“Madam President?” A male voice interrupted President Gassinthea Mila Tylio’s thoughts where she sat at her desk in her office. Around her, the ten large screens showing all sides of the vast spaceship Pathfinder gave the illusion of viewports. Pathfinder consisted of twenty-one cubes, each holding approximately 100,000 individuals on their way to their new homeplanet, P-105.
“Yes, Commander?” Thea said and leaned back in her chair.
“We have to leave for the ceremony in half an hour, but…once again we cannot persuade Caya Lindemay to follow your orders.”
Of course. Thea sighed inwardly but merely nodded to the burly man in the doorway. It was rather ironic that a man his size and with his commanding presence couldn’t make a petite young girl join in the awaiting festivities. “I’ll talk to her.”
“Thank you, sir. And as I said, we need to leave in thirty.”
“I hear you, Commander.” Thea stood and adjusted her ceremonial robe. “I’ll see you at the presidential jumper. Dismissed.”
The commander looked quite relieved that Thea would approach Caya herself and strode down the corridor toward the gate where they would board the presidential jumper car ready to take them to the park area. The jumpers consisted of a multitude of huge cylinders crisscrossing the twenty-one cubes, transporting people where they needed to go. The presidential ones were fortified to sustain anything but a black-garnet attack, or so the specs claimed.
Thea left her office and locked the door with her security code and retinal scan. She hurried to the far end of the corridor, where her presidential suite was located next to her main cabinet members’ quarters. She had stopped in front of a door and raised her hand to the chime, when she had to stop and take a deep breath. Caya Lindemay had been under house arrest in the luxurious guest quarters for more than six months. She could leave them only while escorted by the presidential guards, which didn’t sit well with the young changer. Their discussions regarding this matter had grown increasingly heated.
The door hissed open, and Thea stood eye to eye with the apparition that was Caya. Slender, ethereal, and with her waist-long blond hair flowing around her shoulders as if it were weightless, she scanned Thea very carefully with transparent turquoise eyes.
“I see you’re off to the naming ceremony. Have fun.” Caya stood with her hands on her hips. “If you’re here for a security update, I can tell you I don’t see any malicious intent happening there.” She turned to leave and the door began to slide shut, but Thea put her hand out, which triggered the sensors and reopened it. To her surprise, Caya had instantly turned around and pressed a hand on the sensor. If Thea didn’t know any better, she’d have sworn Caya had reacted with instinctive protectiveness.
“I want you to join me. Us.” Thea inspected Caya’s clothes. “You don’t even have to change.” Caya was dressed in a white-embroidered light-blue caftan over white slacks.
“Letting me out for good behavior? That can’t be right. I’m barely able to be civil to you these days. So why?” Caya tilted her head. “Let me see. I don’t have my sister’s knack for clairvoyance, but I can bet you want me there to smooth the waves. Try to show me off as a harmless little girl and make the Oconodians and Gemosians see that I’m not going to burst into flames or throw plasma spheres at them. Or—oh yes—or you think my being there will take the brunt of everyone’s speculations about what happened between you and Hadler, your lovely ex-spouse.”
Thea flinched. She couldn’t stop it. The mention of her former husband who had made her private life a living hell for so many years, said with such spite by the young woman before her, was like a blow to her midsection.
“Thea.” Suddenly pale, Caya lowered her hands to her side. She looked very young and also tremendously tired at the same time. “I’m sorry. That was uncalled for, no matter what.” The huskiness of her voice showed how the stress and sorrow over the long incarceration was taking a toll on her.
“I suppose you assume I deserve whatever harsh words you fling at me.” Thea’s back was rigid now; she was trembling and could only hope her lifelong training made her reaction invisible. She had aimed for greatness from the age of ten, when her father saw her potential as a leader. This ambition had taken her on different paths, some rewarding, some heartbreaking. And some of the heartbreak had seemed to happen over time, like fate had chipped away at her soul little by little until one day she would wake up and find most of it gone.
“No.” Caya sighed and ran a hand over her face. “That’s a lie. I do have moments when I think you deserve horrible things for keeping me locked up in this…this golden cage. I’m going crazy in here. Yes, Briar comes by almost every day. As does Adina. Since they became officially betrothed, at least I don’t have to worry so much for Briar. Meija and Korrian visit too. And some of the Vantressa family when they can sneak past their megalomaniac matriarch. How she can be Adina’s mother, I don’t know. So I’m not lonely that way.”
“But you’re still a prisoner.”
