5. Communication

Airgoidh moved among the stone gardens of the Sun Warden town beneath the Twin Mounts of Amake'Son. The globes of burning gases gave off standard light enough for her to see, and she wondered at the technology of such a device - how old must they be? She chuckled a bit too. Who would have thought to put gas inside a ball and set it on fire? So backward . . .

Despite the ancient technology, she could not keep her mind from admiring the tenacity of the people of the town to build such a place, specially from the hard core of malinite. For what reason? The Paratwa Ra congregated as a Sect, but was that any indicator of what the Paratwa Ra were supposed to do under Cizin's guidance? Why did these Cast-off seek to be gathered in one place when the Yasodhara showed clearly that four were a Unity of mind and empowerment of body. The town could easily have held a hundred times that.

She had slept soundly for a time, and then woke when Gaelbhan started out to the sands.

“I will return shortly with Sister RageChild,” she said, their third sister having opted to sleep outdoors for the night. She had looked nervous being encased underground, saying that she wanted to sleep outside and be reminded of the Tharcis Desert, a place Airgoidh had never heard of - much of the universe was unknown to her except the slaver's paddies she had tended since before memory.

Even her schooling had been breakneck, and her sister had provided for her first ship. In that time, Gaelbhan had joined the Paratwa Ra in search of something, perhaps an answer to why their minds were joined in thoughts and emotions. Airgoidh didn't understand a lot of things, but she found technology to be very . . . entertaining to play around with. Gaelbhan would be shocked to find that she was quite good at hacking into systems too.

The panel's display was black until she ran her hand along the left side. It lit and the screeching voice spoke to her. She moved through the icons to the fourth Rona glyph, and watched as the Yasodhara built upon itself to create the Unity. She looked back to the town, then hunched down over the panel and whispered. The words she spoke were the words of the panel, the screeching voice replayed sound for sound. During the long years of enslavement, she had practiced imitating the animals as a form of amusement while she worked in the paddie. She used that talent now.

The panel returned its customary icon feedback signal, and another Yasodhara appeared. This Unity sat askew of the first, attached to the first along one of the pyramid's sides. Airgoidh had wanted to tell her sister she felt the panel took voice input, but after so many years of not trusting anyone, she wanted to . . . she didn't know what she wanted to do, she realized.

Gaelbhan was her sister-by-blood, and RageChild a sister through the power of Cizin. She could trust them, right?

The panel appeared to wait for more input, but she did not know what to say. She could imitate the words, but not the language. She double-tapped the display at the center of the sun, and the icons returned to their starting sequence. She saw the pattern, and tried to work it through in her mind. The Sun Warden were a deliberate people, she knew. Why else build a town deep in the near impenetrable caverns of malinite. Might as well force the Amarr system sun to go nova as work these caves. She felt the information being displayed was just as deliberate.

The first icon, the horn, was the Rona glyph. That was Gaelbhan, she knew. The second icon was the Tway glyph, which was RageChild. She did not understand how the two would come to completely share their mind, but she felt a little of it as feelings and images too. She found that thinking of their connection in analogy, like the gel and the pilot, helped to make it clearer. Certainly the lights in her mind were just like the signals introduced by a neural interface.

She touched the Tway glyph, and the third icon appeared from the Rona, sliding out and up. That glyph was her. She smiled. Yes, the Sun Warden had seen these patterns before, their Sect if that was what one could call it, had been created, lived and ended over and over as the universes' energies were rebalanced.

According to her sisters, when the universe had been balanced sufficiently, Cizin recalled the Paratwa back into his realm, but when the universe had been unbalanced once again, Cizin's great power recalled the Paratwa from the shadows. It was a logical process, from what Airgoidh could see. First the Paratwa would apear, assassins and warriors with only the purpose of Cizin to guide them. Then, but natural evolution of any system, there would be those who were Cast-off, or who even renounced the sect of that era. That was represented by the Rona symbol. Then a disjoined Tway would follow, represented by the second glyph and the two white lines dropping between them. Of course, the third icon appeared from the Rona because that was the icon also of blood, of family - the Trinity glyph.

How many times had this cycle begun, run its course and ended? Even before the EVE Gate cataclysm? Airgoidh could only imagine.

The fourth icon floated outward into the group of glyphs, joining the Trinity glyph. Airgoidh wondered if that were her Tway. She wondered if the Unity Temple would hold some answers. From what she learned from her sisters, the Paratwa maintained a pairing bond, but the group of four were a direct reflections of Cizin. What Cizin intended in such a group they could only guess. And why had Cizin made it necessary for the Cast-off to discover this strange set of circumstances? Why did the Sect of the Ra not know of these things? Was it possible the Sect of the Ra were destined for other engagements while the Cast-off were meant to journey along a similar, but lonely path?

**

Gaelbhan and RageChild stood in the sand, back to back, in the heat of the sun. Sweat dripped from their foreheads, but internally they were calm. Anger and determination to fight the Amarrians, sadness at the loss of friends and loved ones, all these were shared by the two women as they calmed their thoughts to let the single mind take over.

Paratwa were created by Cizin, and birthed into the universe under his guidance. The shared minds made them deadly opponents, assassins and also ghosts. Stories. Myths to scare little Matari children into being good.

Why did you leave?

RageChild formed the words in the shared-mind, and both Gaelbhan and RageChild answered, for there was no difference or distinction between one or the other. The only exception being each body’s unique physical experiences.

I joined the Ra to find myself, to answer the questions of why I could feel my sister in my mind, in my body. I learned their lore, and shared their battles, but their minds were singular in the purpose of Cizin. All else was useless to them.

