Eclipse - Book One: Darkness Falling
by M. Bumbarger
Turning and turning in widening gyre
Prologue : Gyre
"Forgive me Father, for I have sinned."
Leaning comfortably back against the wall of the confessional, the priest nodded. This would be his last confession of the day, and for that he gave a small prayer of thanks. Then, realizing precisely how sacrilegious and petulant that relief was, he grimaced inwardly. He was true to his faith, no matter how much the government had twisted and mutated it into what they wanted it to be to keep the Unified Alliance strong. "How long has it been since your last confession?"
"I have never been to confession. I am not Catholic."
Those words caused him to sit up straighter, as though a bolt of electricity had been sent through his entire body. Yet, his voice remained calm. "Child, there is but one religion in the Unified Alliance and that is the true religion of our Lord and Savior and his blessed Mother. We are all Catholic and we are all His children."
"And where there are those gathered in my name, I am there."
The bible verse was both a light of hope and a tentacle of fear that wrapped itself around his heart. Each time he went through this, he knew he was walking a fine line between freedom and imprisonment. Each time, he gave a small prayer that the person on the other side of the confessional was truly one of his own, and not a spy or infiltrator. That would mean trial and death for the charge of treason.
That would mean the end of his work here forever.
"What weighs heavy upon your soul my child?" The priest asked quietly, his heart pounding so loudly he wondered if the parishioner could hear it as well.
"I wish to know if the gates of heaven are open to all of God's children no matter what their sin or crime."
The code words yet again. Words that held meaning for him, but would hold meaning for no one else listening to the conversation . . . if anyone was listening. The government insisted that the confessional was still sacred but he did not trust the government any more than his father had before him.
"The gates of heaven are always open, but sometimes a soul must be weighed in purgatory."
"Even the souls of children who are without sin?"
"Even children bear the stain of original sin."
"They have been baptized and cleansed and I know their hour draws near, Father. If I should lose them, I need to know that they will be received at the pearly gates."
Children. Even he could not turn away children. "The Lord will not turn his face on the innocent and the pure."
"Is it wrong of me to miss them already? I do not think they will survive this night or the 'morrow and –"
"No matter how short their time, be glad and give praise for the joy they have brought to your life. And know that you too, one day will be united with them in heaven."
"Thank you Father."
"You are welcome, my child."
He waited a while before leaving the confessional and returning to his private chambers, feeling the familiar ball of disgust rise up in stomach.
Children, mere children. They would be shipped out of Psi Control tonight and sent to the farms . . . the camps . . . or worse, to their deaths. Because their psionic abilities were not strong enough, or because they were not powerful enough to be used by the Unified Alliance. Perhaps it would be because they were not 'trainable' or 'malleable.' Whatever the case, they were less than second class citizens now. Their status would be entered into their permanent records and they would never ever be allowed even the semblance of freedom unless they were re-tested later . . . which seldom happened.
He had only a few hours to prepare and he hated to rush these things. The only way to keep the safe houses safe was to approach these transfers with caution and thought. But these children would not be safe for another few days, that much was certain. If The Coalition insider thought they would be safe, they would not have come to him.
Putting on his overcoat, Father Andrew sighed heavily. He had a contact to meet if he hoped to get those children to the safe house by morning. And then it would be time for another letter to Brother Darius.
Andrew hoped that his fellow would be able to accommodate two more children and smuggle them into Africa.
It was their only hope for freedom.
* * * * *
"How are you today?"
It took her a moment to realize that the question was directed at her. It took her a moment to realize that the speaker was sitting besides her on the patio terrace, hands folded on the table top, staring curiously at her while he awaited her answer. She looked up from her reading, trying to remember his name, and secretly despising the interruption. Why couldn't people just leave her alone? "Fine . . . Stephen. Just fine."
Stephen tilted his head, his eyebrows rising in implied disbelief as a lock of soft brown hair flapped across his blue-gray eyes. "Want to try that again? This time with feeling."