“And I did nothing wrong!” Caya held out her hand, anguish now written over her face. “You—you say you keep me here because threats have been made and it’s for my own safety, but, please. Please, Thea. Madam President. I can take care of myself and—”
“No. Don’t ask me. I will not be responsible for any changer-hating individual taking your life.” Stirrings of sheer nausea at the thought of anyone snuffing out this precious girl’s existence due to stupid fear made Thea sound harsher than she intended.
“All right.” Going very still, Caya closed her hands into tight fists. “Will my sister be there?”
“Yes. She and all your friends are invited to the presidential box.”
Caya nodded slowly. “Fine. I’ll come. At least I’ll see other people for a bit. Perhaps I’ll get some readings on something useful as well. Who knows?” She stepped into the corridor and the door closed behind her. “What? No guards?”
“The corridor is monitored remotely. They’re only seconds away.” Thea knew she had said Caya could join the naming ceremony as she was, but her hair needed tying back. “You need a hair ribbon.”
“Oh, right. Wait.” Caya pushed her hand into a deep pocket and pulled out a long, dark-blue silk one.
Thea took it from her and motioned for Caya to turn around. She pulled the blond masses of hair back and arranged them into a low ponytail. As she tied the ribbon securely, her fingers tingled at the feeling of the silky strands. A surprisingly spicy scent emanated from Caya’s hair, and this together with her otherworldly beauty made Thea yank her hands back before she dug her fingers deep into the golden treasure.
“There. Good to go.” Thea motioned for Caya to follow as she strode toward the presidential jumper gate.
The guards knew better than to react openly to Caya’s presence. They merely saluted their president and treated Caya like she wasn’t there. As they took their seats, joined by four of the most seasoned presidential guards, Thea had to exhale in relief. She hadn’t enjoyed pulling rank or being subjected to such resentment, but having Caya come with her was yet another step in the right direction. If Caya, as well as her sister Briar, were to have any kind of normal existence when they reached their new homeplanet, the people needed to see them for what they were. Changers, yes. The sisters possessed the mutation that gave them extraordinary powers, but in their case they were harmless to others. Nothing about them was violent or malicious. Instead, they had saved lives and would continue to do so if allowed.
Briar Lindemay was revered already. She was Red Angel, a moniker ordinary people had given her when they knew her as a nurse ready to risk her life for her patients and possessing a level of empathy for them that superseded anything they’d ever known. She was untouchable. They regarded her younger sister Caya, however, as a stowaway changer, which in part was true, but it also meant they feared she hadn’t showed her true self with her full arsenal of powers. The Oconodian people had grown up fearing the violent changers: the ones that spewed fire, threw plasma spheres, altered people’s minds, hypnotized, and created explosions with their powerful minds. Oconodos had eventually become a society ridden with fear and demonstrations, and when the last few years before the Exodus operation to leave the planet to find a new home had commenced, Thea had been forced to issue martial law.
Remembering how she had felt when it turned out the young woman she’d come to take quite an interest in was a changer, Thea closed her eyes briefly. Caya had gone into convulsions during a presidential ball, right there on the dance floor, and foreseen Hadler Tylio’s death in a terror event. Thea had wanted to remove herself from the ballroom and distance herself from the writhing young woman, but she hadn’t been able to move. Instead she had knelt next to Caya and kept her safe until her sister reached them. When it turned out Briar was also a carrier of the changer gene and every bit as powerful as her sister, Thea knew she had reached the point of her presidency that would define her as a person and politician forever.
The jumper stopped, and the loud background noise of excited people slammed into them when the doors opened. Thea stood and followed two of her guards. The others moved in, two steps behind Caya. As they entered the lane leading to the presidential box at the large park area at the center of cube one, Thea felt the usual pull at how beautiful it was. The engineers and botanists had created a real park with actual vegetation and grass. At the center stood a semicircular stage that Thea would soon enter to announce the name of their new homeworld. Protective transparent shields would keep her safe from potential terrorists, but she wasn’t worried about herself. Caya was the true target. Her intelligence officers had confirmed that the chatter among the population hinted that most of them feared her and her abilities.
“How many people have gathered here?” Caya spoke quietly.
“Last estimate, 110,000 including the official cube representatives from the different enclaves. Thea cast a glance forward. “Look. There’s your sister with Adina and Admiral Heigel and her spouse.”
“Meija.” It looked like Caya might forget herself and rush forward to greet her sister and their friends, but she dug her teeth into her lower lip and remained between the guards. “It’s been too long.”
