister. Da'an had survived. He did not understand how, but she had survived. In a rage more powerful than his could ever be, she snapped the mighty trees from where they had stood and ignited them in flames. The ring of fire got closer and closer to Bel'lie and frightened him so terribly that he fainted. The entire forest around them erupted in flames including the lake where Bel'lie had drowned her. Ma'el rushed to his sister and grabbed her. The flames subsided, but they were not gone. She was so surprised by Ma'el's touch that she started screaming. He fled with her tightly wrapped in his arms still screaming bloody murder until they came to a nearby house. That was where they called the authorities and waited with the Taelons in the household until they came to arrest Bel'lie.
Ma'el read on from there. He read for hours letting all the memories return to him in tides with each passage. He recalled the power of his visions and how terrible they had been to him when he was a child. He remembered how his sister had held him tightly and taken away the pain. It was from her comfort that he discovered that she had an extraordinary power hidden away, a power that had saved her life when her parent tried to drown her. She was a purifier. And from this, Ma'el recalled the many times she had used this power to save him from the brink of insanity.
He recalled the evolutionary struggle the high priest had put the Taelons through. He recollected how the Kimera had drawn the Taelons to the Commonality and had altered their evolutionary course. He recalled how the high priest continued that evolutionary turn by maintaining the power of the Commonality. He remembered the terrible images of the Taelons' extinction that plagued him. And from those visions, he had decided to dedicate his life to restoring the Taelons to their rightful evolutionary path, a path without the imprisoning grip of the Commonality. His sister was the key to that path, and only she could save them.
I will always love you. I will always protect you.
Everything was clear to him now, and he recalled why he had retreated to this, his bedroom. When the Taelons outlawed time travel and ordered all time travel technology destroyed, Ma'el had to find another way of transferring his powers to his sister. His research that he had conducted long before he ever came to Earth told stories of a powerful gateway, a portal between this world and the next. He was in the process of building a machine, using harnessing the geothermal power of the lava beneath these mountains to power it. This machine would tear a hole in the fabric that divided this plane of existence from the next.
Right now, his followers were at the final stages of completing this massive project. It had taken them fifty-six years, but they were almost finished. The labyrinth was all but completed. All that they really needed to do now was dig until they came to a power source and finish building the machine.
Contrary to what Paul had told him, he had simply retired to his room for a light rest. He had also gone in search of an object he had meant to show Paul. He found it in the box with his diary.
Ma'el then left his room and went in search of Paul. He found Paul on the bridge of his ship talking with a young white woman with long curly dark red hair. She was wearing a simple white dress under a multi-colored robe very similar to his. It was Sonya.
"Excuse me," Ma'el said softly.
"My lord, you are feeling better I presume," Sonya said with relief in her voice.
"I am," Ma'el said.
"Sire—"
Ma'el lifted his hand to silence Paul. "You are letting the sentiment of my followers override our friendship again. I told you that you are free of that formality."
"I apologize, Ma'el. It is a relatively new habit. Will 'my lord' suffice?"
"Paul, you are my protector and my friend. I respect this honor code you have adopted naming me as your superior despite the fact that we have been close for centuries and that my life is ultimately dependent on you. For your comfort, you may call me whatever you wish. Just be mindful that the title of 'sire' that my followers have decided to bestow upon me discomforts me, especially when uttered from the throat of a friend."
"You do not quite fit the profile of a king," Paul agreed.
Ma'el chuckled, but he stopped when a wandering thought entered his mind. This thought felt foreign to him. It was not long before he realized that this thought was not his own. "I believe you have a question to ask me, Paul."
"Ma'el, you have warned me time and time again of the consequences of delving too deeply into a vision for too long. Yet you have spent hours in your visions lately. You have spent nights."
"I understand your concern. Is that the meaning of this concept your species calls irony? When I do not follow my own advice?"
"Possibly. May I inquire—?"
"You may, Paul," Ma'el said softly, stopping him because he already knew what Paul was going to ask him. "I am running out of time. We can ill afford to wait any longer. We must shorten the time frame and complete this project as soon as possible. I have both observed and interacted with your species for hundreds of years. I have taken you as my protector and taken measures to prolong your life."
"For which I am grateful," Paul replied.
"Are you? Are you really?"
"Why not read my mind?"
"You know that I will never do that. I never have to. You send enough thoughts to me as it is."
Sonya laughed quietly.
Ma'el smiled when she did. For some reason, Sonya's smile reminded him of his sister's. Perhaps that was why he held her in high enough regard to let her walk freely around his ship.
"If I am allowed to ask, why are you so concerned with time?" Sonya asked curiously.