She sighed and marking her page in the book of poems closed it and set it aside. "I guess, I'm a little homesick."
That probably made a world of sense to Stephen. It probably made her sound like a raving lunatic. When home was the outskirts of the city, the lean-to's and shanties where the poor lived . . . if you could call it living. She grew up in the ghettos and slums that the upper crest of London tried to pretend didn't exist; she grew up in the forgotten subway and train tunnels that made the underground where there was scarcely enough to live on . . . but where they were free.
It hadn't always been that way. She remembered a yellow house with a porch. She remembered pretty dresses and lace around her socks and shoes that were shiny and black. She remembered dresses and trinkets and a time when her dolls had all been new and real, and not battered and busted. Like yesterday, she remembered the streets of downtown London, the shops and people. And all their thoughts a jumble of wonderful and fantastic noise that filled her senses and made her feel like she had power over them.
She knew what the ladies on the train really thought about one another. She knew what that man in that corner wasn't saying to his wife on the phone. She knew why that woman's dress wasn't coming out properly, even if the woman couldn't figure it out for herself. She knew it all; she heard it all. And she had known when the people were going to test her; she hadn't understood what all the fuss was about. She hadn't understood why they shot guns at them or why they left the house and the dresses and the dolls behind.
Sometimes, she wished that she had never gained that understanding.
Because back then, she hadn't known what she was and in not knowing, she had been free. Now, she had the knowledge that she would never be free as long as Psi Control could use her mind. But she was one of the lucky ones; she had lived on the fringe actively using her psi powers for most of her life, and had avoided capture and tagging for . . . well, all of the time she had spent living there.
If only she had listened when they called the raid. If only she hadn't gone back for little Sara and the child's silent twin. If only they had been able to find some place to hide. If only she hadn't lost control for those few minutes and attempted to crash the tunnel with telekinesis alone; if only she hadn't decided to fling two of the raiders a distance of several meters with the power and will of her mind. If only, if only, if only. It didn't do any good to wish or look back now. What was done was done and there was no turning back the clock.
They still told her to consider herself among the lucky. She had spent only three days at the harvesting farm before she had been brought to The Centre. Only three days living in military cabins on a thin cot with a small blanket. Only three days before she was banded at The Centre, given a small flat of her own and living credits. She was one of the special ones, one with talent that Psi Control could use once they figured out what to do with it. She was one of the lucky ones. She would have the semblance of life until the day she died.
The slums had been better. Even eating cold food out of cans and huddling around weak and dying fires had been better. The disease, the infestations, the cries of the hungry children were all better than her "blessed luck."
But the people here were good. The psi's that had welcomed her that first night. They made their own family units here, just as they poor and the psi's did on the fringe. She really didn't want to take her anger and bitterness out on those who worked so hard to be good to her . . . but sometimes it was hard.
"Yeah, that happens," Stephen said softly. "Where are you from, anyway?"
"Aurora Farms."
"No," Stephen shook his head, giving her a soft smile. "Where are you from? What city?"
She blinked at him in surprise. Why did it matter? To Psi Control they were designations and numbers, marked by their abilities and where they were 'harvested.'
"Because no matter what they do to us, here we are more than psi's," Stephen's smile softened in a silent apology for breaching her thoughts. "We are still people and we can't ever forget that. We can't ever let them take that away from us."
"I was born in London. But I lived in the fringe since I was six," she supplied quietly. "My mother ran away with me when I tested positive."
Stephen nodded. "I didn't get that lucky. It never occurred to my parents to run. They just accepted it and handed me over."
"I'm sorry," she whispered.
"Don't be. I'm not. I didn't grow up in one of the farms or one of the camps. I grew up here, in The Centre. Liz helped me, she'll help you if you let her. We all will. We have to stick together in here."
