“Well, what do you remember?” Serenity hoped Rissa would come up with something useful. He didn’t really want to fight Lykandeon, even with a plan. He wasn’t certain what the plan was; obviously it depended on Ita, but he hadn’t thought about what she’d be doing while he was fighting and the vision didn’t cover the plan.
Rissa’s vision was probably similar, the action in the moment but no reflection on how she got there. That would explain her frustration.
Rissa sighed. “We went to Aeon. Rourke met us when we got there.”
“It was High Priestess Karin in my vision. She had very mixed emotions; you and Blaze are right about her.” Serenity figured he’d fill in the differences. This vision hadn’t taken nearly as long as the previous ones, after all.
Rissa nodded. “I was pretty confident. She didn’t meet with us until the following day, but we mostly dealt with Rourke. He helped us find as many of the missing as we could; the only ones he couldn’t find were the ones who’d gone through something he called Separation. We sent over four thousand people back to Earth, so we probably found everyone who was possible to find and still alive.”
Serenity had to nod at that. Four thousand people was more than he’d really expected to find on Lyka after everything he’d heard from Helen, never mind what Rourke had said when they first met.
“Rourke asked for a favor to pay him back for all the help he gave us; it seemed reasonable, so we agreed. I think it was also supposed to be some measure of punishment for the kidnappings. The mission was pretty simple; we just had to attack a specific place on Lyka at a specific time. I remember that much, but I don’t remember why even though I’m pretty sure I knew.” Rissa leaned against Serenity and put an arm around him again.
“The soldiers bled green instead of red even though they looked human.” Rissa shivered. “They were mindless. They fought like they were people, but there wasn’t anyone behind their eyes. They coordinated like they were talking all the time or maybe there was a single mind behind them all. We were winning, but then everything turned green and I was here again.”
“Why do we keep running into mind control of one form or another?” Serenity grumbled. He didn’t remember so much of it from his time as Vengeance then the Final Reaper, unless you counted controlling undead. If you counted that, then he was probably running into it less.
Rissa shrugged. “Control works when persuasion doesn’t, I guess.”
Serenity nodded. “Mine was shorter than yours. I’m not sure how or why I got there, but I fought the Church’s deity one on one. I took down his shield then yelled for Ita to do something and everything turned green just like your vision. I don’t know if we won or not.”
Rissa frowned and seemed to concentrate. “Now that you mention it, I don’t remember Ita being at that fight. You were there, you were in front, but I don’t remember Ita there. Do you think she did whatever the green thing was?”
Serenity could only shrug. “Could be. It’s something to keep in mind. I think we found some useful stuff out here; how do we leave?”
The green sky was creepy and Serenity was more than ready to leave.
“Let go,” Rissa answered. “It’s pretty simple.”
Serenity didn’t find it simple, but they eventually got out.
They spent the rest of the time Blaze was unconscious planning. Serenity and Rissa had learned more than expected in the trip to the Timestream; while it made the decision to head to Aeon easy, since it was the only option that led to returning people to Earth, nothing else was easy.
The green at the end of both Aeon visions was the same green as the beam weapons, the mindless soldiers’ blood, and Lyka’s core; no one believed it was a coincidence, but they couldn’t agree on what it meant. Serenity was convinced the beam weapons were made at the underground facility. The soldiers were probably also connected to it, but the green glow at the end of the vision was unexplained as was its link to Ita.
They also weren’t sure why the beam weapons only showed up in one of the three visions of Abiding One. Clearly someone had done something to delay them but it wasn’t clear what.
What was clear was that High Priestess Karin and Rourke were both not only willing but eager to work against the Church and could help with Serenity’s top two goals for the situation, recovery of the kidnapped and appropriate punishment of those responsible. They were both on Aeon, so that was where they were all going to go.
Everything else they’d learned would be remembered and considered as they figured out where to go from there. Serenity wasn’t interested in taking any work from Juka, but she was still a good contact in case he needed to farm some work out. He’d have to be careful about what he handed her, but with what she’d given Rissa it was clear that she was happy to find people to work against the Church.
Serenity would also keep Lyka’s World Core in mind. He was sickened when he thought of mining it for power, but it was clear that that was happening. He wasn’t blind to the fact that Ita could talk to it and had convinced it that the Church was hurting it, but he wasn’t sure what else to do yet.
When Blaze opened his eyes, he was sore, hungry, and thirsty. It was normal after a multi-day harad, an abandoned body only mostly shut down, but it was never fun. This harad was longer than average, even for him, because of how hurt Ekari was. Even so, he was nowhere near the limit; he’d be fine with a little time, care, and perhaps a little healing.