I remember the fight between you and the Sect over the body of one of our brothers lost in battle. Vice Admiral Ters had contacted you so that he could return the body to you, and you accepted.

Yes, to do so was punishable, even under pain of exile or death. The Paratwa should never care for the body. The body is now, and the soul is forever. What Vice Admiral Ters did with the body was of no concern, should have been no concern.

But you felt more was needed to honor the body of our brother?

I do not know what I felt. To house the soul of a Paratwa, the body must be capable. Cizin’s great plans include the genetic manipulation of the human races to create hosts suitable to His purpose. I could not let the body of our brother go.

You were not punished though. You were not exiled. You have not answered my question. Why did you leave?

Because to stay would have caused your death.

RageChild stepped away from her sister, and turned to her with wide eyes. “My death?”

Gaelbhan slumped a little, breaking the shared mind. That had been their first attempt to join their thoughts, now that they believed they were the other’s tway. The lore of the Sect of the Ra had provided the method to do so, but the work to maintain the shared mind was enormous. She felt drained.

“I had learned from another of our brethren that the question of your birth had been a hot topic within the Sect.”

RageChild grabbed her sister as she stumbled and fell to one knee. “Sister, rest a moment.”

“You are strong, sister,” Gaelbhan said as she leaned against her tway. “Yes, the Sect were concerned that your birth was against the Will of Cizin.”

“Even I do not know where I come from. They are presumptious.”

“And deadly. I do not think they would tolerate knowing you were partly Amarrian.”

RageChild stepped back, letting her sister falter and drop to the ground. “You speak lies! I am not Amarrian. Why do you say this?”

“Calm yourself sister. I did not say you were Amarrian. I said you were partly . . . I ran a scan on you some time back when you first joined and found that your blood contains Amarrian proto-genetic material.”

“A scan? What about you? Did they scan you too? You are half-Amarrian.”

Gaelbhan stood and stepped close to her sister. She took RageChild’s hand in hers. “It is the weakness of the Sect that they do not check more thoroughly into the genetics of the membership. Cizin intends the proper genetic material to be occupied, but the Sect doesn’t seem to find that of interest. I was not scanned, but I did scan you.”

“You are half-Amarrian. So is Airgoidh.”

“Yes, but I did not fear for my safety as much as I feared for yours. When they started asking their sources about your background, I realized that your safety might be in jeopardy.”

“So leaving kept me safe how?” RageChild pulled her hand out of her sister’s.

“What was the first thing you did when I left?”

“I made plans to follow you.” She laughed. “And now that I am gone from the Sect, they will likely just tend to their efforts to battle the Amarr.”

“As we all must sister.”

“The cycle be done.”

The cycle be done.

**

The three sisters walked along the underground path, going upward. "The number of Amarr deaths here will likely cause some attention," RageChild said. "Natural causes or no, we can expect some company."

"Actually, sister," Gaelbhan said. "The bartender is a member of the Peoples' Front. He was following the Amarr, and has already discovered their bodies. No doubt he will inform the right people, make the right posts, and the deaths will be by natural causes." "A lot of deaths," RageChild said, smiling.

Gaelbhan nodded, but Airgoidh said nothing, walking along the path in silence as she contemplated the Sun Warden panel and their destination in space. The three emerged from the long path inside the malinite caves into sunlight and heat. The second Mount of Amake'Son reached up into the sky so high, the sun could only peer down the hole at midday, which was now. Airgoidh, still barefoot, felt connected this the ground despite the hot sand. They had offered her some boots, and she took them, but a life without them seemed a full life nonetheless.

RageChild and Airgoidh stopped as they turned the corner of a boulder, looking at the Blackbird sitting center in the Mount. "The Virtue of Silence," Gaelbhan said, pointing to the cruiser mounted with cannon, missile bays and extruded warfare antenna.

"Those are heavies," RageChild said of the launchers on the Blackbird, heading towards her rifter, smiling. "It won't last long though if you are targeted."

"Do not fear for me, sister. The loss of ships is just something we must all live with."

Turning to Airgoidh, she pointed. "Take the other rifter,"

The three ships lifted off, the Blackbird first in the case of Amarr fleet ships perchance in orbit. The rifters and the cruiser sliced through the troposphere, into the tropopause and finally to space. Airgoidh activated the rifter’s command functions through short finger movements, amazed at how incredibly more advanced the ship was compared to her probe. She loaded the program Gaelbhan mentioned. A moment passed, then the screeching language appeared as three dimensional objects in the gel, moving from right to left. They were now integrated with the Sun Warden panel. Touching the coordinates set the autopilot, and the three ships warped from Amamake VI.

**

Zayard waited while the Ammatar Inspector jotted his answers into the PAD, the heat of the bar making both men sweat. Zayard hadn't offered the man anything, beer or water. Let the man suffer and go away.

"Five deaths seem kind of contra-coincidental after the death of Ensign Castor," the Ammatar said, not even looking up.

Officious bastard.

"What do I know of Amarri interests? I'm a bartender" He replied, sweeping his hands as if to showcase the awesomeness of Luci's bar, empty as it was. "They heard of the goings on, and came by to poke their noses in. They stayed too long, didn't listen to the public warning system, and died."

The Ammatar continued to takes notes.

"One of the pilots was following a suspected terrorist, or maybe a black-marketeer."

Zayard shrugged. "Ok."

"You don't know anything about that either then?"

"Why would I? I'm a barte.."

"Yes, yes, a bartender. Might I get some water?"

"Fresh out, sorry."

cont...