Ma'el paused for a long time, searching for an answer to give her, but he had none. He hated leaving her to wonder, but he also knew she would not be offended. She trusted him so. He never understood why that was. He asked Paul to follow him and for Sonya to leave and bring food and water to the workers in his labyrinth.
"When the generators are installed, I want you to strip my ship of its interdimensional core and of its weapons compartment," he told Paul when Sonya was gone. "Use the coils we retrieved long ago to connect the power from the core to the generator and install each of the weapons power fusion cores in the areas I marked for them. That should take care of the lack of a strong enough power source that you mentioned to me earlier."
"That is good. I have been wondering. Do you plan to allow our followers to pass this knowledge on to their children?"
"Absolutely not."
"You know that will not bode well. They all feel such knowledge is valuable and must be shared. They will not follow your command," Paul warned.
"There is no need for humans to learn such technological secrets earlier than they are ready. The only reason why I shared it with them now is because I had no choice. If the Taelons fell under the impression that all of humanity's advances in technology were because of me simply because of a few technological leaps forward I gave a select few, they would respect your species even less than they already do. I have recorded message after message asking my fellows not to come to Earth for reasons similar to this explanation, but the point my species will make quite clear when the time comes is that we did not choose your planet for your innovative intuition. Our reasons are much simpler."
"I know this," Paul said grimly.
"I cannot tell you how many times shame has plagued me over the Taelon agenda. What makes me even more ashamed is that I once agreed with it."
"Ma'el, I have never faulted you for your past mistakes. I am grateful for every day I am allowed to spend with you. You and I are living proof that the Taelons and the humans can work together. Just remember what you taught me. You always say that the past is not something to disregard, disrespect or disenchant, for the past offers the greatest gift to the present to help ensure a better future."
"Wisdom. The ability to learn from our mistakes. Did you know that my twin told me that?"
"He did?"
"Yes, but unfortunately, at the time she was no longer my twin. She and I were and still are strangers. I will die a stranger to my only family."
"I am sorry for that."
"Do not be. It is not important now," Ma'el said. They stopped at the entrance to the lab. When they entered, Paul closed and locked the door. "I assume you are going to tell me what you planned to tell me in my bedroom."
"Ah yes. You called me there to show me something."
"Of course I did," Ma'el said, his tone growing in excitement. "I have been working on this device for quite some time, and I thought you would like to be the first to see it."
He revealed the clear orb from beneath his robe. Paul took it and examined it closely. He could see a faint spark glowing inside the center. Suddenly, the orb bloomed like a flower. The cool, liquid substance fitted itself on to his hand like a glass glove.
"What is it?"
"It is amplifier made out of a combination of virtual glass and liquid crystal. It is a very difficult process that requires precise calculations. Given to the proper psychic, it could make an extremely powerful weapon."
"How do I take it off?" Paul asked.
Ma'el pressed the tip of his fingers into Paul's palm. The liquid seeped away from Paul and back into an orb in Ma'el's hand. "Small nanobots react to activate the crystal. I have not yet programmed them to react to a specific energy signature, so they react to anything they see. If you look close enough, you can see where they gather at the center of the orb."
"So that explains the faint spark I saw. How long did it take you to build it?"
"A year to make the prototype and four months to perfect it and build the final product. The amplifier does have one flaw, however. If it attaches itself to a person long enough it integrates into the subject's body. It becomes part of its host."
"Interesting. I suppose you intend to leave this for Da'an."
"That is correct."
"I believe it will suffice as a most effective device. You did mean to ask for my opinion, correct?"
"You're funny, Paul," Ma'el chuckled.
Paul chuckled along with him. "I will inform you when the technicians have finished the generator."
"Good. It is a very delicate process handling an interdimensional core and I want to be there personally to direct them."
Paul nodded and left, glad that Ma'el was feeling much better.
"And one more thing, Paul," Ma'el called just before Paul could start to leave.
"Yes?"
"Please spend some intimate time with Sonya away from here to save her the trouble of looking for excuses to enter my ship and flirt with you."
An awkward smile appeared on Paul's face. "Is it really that obvious?"
"Yes, Paul, it is," Ma'el said bluntly with a smirk painted on his face in response to his Paul's awkward grin.
Paul nodded humorously and left Ma'el alone in the lab. Ma'el opened a hidden compartment and pulled out a tiny miniature of a Taelon the Mayans had crafted for him. The eyes were crafted from rare jade stone. It was simple yet so beautiful like so many other things these humans both created and possessed. But looking into those jade eyes did not remind Ma'el of his many travels around this planet so much as it reminded him of the brilliant blue eyes of his sister. He visualized her now playing merrily with him and their older sibling Tay'jay. He began to long for those days, those days when things were so much simpler. He found that most beings did this when they were on the edge of death as he was.