She studied the man across from her for a moment. He was at least ten or fifteen years older than her, but there was still an air of childhood and youthful enthusiasm around him. He had to be a rarity, growing up in The Centre. Most of those she saw here were merely resigned.
"Do you like it here, Stephen?" she asked him.
There was a moment while he paused, considering her question. He sat back in his seat, thrumming long fingers against the tabletop, his eyes momentarily closing. When he finally opened them and looked at her again, he too wore the familiar mask of resignation. "Like it? No. Have I found . . . satisfaction, yes. You accept it and move on. It's how you survive. It's the only way you survive.
"You've gotten a second chance. It's a life, a different life than what you wanted or what you had but it's a chance. It's your chance, not theirs. You are still you no matter what they tell you. As long as you don't forget that, you'll be fine."
Stephen leaned forward again, placing his outstretched arm on the table. He ran his fingers lightly over the metallic band. "They call me Gamma Nine Two Five. But that's not who I am. I'm Stephen Jamison. I always have been and I always will be. Now, who are you?"
She stared down at her own band for a moment. The wristband was better than the collars and ankle manacles they used at the farms. Better than the collars and body harnesses she heard they used at the camps. But still it marked her as a designation, a psi and nothing more. Yet, Stephen seemed to believe that she could hold onto her identity, to her fragile and important past. He seemed to be proof that what did not kill you did indeed make you stronger.
Slowly she lifted her head to meet his eyes, seeing the challenge there. Briefly, she wondered how often he did this, how often he approached the new psi's and forced them to stare down their fear and their pain, forced them to accept this path but not to lose themselves to it.
"I'm Amelie Jackson."
Stephen took her hand and shook it, a gesture of friendship and welcome. "Welcome to The Centre, Amelie. I think that you're going to be just fine here."
* * * * *
David Stade watched without expression as the medic pulled the sheet over the face of the pale and lifeless corpse. Another one wasted, another pushed too far and then beyond. They were too weak, too fragile, these psi's. Too weak and fragile for what The Board wanted to be accomplished. But it would not be up to him to tell them that. The Board ran Psi Control. The Board owned Psi Control. And ultimately, The Board owned David Stade.
"That's the third one this month, Stade. What am I supposed to tell The Board?" The voice from behind him was raspy, yet feminine. A voice that carried the telltale signs of too many cigarettes.
"Tell them that another subject died. Tell them that the boy broke." Stade turned, facing the woman slowly. She was a good head and half shorter than him, with glittering gray eyes which matched the silver and gray of her hair. She leaned on a cane, a large diamond or other precious jewel ring on each finger of her hand, and at first glance she seemed both diminutive and weak. Stade knew better. He did not underestimate her. She was as powerful . . . and as dangerous . . . as The Board.
"I don't care what you tell them, Lady Mulvaney. Just make it clear that I need more time."
"More time?" She stepped forward and although he gazed down at her, he felt like the one being cowered. "You've had six months. How much more time do you need? How much more time do you think that The Board can give you?"
"You don't understand the sensitivity of this! You don't and they don't! I can't simply reshape a mind, make a person into a machine over night, I can't –"
"They are not people, Stade. They are psi's."
"And their physiology is the same as yours or mine. Too much and they break. Like that boy."
"We can't afford for you to continue breaking them. Psi's are a commodity."
And like all commodities, even a psi could not be wasted. Stade knew the rhetoric and the litany. "Then stop pressuring me. Give me time to do what has to be done . . . and maybe I won't destroy anymore of your precious commodities!"
"I'll talk to The Board. I make no promises, but I will see what can be done." Lady Mulvaney turned on her heel and left without a backward glance.
David Stade swore softly and then putting the corpse out of his mind, returned to his lab. It was back to the drawing board, and he had a lot of work to do before the next batch of psi's rolled his way.