Ekari was, of course, sitting next to him. He’d had to get her there in order to move back into his own body. “How are you?”
Blaze tried to sit up. It was embarrassing, but Ekari had to help him; he wasn’t weak, but even a few days without moving at all were enough to make him horribly stiff. “I’ll be fine. It just takes a little time to recover.” He started to try to get out of bed, but Ekari blocked him. “I have to move. It’s the best way to recover and anyway I need water, food, and a restroom.”
Ekari scooted out of the way then stood up. She watched as he painfully slowly made it to his feet. “Are you going to make it on your own? Can I help?”
Blaze felt a little unsteady, but he was certain he could make it until he took his first step. Fortunately, Ekari caught him when his knee locked up and he started to lose his balance. “Maybe I could use a little help.”
He told himself that it was a good excuse to spend some time with Ekari. For all that he’d been with her continuously for the past several days, it wasn’t the same. He should talk to her; that was what he was missing, after all. Wasn’t it? “How are you feeling?”
Ekari giggled. “Isn’t that what I should be asking you?”
Blaze started to shrug, but there was no way he could make it work while Ekari was supporting him. “You already did? I want to know if you’re experiencing anything that means I missed something.” Whether that something was preexisting or something he’d done to her, Blaze wanted to know so he could fix it.
“I’m fine.” Ekari didn’t even think about it. “I’m definitely fine. Not only do I feel better than I remember feeling in a long time, the Voice agrees that I’m fine.”
Blaze blinked. “What?”
“I had a Path to free myself. It finished shortly before you said you were done.” Ekari’s grin was obvious in the corner of Blaze’s eye. “I haven’t checked yet, so I don’t know if I have a Tier Four available, but I expect I do. I don’t want to look, because I don’t want to be tempted. I want to stay at Tier Three for now. Mother knows what Tier Four means; she knows that’s where the Priesthood Paths appear. She’s always wanted me to take one so that she could initiate me as a Priest of the Church of Aeons.”
Ekari’s smile dimmed as she spoke.
“Are you certain that was what she wanted and not a warning that that was what would happen if you weren’t careful?” Blaze stopped and reached for the door handle. They’d made it to the restroom; clearly, Ekari had guessed what he needed the most. “I can take it from here; I can use the wall for balance. I’ll see you when I get out.”
Ekari’s first words when Blaze left the restroom were not entirely unexpected, given the question he’d left her with. “Can you heal her the same way you healed me?”
Blaze took a deep breath as he reached out to Ekari for help with balance. Yes, that was why he was reaching out to hold her close; it couldn’t possibly be because he wanted to comfort her. He knew he was lying to himself, but if he admitted the truth, he’d have to push her away. The fact that she hadn’t already run from a diehar was amazing enough; there was no way he could ask more of her.
The question was harder than it sounded. Most relevantly, after this harad it would be a long time before he was ready for another; this one had strained him and he needed to recover. Normally, he’d welcome the strain; this time, it might be inconvenient. It wasn’t something he could just heal away. “It depends on her, on how much she wants it. I think she does; Rissa thinks she does. We could be wrong. Even if we’re right, it’ll be difficult and long. I won’t be in harad, so I’ll have to heal from the outside. That’ll slow it down, but the bigger piece is that she’s clearly been more affected than you were. We’d also have to keep her away from Lykandeon for the entire time; he might notice something.”
Ekari shook her head. “Not a chance. He doesn’t actually pay attention to people as long as they seem to do what he says.”
How could anyone run a planet that way, much less two?
Blaze didn’t want to know. He suspected that the twisting effect on the Eternal Church’s Priests was a large part of the answer. That was something that Blaze actually did understand; he was diehar and he’d been raised diehar. That meant he’d been raised as someone who anyone outside his community was afraid of. Diehar were spies and assassins even when there were no worse rumors; that was reason enough to avoid them. The allure of being able to make people like you and want to do whatever you wanted was easy to understand.
Once they reached the dining area, Blaze gratefully slid into a chair. He was going to be spending a lot of the next day doing all sorts of exercises, and walking was the first one. At first, he wouldn’t be able to make it very far, but his range would extend quickly. He was already recovering his balance; he just wasn’t letting Ekari know that yet. If he did, she might leave.
A glass of water appeared in front of Blaze, placed there by his friend. Ekari started rummaging through the stuff they had sitting out to make something quick and easy. “While you’re eating, I should tell you what happened while you were busy. I don’t know if you knew or not, but Rissa’s a sibyl…”
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