Rembrandt Emerson Dauterive was a man with a secret. It was a secret that should not have shamed him today, but it did.
He was concerned about Da'an. Everyone was. However, he was more concerned about her than anyone. They claimed her descent into insanity was a terrible thing to watch. Apparently his friends were either cowards or idiots. Rembrandt had seen it from the beginning. He was there when she awoke the first terrible night whimpering from her vision. He was there when the voices first started to come to her. Incidentally, they all claimed it was the visions that had driven her mad. Only Rembrandt and Ariel knew the truth. It had been the sounds and the voices. It had always been the sounds and the voices. When Da'an was first given Ma'el's power to read minds, she had no idea just how much noise went on inside an average mind. Millions of innocent conscious and unconscious thoughts race a mile a minute inside the mind.
Then, there was the feedback. The feedback could only be described as the sound neurons made while sending signals from the mind to the rest of the body to perform rudimentary functions. Most people go on without giving those functions a second thought, much less understanding it, unless there is a problem. Why should they? If the sentient being had to spend all of his time working the many functions his many different systems performed, he simply could not exist. If he made one mistake, it would all end in a second. It was the miracle of the mind—the ability the of subconscious to learn and retain all the information needed to regulate as complex a system as the sentient body without giving the conscious any reason to worry about it.
But that didn't mean Da'an had to be the one to hear all about it. It didn't mean that she had to hear the voices and the sounds of the mind working and regulating constantly, all day and all night, in millions of people at once.
That was why Da'an had to leave. Rembrandt had not wanted her to go. He begged her to stay. He pleaded to her that Ma'el's powers just needed some getting used to like her own powers. Eventually she would learn to control them, and they could put this whole mess behind them. But Da'an had shot back in a low and poisoned tone that she was sick of the noise that he and Ariel constantly made. Them just being around her made her want to kill herself or at least destroy her own hearing. Then, she marched out of the apartment with a small suitcase of her things and locked herself in Augur's room in his lair, completely unaware that Ariel had been listening and crying the whole time. The noise was so loud and jumbled between the two of them that she couldn't find a thought to cling to even if she wanted to.
Rembrandt had to be the one to hold and comfort Ariel. He was to explain to her that Da'an really loved her. She was simply not feeling well, and we all say terrible thing when we're not feeling well. He had spent so many days calming her and reassuring her that by the time she was ready to believe that both her guardians loved her unconditionally, she and Rembrandt received the terrible news that Da'an had been brutally attacked and injured by Zo'or. Liam got to watch Da'an finally go over the edge, but Rembrandt had seen enough. He came to see her one time and he stayed with her until she fell asleep, but then he walked out and never came back.
Until now. The word was that Da'an was locked in a maximum-security mental hospital. Dr. Curzon had placed her there, but no one knew it was she. Only Ta'lay, Curzon, and the psychiatrist that had given up all hope of getting through to her were allowed access to see her. Rembrandt left Ariel with Su'ki, her tutor, and followed Ta'lay down a long white corridor, passing doors on each side of him thick enough to be its own bank vault. Ta'lay had been changed by Da'an weeks ago. Her eyes retained that blue that all Taelons and Espelons had, but her body had changed considerably. She was a slender and quite beautiful woman with milky white skin and long blond hair—even longer than Renee's. She had not given it any kind of curl, but it still retained quite a bit of volume and thickness that covered her artificial-looking ears. Most Espelon females grew their hair long for that reason, especially those brave souls who had once hidden themselves among the Taelon implant and volunteer corps. Ta'lay wore the familiar white doctor's coat under a blue dress she had borrowed from Renee that she had told Rembrandt was terribly uncomfortable and tight.
"She hasn't said anything ever since it happened, until recently that is."
"What did she say?"
"She's not saying anything."
"I don't get it."
"Words are coming from her mouth, but the voice is wrong."
"What does it sound like?"
"It sounds like a man. The psychiatrist spent three weeks trying to get her to talk in her own voice—just trying to get her to talk to him."
"She wouldn't talk to him."
"Whenever the psychiatrist tried to speak to her, she became completely catatonic. He would spend hours trying to get through to her using every technique he could think of. Nothing worked. He finally gave up and left."
"Did he know she's an alien and that she's psychic?"
"We probably should have told him that. Dr. Park insisted we not tell him."
"Dr. Park? What happened to Dr. Curzon?"
"Curzon has other patients and other issues. Besides Dr. Park is the more knowledgeable human in alien affairs. She just keeps a lower profile. Apparently, she hasn't been the same since Jonathan Doors died."