****
Colonel Masters calmly bit the tip from his cigar, his gaze focused on the cold steel in the blue eyes that locked on his from the other side of his desk. He hated this part of the job. He hated the Hunters as much as he hated those dirty psi's. Sometimes he thought that he might just hate the Psi Hunters more. He certainly hated the man across from him. Masters hated talking to him, hated dealing with him. Hell, he even hated *thinking* about dealing with him. At least the psi's knew their place. They were the second class citizens. They were born to serve and serving they would die. The Hunters, particularly men like this one, seemed to think that they ran the show and that everyone should bow and cow-tow to them.
Masters had never done it and he wasn't about to start now.
Striking a match against the edge of his desk, he calmly lit the cigar and puffed on it a few times. "Cuban. I love my country, I am as patriotic as the next man. But we just can't make a cigar like those Cuban bastards do. You didn't want one, did you?"
"No." The man was practically seething. His jaw clenched tightly, his face a dark red, a vein popping out in his throat.
Masters puffed again. "Nothing like a good Cuban cigar." Then, pulling the cigar away from his mouth, he gave his full attention to the Psi Hunter. "I believe you were questioning my terms, Horton. I don't like it when you question my terms. Psi Control doesn't like it when Hunters start getting ideas of their own."
"I'm not afraid of your idle threats, Masters." James Horton narrowed his eyes. "You and I both know that Psi Control needs the Hunters. And I am one of the best. I brought you four, and I think that deserves a bit more than we previously discussed."
Pretending to consider the man's words, Masters enjoyed the cigar a bit longer. It was contraband for certain, but he was a man with powerful friends. This little vice would go unnoticed and besides, it was the wonderful and full of himself Dr. Neiman that gave him the cigars in the first place. For a job well done and for his careful and wonderful management of the situation with the Hunters.
In other words, the pompous windbag asshole had been thanking him for making sure that none of the high and mighty up at Psi Corporation and Centre for Development and Control had to deal with the righteous and pompous like James Horton.
"They might be damaged."
While it may be true that Psi Control didn't care how they got their hands on psi's who slipped through initial testing or the rogue ones who escaped the farms and camps, they did care whether or not those ones were in good condition. Methods of delivery didn't matter, so long as they were handed over mentally in tact. For the most part, Psi Control didn't want to know about the methods; it helped them to pretend that they only served the government and that they kept their hands clean.
No, they didn't want to know about men like Horton who used psi's to bait, trap and catch their own kind. He used them and used them until they burnt out or burnt up and then he simply supplied himself with another one. Like the girl that stood in the corner now, staring submissively down at her feet, her blonde hair falling obscuring her face like a veil.
Masters repressed a shudder as his eyes and thoughts turned to the girl. He hated being around psi's, he hated the way they looked at him, peeling back the layers of his mind. The way she looked at him now, tired blue eyes simply staring at him as though she had perceived his every thought. Which she probably had.
He hadn't wanted her in his office at all. She was properly banded, the security device around her neck and another around her ankle, she wouldn't be able to escape Horton. But the weasel had insisted on keeping the girl close; Masters knew that he did it to have the upper hand, to make him uncomfortable. He refused to give James Horton the satisfaction.
"Masters, you know they are in good shape. Jade will even verify it if you ask her."
At the sound of her name, the girl's gaze shifted to Horton, her eyes hardening ever so slightly. Masters noted that with some interest. Horton might have a trained dog, but it was an unwilling trained dog. And the unwilling trained dog just waited for an opportunity to bite the hand that feeds. He would so enjoy being there the day that Horton got bitten.
No, Masters didn't want to ask her. He didn't want to deal with psi's at all and Horton knew it. But then again, Masters knew that the psi's were all in good condition. One had even had the nerve to glare in defiance and spit in Horton's face. A good show and strong spirit, but Psi Control would take care of that.
"Fine, Horton. You'll get your extra money. Just get the hell out of my office. You're starting to make the place stink."
Masters turned his chair away, staring at the back wall to indicate an end to the conversation. Hunters and psi's. He hated them both.
***