ZETA

Zeta hated camping. Specifically, he disliked sleeping outdoors. His classmates would always pull pranks on him, stuffing insects into his bedroll while he was unconscious on the grassy knoll. It’s why he developed arachnophobia. They didn’t use a regular spider, either. They just had to find the palm-sized, eight-legged, orange striped, poisonous Hellion Spider, probably the only one on all of Axle Island.

None of them knew that the spider’s bite could disintegrate flesh within minutes. Zeta was lucky the thing was docile, even though the image of that fiend’s eyes burned vividly into his memory. When Sir Kagan learned of their ‘friendly joke,’ he made sure that Zeta’s classmates didn’t skip a beat as they ran the steep of the mountain three consecutive times. The pranks never returned, and Sir Kagan banned them from going anywhere more than a kilometer from the mountain’s base. Until the night he passed, that is.

Sir Kagan…

Regardless, Zeta was sleeping in the wind. Hera had made it adamantly clear that he had ‘lost his privileges’ to the suite ever since that harmless joke. She ensured the balcony’s crimson drapes were tied shut. Her erratic, cattle prod touch had bruised his eyelids, and he struggled with the weight of keeping them open.

The balcony was not wide enough for a man of his height to lay down in, so he sat on the rail, rested his head against the wall and balanced himself on the thin guard. It was decent practice. Thrilling, with the stake of his life hanging over his head if he messed up. That was true peace, the acceptance of death, not that Zeta had any plans to die in the near future.

Two circles enlightened the night sky, one white and the other a shade of reddened rust. The twin moons, Dracos and Koios, orbited close together, shaped like the Eastern Shelf symbol Sir Kagan once showed him. He forgot its name but remembered it represented balance. The moons were so far away that their position in the sky never changed. The vantage from that balcony was the same as the summit of Greenwich. He wondered if someone was viewing them from there too.

Greenwich. Sir Kagan. Zeta was nightsick, where deep emotions and memories rose to the surface because he was both tired and too exhausted to sleep.

A breeze swept across the streets below, and the draft rose to glide across Zeta’s skin. Black Meridian, unhooked from his belt and leaning at his side, shivered as the air crossed it. He steadied the sensitive blade with his hand and smiled. It was here with him now, in his hands, in his protection, and in return, Sir Kagan’s spirit would be there to protect him from the outdoors he despised to sleep in.

Zeta analyzed the tops of the palms of the Atman Bolo oasis, and then he began to laugh at himself. What was he? Stupid? He was an adult now; nature would not hurt him.

Atman Bolo, this desert paradise, could not harm a living soul. Zeta let his eyes shut, and then they didn’t open until morning.

His skin was a degree tanner, and Zeta’s eyes were singed by the bright glare of the desert sun. After shaking off the initial shock, a few more stars on the balcony caught his eyes with their glimmer.

Zeta smiled when his eyes returned to focus. Two shining crystals, gray and green, rested on the rail aside a small yellow note. He picked it up.

For getting us through the desert…

-H

“Read,” Zeta said with both sigmas in his hands. One was of the ten in the Standard Set, the only sigmas of that grade. Pocket Inventory, like the little rift Hera opened when she wanted to store something. He could hear her voice in his head, saying ‘take care of your own crap.’

The other sigma was one he did not recognize, not among his allies nor his foes. Taser, an Elementary Lightning sigma. The only possibility was that they pulled it from the Lilick Brothers whose lives he advocated for. It was a frightening prospect to know that not every foe would use every sigma in their arsenal during an encounter. That, or maybe they just didn’t get the chance to use them. Zeta smirked.

He employed both. As usual, the sigmas shattered without resistance in his hands, the glittering specks of the former crystals melting into thin air.

Zeta entered the suite through the now-loosened drapes. Everything was immaculate as if no soul had touched the room in weeks except to clean it. After reassuring himself that he had not somehow entered the wrong room, he noticed another paper note on the door handle.

Went to meet Jerine and Clementine. We are going to the Bazaar. Don’t follow me. Look for work.

-H

His heart sank. There were most likely sigmas in that market, and he despised the idea of missing out on perusing them. Zeta sighed. It didn’t matter, he had some Divinity to accumulate anyway.

Recalling what Clementine said yesterday, he opened the bed’s footlocker and retrieved a familiar bronze statue. The Angel of Valeri. Her hands were clasped together, eyes shut. Her wings curved into a thin, tall heart behind her spine and neck. Flowing curly hair split them. She wore nothing but a plain tunic, the wrinkles in the fabric detailed to every blemish. Overall, it was nothing impressive, and Zeta didn’t understand what gave this statue more power than any other.

He placed it upright on the footlocker and kneeled before it. The sounds of the street were muffled, leaving the room in a tranquil silence. Perfect for meditation, a practice that Sir Kagan had taught him to clear his head. When he saw Hera in Prayer, he assumed it was the same thing. Meditation never worked in clearing Zeta’s head, but if it supposedly had a divine connection, he was all for it.

He shut his eyes, and there was a buzzing in his ears. His heart jumped, and his prayer broke immediately.

Zeta broke into a clammy sweat but brushed it off as nothing. However, when he tried to return to Prayer, he felt nothing but satisfaction. What?