"Love interest?"
"Apparently."
They finally made it to her room and stopped.
"Interesting. Well, if the psychiatrist can't get through to her, why do you need me? What can I do that some psychiatrist can't?"
A low and slow tone. "She's been asking for you."
A pause. "Excuse me?"
"Dr. Park believes that a familiar face may bring out the Da'an we both know, so when she started asking for you, Park told me to contact you immediately."
"Why is she asking for me?"
"She refuses to tell us. Apparently this conversation is not for impure minds."
"I'm a pure mind to her?"
"Absolutely not. She just wants to talk to you. It is important, she says."
No response.
"Are you certain you are ready to do this?"
"No. Not in the least."
"We have people waiting outside in case anything should happen. I can safely say however that she has never attacked anyone. Everything is ready. You simply need to acknowledge that she will not appear as the person you remember."
"What'll she look like?"
"Pale, ghostly, with white strands and white eyes. She should be wearing a straight jacket, but I would not be surprised if she hasn't already escaped from it. She always breaks out of those things, but when we put them back on she shows no resistance. I think she enjoys the whole process. In any case, if she is out of the straight jacket she will be sitting on the bed in hospital pajamas. Her strands have grown out longer too. Are you picturing this in your head, or are you preparing yourself for the real picture?"
A dry tone. "A little from column A and a little from column B."
"Just be careful what you say around her. If you say the wrong thing, she will turn herself off from you completely."
"What's the right thing to say?"
"I'm sure she will tell you when you get inside. Cheerio, good luck, and whatnot. I will be right here when you are ready to leave."
Rembrandt waited for Ta'lay to open the door, which for all its bulk was quite silent. He walked into a bright white room with a metal chair sitting in front of a sheet-less bed. The walls were those white padded ones he had seen in the movies. Sitting on the bed with the straight jacket tossed aside as Ta'lay had predicted was she. Da'an. His Da'an. She was cross-legged with white hair so long that it passed her form and spread out on the light and obviously hard mattress. Her eyes were that pupil-less white that Ta'lay had warned him about, but they were not as he had expected. These white eyes were glowing, as if they were not eyes but rather tiny light bulbs. As he hesitantly sat in the chair, somewhat startled but not afraid of those white eyes, he noticed them beginning to dim. They dimmed to that what he had expected.
"Mr. Delancey. I have been expecting you," a raspy masculine voice said.
Tay'jay was giving Liam sparring lessons in the workout room at the ANA building. It was equipped with a weight training room, a sparring mat that could turn into any kind of simulation room, and small indoor pool. Tay'jay was sick of seeing humans pretend to know how to do Pa'dar and he made it his mission to teach all his new human friends how to do it right. Of course, Taelon Pa'dar was so difficult that most of them quit before they could get the beating Tay'jay still believed they rightfully deserved for thinking they had what it took to be a real Pa'dar warrior. Liam was the exception. Not only had he stuck with it, but also every time Tay'jay knocked him down (hard at times) Liam got up and asked to go again. Tay'jay could understand why Da'an liked and admired Liam so much.
"So is it true that October's Satan's month?" Tay'jay asked Liam.
"What are you talking about?" Liam asked.
"I was walking down the street with Street—hey that's kinda funny. Anyway I was going with Street to get some croissants—she likes those things for some reason. I don't see it—and some weirdo guy came up to us saying the devil is coming on All Hallows Eve. Street said that was some kind of holiday at the end of October."
"All Hallows Eve. You mean Halloween?"
"Yeah, that's the one."
"Halloween is an old Druid festival. It was a celebration of the fall harvest and a time to pay respects to the departed ones and the ancestors. It supposedly was the one night of the year where the spirits of the dead could return to the earth. When Christianity was on the rise, it conflicted with the old traditions. Anything non-Christian was dismissed as pagan and equaled with satanic activity. So some fundamentalist extremely conservative Christians still believe that Halloween is a satanic holiday, and the fact that we associate the whole month of October with it would make October Satan's month."
"Well if it's believed to be satanic, how come it's so popular?"
"Most people don't consider Halloween to be satanic. It's just a fun night where you can dress up as a ghoul, get candy and cause mischief. It's good fun. Halloween's turned into a secular holiday. Everybody celebrates it here in America no matter what religion they are. Besides, big business companies have invested too much in the whole idea of Halloween to let some crazy Bible-thumping, end-of-the-world fundamentalists tell them it's a satanic holiday. The candy companies rake in the most profits on Halloween."
"So holidays on your planet are really capitalized for business profit," Tay'jay surmised. "Interesting. We don't do that kinda thing on Taelon."