“We’ve all been insanely busy after that last attack. Not finding the culprits in a timely manner—”
“If you’re going to use this moment to twist my arm, I might as well go back.” Caya’s light, transparent eyes fired off lightning bolts. “I can’t force images to appear. How many times…”
“That wasn’t my intention at all. Come on. Let’s join your sister before she leaps over the railing and drags us in.”
As they entered the box, the presidential march played, and the gathered Oconodians and Gemosians stood and sang the ancient lyrics.
Along the path where hills turn into mountains,
Where brooks grow into rivers
And raise the mighty seas,
I dream about the plains of Galamanor
And the colors of the skies
Above the purple beetles’ trees.
As always, the song made Thea momentarily homesick. Yes, for her entire life, the threat of growing numbers of hostile changers had cast its shadow over the Oconodian homeworld, but no other planet could possibly be as devastatingly beautiful. Not to mention how brave its people were. Most of them had never even contemplated entering a spaceship. The military or freighter crews were usually the only ones who traveled in outer space.
Thea continued up onto the stage, where Interim President Bymento of the Gemosians and his wife, Dalanja, met her. He was a sparsely built man, low-key in the way he spoke and carried himself, while Dalanja was exuberant and glamorous. Thea had learned over time that the president’s soft-spoken manners hid an iron will and a brilliant intellect, and his wife was not shallow at all, but sweet and loyal to a fault.
“Mr. President. Mrs. Bymento.”
“Madam President.” The Bymentos greeted her, he cordial and correct, she with obvious warmth. “This is a great day.”
“It is.” Thea motioned to the conductor of the orchestra, and the musicians began to play the Gemosian anthem. Thea hummed along in the ancient Gemosian tongue, as did the vast crowd below the stage. When she glanced at the couple next to her, she saw how Bymento’s features had softened and Dalanja had tears leaking from the corners of her eyes.
“Thank you,” Bymento murmured as the music ended. “I did not expect that.”
“Sir. We’re one people now.” Thea allowed her eyes to fall upon Caya, where she sat with her sister Briar’s arm around her shoulders and Meija Solimar on her other side. The social anthropologist simply patted Caya’s knee and then smiled up at Thea, who could have sworn Meija winked at her.
Thea pulled her self together and, after a deep breath, stepped up to the sound system. “My fellow Oconodians. My friends, the Gemosians. This is a very special day. It’s not a mere naming ceremony, even if it is important what we will call our future home from now on, but in fact, this is the official day when we merge our two people. We will no longer be known as merely Oconodians or Gemosians. As we continue on our journey toward our new homeworld, where we will be met by the advance team that is working so diligently to receive all 2,100, 000 of us, we will do so as one. If and when we face adversaries, we will meet and combat them as one nation. When we reap the fruits of what we sow, we will enjoy them as one. The Oconodians will not be superior because we were originally in the vast majority. Nor will the opposite be said of the Gemosians. From now on, there is no ‘them.’ There is only ‘us.’ We are capable of so much more when we work together side by side.”
Thea looked at her colleague to the left of her. “President Bymento has shown great leadership skills, and until we can hold the first democratic voting procedure on our new homeplanet, he has agreed to act as our vice president.” She held her breath now, waiting for protests to erupt among the Gemosians. When that didn’t happen, she almost lost her train of thought.
“Now the moment has come to reveal the name suggestion that sixty-five percent of you voted for. P-105 will from now on be called Gemocon!”
The park area erupted in cheers, and people stomped and clapped so hard, Thea feared this sound might affect Pathfinder’s course. She smiled, relieved and with a sense of accomplishment, as she had dreaded their respective people would hate the merger of Gemosis and Oconodos. As it turned out, people really did like the name. A new calmness flooded her, and she laughed out loud until her eyes met Caya’s. Then Caya nodded where she sat, still with her head on Briar’s shoulder. Why this gesture made Thea finally relax fully, she wasn’t sure, but if Caya had hated the name, she wouldn’t have been able to.
As the ceremony continued with performances by dancers, singers, and actors, Thea returned to the president’s box with the Bymentos. She sat down just in front of Caya, which she didn’t like at all. Thea wanted to watch her young clairvoyant changer, make sure she didn’t do anything to set off alarms or alert the guards. Instead, she had to sit there, straight and in control, when her entire being was wrapped up in Caya’s scent.
Afraid Briar might inadvertently read her thoughts, Thea used some meditation techniques to empty her mind of thoughts of Caya. She knew Briar, the Red Angel oracle, did not invade someone’s thoughts if she could help it, but she was still perfecting her gift and might stumble into someone’s personal contemplations without meaning to. Thea could not risk Briar discovering just how much time during her waking as well as sleeping hours she had Caya on her mind.