He looked at his palm to Read his own score. Once again, it had filled to completion, and his Prayer was gathering Excess.

“Display,” he said, envisioning the Taser sigma. After refreshing himself on its activation and other conditions, he found nothing to explain the mysterious accumulation.

With his index and little fingers extended, Zeta said, “Taser,” and a charge of lightning connected the two digits. He could feel it, crackling harmlessly against his skin in a vivid, bright blue of danger. His hand twitched with the electrical stimulation.

Zeta celebrated to himself. He was alone, but he didn’t care. On Greenwich, sigmas were left entirely to his imagination, based solely on the hints of Sir Kagan. In Aspic, they became a reality, actual, tangible superpowers. Both times, they were awesome to behold.

JORN VAGOS, Operative of Aspic (former)

Vagos’s head erupted from the fresh, cold waters of the oasis’s spring. Why is it so damn hot!

That should have been an obvious question. The desert of the Western Shelf was far more prone to heat waves than the rest of the world. Still, Vagos never felt like his body would adjust. Every day his soul was simmering.

His Superior Swimmer sigma had carried him across the sea from Aspic, but that sigma was not designed for such a long passage, and Vagos wished he considered that before taking a plunge in Aspic. Stupid, stupid! They were just artillery shots, you fool! Since Aspic was dying, he had grown eager to leave under any excuse possible. That motive suppressed his sense of rationality.

To make matters worse, the first bit of land was nothing but sand. Vagos was lucky he knew where the nearest settlement, a pristine oasis smacked in the middle of the desert, and for the fact that he was a Liquid focus. Arid lands, the antithesis of everything his powerset stood for.

He climbed out of the spring and returned to the palm where his cloak and clothes lay freshly washed of sand. Another brown cloak leaned idly against the palm trunk, her grin wide as she stared at his bare white figure.

“My, my, Vagos. You certainly don’t disappoint in the finer things in life,” she said, biting her lip.

Everything in Vagos clenched tight. The hairs on his head and beard stiffened like pine needles. “Of course you would find me now of all times,” he said, donning the light clothes and padding the Pentagon assigned to their operatives. He picked up his badge, a small metal square engraved with a diamond and five short vertical lines in its center, and stuck it on his belt. The badge was a tiresome chore to carry around, but it was needed for an Operative to verify themselves with others, and it was meant to be concealed at all costs. Unfortunately, it wasn’t needed for dealing with this woman, because she and Vagos had crossed paths one too many times before.

Vagos scoffed. “I arrived here several days ago, Elana, and I looked everywhere for you. Now you show your face?”

Her thin lips wired together with the slightest flinch. “Jorn, dear, you’re an Operative. It’s quite shameful if you couldn’t manage to find a simple hideout. Or maybe you want to admit you’re not as good as you think you are.”

“Not a chance, bitch.”

She stifled her laugh. Her two-pronged tail wagged wildly in the wind. In every sense of the word, Elana Kortikar acted like a dog and a rabid one at that. “Although, I am curious as to why you’re here. Did you come all this way to visit me? I think I’m quite the vacation.”

“You can’t possibly know that. If the man is sleeping, he can’t give you his opinion.”

“Give me some credit, Jorn. They weren’t sleeping, they were dead.”

Vagos cringed. “You disgust me.” If he had more empathy is his system, he would hurl into the bushes, but that meant admitting he was weak. Not a chance, not for her. Elana didn’t deserve a dime more of his attention than any other Operative. If anything, she deserved less.

“Well, if you’re not here for a ‘special encounter,’ then I’ll assume it’s because of that nasty business in Aspic.”

“So you heard?”

“This oasis isn’t on the edge of the world, Jorn. The Disciples want to speak to you.”

“I know they do, and I need your Transmitter. I have my report for the Pillar of the Mind, and I’d like to deliver it before she gets angry with me.”

She raised a mocking eyebrow, her eyes masking mischief. “I don’t see why I should care about your standing in our little society.”

Vagos strode forth, a finger in her face, centimeters from the bridge of her nose. Spit foamed from his mouth. “Because if you don’t, the Operative of Atman Bolo is going to need an emergency replacement. I don’t have time for your games, Elana.” His Chilling Presence was activated at full blast. Unfortunately, so was hers. They canceled out.

She didn’t flinch. Elana’s grin grew wider. “Making threats? You’ve grown desperate. Don’t pretend to be something you’re not. The Operative of Atman Bolo is an innocent spy minding her own business and doing her job. It’s the Operative of Aspic whose in deep shit right now. Remember that.”

Vagos’s finger curled back into his clenched fist. He took several steps back into the shade of the palm trees. “What do you want?”

“I’ll lend you the Transmitter, but I want your assistance in hatching a little plot of my own. You see, there’s someone in Atman Bolo who I would just love to wrap my tail around.”

Vagos glanced up. He had heard rumors of people disappearing in the oasis, and a part of his heart told him he was about to receive the answer. “I’m listening.”

Taser - Lightning: Creates a high-voltage charge between the user’s fingers that can quickly incapacitate a foe. (115).

(A) Extend the index and little fingers on the user’s hand. Taser can be used with both hands simultaneously.