"Yeah, Da'an told me that. She said you don't have any real holidays for festivals except for the Pa'tranah festival and the Pau'li rites."
"Oh yeah. I remember Pa'tranah. It was the only day in the Taelon year that people could let loose and do what they wanted regardless of the consequences. It was a celebration of the anniversary of the planet combined with a lead-up to the Ka'ar'paaj ritual. I guess the closest thing you guys have to it is Mardi Gras."
"What about Pau'li?"
"Eh, you wouldn't like Pau'li. It's a celebration of when all the tribes of the Taelons got together to defeat the Kimera. Pau'li was the word the Taelons used for the last battle we fought to defeat the Kimera. It was named after the Pau'li mountain range, the tallest range on the planet. I forget exactly what the reference was because we sure as hell didn't fight them there."
"What do you do on Pau'li?" Liam asked, refusing to show his offense over the fact that they had made a festival out of the brutal slaughter of his species.
"Pau'li was an annual festival when the Pa'dar rituals were held. Pa'dar warriors conducted battles at the foot of Mount Kritana, the tallest mountain on the planet, simulating the real ones that were fought years ago. Nobody dies. They just get hurt real bad. It's kinda like a boxing match or martial arts tournament of champions. It was kinda the closest thing Taelons had to a sporting event, but we didn't see it as entertainment."
"Why's that?"
"It was an honor-slash-holy thing. Pa'dar's a form of purification. Ka'ar'paaj is a purification ritual for those who aren't strong enough to be Pa'dar warriors. Both Pau'li and Pa'tranah are held at the start of the month of Gon, the holiest month on the Taelon calendar. Pa'tranah goes on at the beginning of the month and Pau'li and Ka'ar'paaj start on the last twelve days of the month. Pau'li's considered a time to honor the ancient Taelon warriors. That's also why it's associated with the battle they fought to defeat the Kimera. When Taelons go to the tournaments, they're not going to be entertained. Showing up at a Pau'li tournament is considered a form of honoring Pa'dar warriors. It's an appreciation thing, not an entertainment event."
"Did Da'an ever go to the Pau'li tournaments?"
"Uh…no, not particularly," Tay'jay said a little solemnly. "It's kinda complicated how she felt about Pa'dar. To this day, I still don't quite grasp her feelings about it. Pa'dar is kinda the equivalent to human martial arts. Some sects use it strictly for meditation and exercise purposes, and others use it as self-defense training. I guess she favored Pa'dar strictly as a ritual. She was opposed to the fact that Pa'dar warriors were still being sent to the battlefield. I guess she never attended a ritual because Pa'dar leaders used it as a recruiting tool. She thought this took away from the prestige of the caste. But I always liked to kid myself into believing it was because she was so focused on completing Ka'ar'paaj at that time."
"Huh. It must have been really hard for you," Liam said in a comforting tone. He may not have liked the idea of Pau'li, but he could see that it held a special place in Tay'jay's heart—a bitter one but special all the same. He was willing to let his prejudices subside for a moment.
"Yeah, well…"
"You're thinking about her now, aren't you?"
"Don't get me wrong, Liam. I know she's gonna be okay, but sometimes I have these moments of weakness where I worry about her nonstop. But I know that she'll be okay. I just know it. Why? Are you thinking about her?"
Liam wished that he could share Tay'jay's optimism, but for him the situation looked bleak. Maybe Tay'jay was disillusioning himself again, forcing himself to believe that she would overcome this malady and everything would fall back to normal afterwards. Those momentary "weaknesses" as he referred to them could actually be the reality of the situation forcing him to cast his delusions aside. But he let Tay'jay have his delusions. If they helped him get through the day, who was Liam to question them? "I never stopped thinking about her. I went to see her a couple of times when she first got sent away. Renee and Park said I shouldn't go anymore. Have you seen her?"
"Ta'lay tells me about her," Tay'jay said looking away from Liam. He appeared reluctant to talk about it. "I heard what happened between you and Renee. I'm sorry man. I know she's something special to you."
Liam tensed. "To tell you the truth I'm actually glad she went. It gives us some time to ourselves…but then I remember she's with Joshua and I grab the punching bag."
"Ah, she'll come back. She doesn't love him."
"She doesn't love me."
Tay'jay laughed. "You obviously haven't seen the way she looks at you. I'll tell you one thing, she don't ask Joshua to dinner at her house. If anything, he's the one who does all the asking in that relationship."
Liam relaxed his composure. "I shouldn't have ignored her for so long. She probably thinks I'm in love with Da'an."
"Ugh! That's disgusting!" Tay'jay exclaimed. "That's the kind of thing you'd expect in a Norman Bates movie. Who in the galaxy would ever be sick enough to think about you and Da'an falling in love? You're like three years old man. She's over two thousand years old! That's like… Bambi falling in love with his mother's mother's mother. Renee's got a sick mind, man."
Liam had to laugh. It wasn't at Tay'jay's disgust at the whole idea of him and Da'an being romantically involved, but rather at the fact that this was not the first time an Espelon or a Taelon had expressed their disgust at the idea. "Well, rest assured I am not now nor have I ever been in love with Da'an. I'm like you. It's just wrong, man."
"Then what is your relationship to my sister?" Tay'jay asked. "Come on. Rehearse to me what you're gonna tell Renee when she gets back."
Liam shook his head and sat cross-legged on the mat. Tay'jay joined him. "Da'an's a…she's a mentor to me. We have a kind of teacher-student relationship. Sometimes, I…even think it goes beyond that. She is the closest thing that I have ever had to a parent. We even fight like a parent and a child do, you know? I'd like to think she sees it the same way. That's always why she tries to protect me by keeping secrets. But I guess it's worked both ways. I've kept secrets from her to protect her too. That must be why I never understood why she went through hell for Zo'or. She was so much better than him. I hate the way he treated her, and I hate that I couldn't stop it."
"That thing they had could have been seen coming a mile away," Tay'jay assured. "There's not a man, woman, or god in this universe that could have stopped that train wreck from happening, even if they both tried their damndest to avoid it."
"Yeah, and look where it's gotten them. She's lost her mind, and he's dead."
"Look, what happened between Zo'or and Da'an is not your fault or anybody else's. Nobody could have done anything for those two anymore than they could have done something for you and Sandoval," Tay'jay said firmly.
It amazed Liam how quickly Tay'jay had come to terms with all of this. Sometimes Tay'jay was a complete mystery to Liam. Sometimes, he was fiercely overprotective of Da'an, but at others, like now, he acted so relaxed toward her actions and events that befell her to the point where someone could mistake it for negligence. Did Tay'jay just act solely according to his gut feelings? Was one of those gut feelings telling him that Da'an would be fine? Maybe Tay'jay had a touch of Da'an's prophetic powers that nobody knew about, that not even he knew about. Liam chuckled in his mind at that idea. Still, whatever was promoting this sudden wave of optimism that had overtaken Tay'jay, he wished that it would overtake him too.
"Now personally, I think you and Da'an are close because you two see something to be desired in the other," Tay'jay continued. "Da'an sees the son she always wanted, and you see the parent you always wanted. It also explains why Ariel's so jealous of you."
"Ariel's jealous of me?"
"She sees the way you and Da'an work together. She wants that too. Ariel wants to be just like you in Da'an's eyes."
"How do you know all this?" Liam asked.
"Partly because I've been told and partly…because I'm smart like that," Tay'jay smirked.
"Asshole," Liam muttered.
"Takes one to know one," Tay'jay shot back. "Anyway, Ariel thinks the same way you thought about Sandoval. She's got Da'an's DNA in her, so that makes Da'an a parent to her. But Da'an pays more attention to you than she does to her own flesh-and-blood. Now, partially that's Da'an's fault, but some of it isn't. Being around Ariel reminds Da'an too much of Lili, and because of what happened between those two it hurts Da'an in some ways to be near Ariel. My stance is that Ariel's gonna go two ways. She and Da'an are gonna work out their differences and become as close as you and Da'an are, or Ariel's gonna go the same way Zo'or went for the exact same reason."
"What does that mean?"
"Oh. Da'an didn't tell you," Tay'jay said a little uneasily. "Okay. When the Jaridians attacked our capitol and started the war between us, Da'an and Zo'or got captured. They used Zo'or and other stuff to psychologically torture her, and Da'an lost her mind. Zo'or got the way he was because Da'an neglected him after that. She tried to make up for it later, but neither of them were having it."
"So that explains it," Liam realized. "And now she's regressed, and Ariel's being neglected."
"That's all there is to it," Tay'jay shrugged in that same near-negligent manner that astounded Liam.
"But Da'an and Ariel have something now that she and Zo'or didn't have," Liam said.
"Yeah? And what's that?"
"A fatherly figure," Liam said. "Rembrandt."
"I don't know if that's a role Link's quite ready to embrace," Tay'jay said frankly.
"He is," Liam assured. "If there's one thing I know, it's that. He's just as in love with Da'an as I'm in love with Renee. Da'an wouldn't have rejected Ar'ron if he wasn't."
"I hope you're right," Tay'jay said solemnly. "Well, anyways…let's get back to business. Don't you have to go to work in a few?"
"Not really. The Synod's still going through realignment, and they don't quite know where to put us companion protectors yet. They haven't even named replacements for the six highest positions in the Synod yet. Until they do, I'm on paid leave."
"Must be nice."
"It'd be nice if Hubble wasn't bugging me every day about the upcoming elections. The ANA's doing some serious campaigning to get resistance sympathizers in legislation this year. We've never had a big opportunity like this before."
"So I've heard," Tay'jay said passively. "All right, Kincaid. Stand and get in sparring position. We're gonna do this one more time, and then I'll tell you why I'm always kicking your ass in less than a minute."
"Not this time, TJ. I've learned from my mistakes."
"Oh learned from them, have you?" Tay'jay said in a Yoda-like voice. "Will not get ass kicked as badly this time, will you?"
Liam silenced Tay'jay by taking the first strike, but Tay'jay was ready for him. He blocked the blow with his own staff, and a new sparring match was born. Liam fought valiantly, more valiantly than he ever had. It was enough to at least impress Tay'jay, but not enough to beat him. The Pa'dar warrior, in a move Liam had never seen in any human or Taelon Pa'dar match before, leapt over his foe and jammed his staff in Liam's face in midair. Liam had to duck to avoid getting poked in the eyes, but as he crouched, he felt his staff suddenly leave his hands. When he rose and turned to face Tay'jay, the alien stood in triumph with both staffs in his hands.
"Not bad," Tay'jay complimented. "I might have actually broken a sweat that time if I were human."
"Show-off," Liam grumbled.
"Aw, don't be so mopey," Tay'jay said. "It took me fifteen years to finally beat my master in a match. It was the happiest day of our lives."
Liam laughed.
"Anyways," Tay'jay said tossing Liam's staff back to him, "you ready to learn some real Pa'dar now?"
Liam stood in a stance with the staff mimicking that of a Taelon Pa'dar warrior. "I think I am."
It was Tay'jay's turn to laugh. "This is gonna be a long day."
Rembrandt had not responded to the voice for several minutes, and the voice had not said anything more. Rembrandt didn't appreciate the standoff, but he had nothing he could use to break the ice. Responding to the claim he felt would only lead him into a trap, but he had nothing else to talk about. It was a dilemma that should not have been such.
The voice recognized his predicament and it sympathized. "I know what you are thinking. Well you need not worry. Thus far, I am the only one who knows your little secret."
"When you refer to yourself, to whom are you really referring?"
A smile slowly appeared on the voice's face. "You are clever. I can see why you are as highly ranked as you are. I apologize. A valiant military hero such as yourself should always be addressed by rank, Brigadier General."
"You respect me. That's progress I guess. Do you respect me enough to give me a name?"
"Does it have to be my name or the name of my sister?"
"Sister? But then that would make you…"
"Indeed."
"She said you were dead. Everybody knows you're dead. You can't be him."
"What would you like to call me then?"
Rembrandt sighed with frustration. Then, he remembered what Ta'lay had told him about the voice becoming completely catatonic to the psychiatrist who had last tried to force Da'an to surface. He decided that if he had any chance of at least getting past today, he would have to humor this voice and this personality that mocked the real deal. "No. It's okay. Your name's fine…Ma'el."
"Thank you for respecting me," Ma'el said a little haughtily.
"I guess I have to respect you for dealing with this power as long as you did," Rembrandt said, playing along.
"I had help."
"From whom?"
"From her."
"How did she help you?"
"I do not believe that it would be in the best interests of you or my sister for me to reveal such information right now."
"But you do think it's in our best interests to call me out?"
"Call you out to whom? This is a secret between friends. No one out there can hear us. The only access those fools outside have is a panic button by the door and a health monitoring system whose function I have long since abolished. Besides, she revealed her secret to you long ago. It is only fair that you tell her yours."
Rembrandt nodded and folded his arms. "Much of what I told her wasn't a lie. For the most part it was true. I just twisted it around a little."
"Do you think she knows?"
"I can't imagine her not knowing. She's a bright person. It's not her that I'm worried about."
"Your thoughts turn to that fool Hubble Urick. Why worry about him and what he knows? Do you honestly believe he is stupid enough to open a classified military file? He would be arrested in a second."
"He was stupid enough to get it and hand it off to Da'an."
"Oh please. That file was riddled with alterations and deletions, and the only reason Hubble got access to it was that he invoked the Freedom of Information Act. And if he did know, your superiors would be the first to tell you about it. They monitor him just as closely as you do."
"I'm not the only one who's been sent here."
"I know this. Let me be clear. There is nothing I know that she does not know as well. How do you think I uncovered the truth?"
"I don't know how you uncovered the truth. If it wasn't from the file, then…"
"You've been dreaming about it. You've been thinking about it. I shall explain so that there is no confusion. The power you refer to as telepathy acts as both a broadcast and a reception to all neural activity. It is not simply your thoughts that are received. Everything is. The simple but vigorous problem my sister suffers from is that she has not fully grasped the concept of how to sort all this new incoming information."
"But you do?"
"Indeed. I am Ma'el. I know of the burden from which you suffer. You hide it well. You do not fear that she will reject you if you tell her. If it were just that, you would not have bothered to court her for so long. You would not be here now. You do not entirely grasp the consequences of telling her or anyone else you care for. However, you are set in this belief that whatever consequence presents itself, it will be malicious towards you and the ones you tell. You know things will change, but you do not know precisely how they will change. That is your greatest fear. You fear the unknown. You have ever since you were sent to war."
"You seem to have me down pretty well."
"Your tone is quite haughty."
"It's not intentional, I assure you. To be honest, I respect someone with that kind of power. And I'm appreciative that you don't tell anyone else. It's a compliment."
"Thank you."
"My burden right now is Da'an. I want to know what happened to her. Is she okay? Can I see her? I'm not like that psychiatrist. I don't think she's some warped schizophrenic, and I'm not out to fix her or you. All I want to do is see if she's all right. I want her to hear me."
Ma'el chuckled slowly. "She can hear you."
Rembrandt winced. "A-Are you sure?"
"She and I are connected. We are connected through this power I bestowed upon her. She hears everything I hear and more. However, she is not listening at this moment in time."
"I don't understand."
"She hears us speaking, but she hears so much more that she has tuned it out. My sister is not insane nor is she comatose. She is…somewhere in between."
"So she's hearing us speak, but she's also hearing our thoughts too."
"Our thoughts, her thoughts, our memories—everything."
"And because she hears all of that, she can't deal with it."
"As I said, she has not completely grasped the concept of sorting the vast amount of information she is receiving."
"So what's all this make you? A stand-in until she's figured all this out?"
"You could say that."
"How long will it take?"
"Well, that really depends on what she wants, does it not?"
"I want to speak to her," Rembrandt said softly but firmly.
Ma'el stood and began slowly pacing the room. The long strands of hair swayed by his sides like a skirt.
Rembrandt stayed firmly in his seat, waiting for the anomaly that had overtaken his beloved to finish his rhythmic pacing.
"An idea has come to me," Ma'el said, stopping and pushing the strands behind his back. "I propose an exchange."
"An exchange of what?"
"Information. You tell me what I want to know, and I will tell you anything you want to know. In the end, if this proves satisfactory to me, I will release her to you, regardless of her condition. Is that a fair exchange?"
"It depends on what information you desire from me."
"Actually, it depends on what information you desire from me."
"Fine. I want to understand. I want to understand what's happening to Da'an. And then I want you to tell me why's she so damn important in this war. I want to know about her and you. Everything."
"In that case, there is only one equitable thing you may provide me in return."
"Yeah," Rembrandt said in comprehension, "everything about myself."
"Indeed."
"But don't you already know about me?"
"I do not know everything."
"Fine. I'll tell you everything."
"It must be truthful."
"Then, you be truthful too."
"I can assure you that I will."
"Then, you don't have anything to worry about."
"Excellent." Ma'el returned to his former position on the bed. The only difference was that he was staring directly into Rembrandt's eyes. He was intrigued when he saw a dull translucent light circulate through Rembrandt, the only visible symptom of the brigadier general's anxiety in all of this.
"So should you start, or should I?" Rembrandt asked.
"The most valuable information is always obtained from the seeds of question. You have a question to ask me. Ask."
Rembrandt began to feel that a portion of Da'an's mental powers had overtaken him. The millions of questions rushing through his head threatened to drive him to such madness that he was ready to storm out of the room. However, he wanted to know more about Da'an. What was there to ask? No, there was too much to ask. That was the problem. How could he formulate everything he had ever wanted to know about Da'an in a single question? Those empty white eyes were not helping the situation. It was his turn to leave his seat and start pacing around the room. He expected Ma'el to say something. It didn't have to be offensive. He just expected to hear something. However, the anomaly sat there as firm and unmoving as a statue, waiting patiently for Rembrandt to gather his thoughts into a question. Suddenly, a question came to Rembrandt. It didn't constitute everything he wanted to know about Da'an, but it made for a great starting point. With his composure regained, he sat back in the seat and faced Ma'el.
"What happened to Da'an when she drowned?"