The Wayward Astronomer: Chapter 16

[Chapter 16]

By the time Hal and Vanir made it back to the cathedral, the day was beginning to transition from afternoon to evening. They walked together down to the “evil rec room” saying little to one another. Hal didn't have anything more to say to Vanir, and he was already beginning to feel the heavy onset of fatigue even though the day was yet to be finished. As they approached the room, they were met with the sounds of an argument. To Hal's familiar ear, it was definitely Miri's voice.

“How the hell is this funny to you, Marcus!?” They stepped inside the room to find Marcus lounging comfortably on one of the couches, watching the news on a large wall-mounted data scroll. Miri was standing in front of him, just barely to the side of his view of the screen. She gestured pointedly with one hand towards the broadcast.

“Just look at them. They have no clue at all. The blind informing the blinded.” Marcus was unphased by her outrage.

Hal turned his attention to the screen, where a grainy image seemed to show a government building billowing dark smoke from a gaping hole in one side as fire crews continued the long fight to extinguish the lingering smolders. From the architecture, it looked like it was a fire in Kojiki district, the next district over from Theophanies, to the east. The little scrolling info bar overlaid on the bottom of the screen confirmed his suspicions.

One of the usual talking heads continued his explanation next to the looping images that were being broadcast. “The fire crews have nearly finished putting out the blaze that started earlier this afternoon at a safety trooper training facility in Kojiki district. We have no reports of any deaths, but authorities at the scene say several trainees and facility staff are still missing and have not been accounted for. Initial reports lay blame on an accidental munitions release, leading to cascading detonations as it set fire to the rest of the weapon's warehouse.”

Miri wasn't about to relent. Despite her clear hostility, Marcus' small band of henchmen didn't move to restrain her, and merely kept a close eye on her actions. “What, do you know something about this?” She shook her head. “People probably died in that explosion! It's not something to laugh at!”

“Am I supposed to cry over a couple troopers dying? They're hardly my friends.” Marcus smiled, a smug sense of satisfaction apparent in his eyes.

“We take you now to an emergency press conference with Representative Nobuteru Kataoka of Kojiki district.”

The screen switched from looping footage to a live feed of a politician standing in front of a podium dotted with microphones. An aging but very well dressed crane rested his wings on either side of the dias, leaning close the the microphones. “My fellow citizens. Today marks a difficult tragedy in our district, as many of our brave troopers have been consumed by this blaze. Troopers who risk their very lives to keep us all safe.” The flash of cameras and the sounds of shutters clicking punctuated the silence between remarks. “Risk is always part of the job for these courageous men and women, but that does not mean they should bear the burden of unnecessary danger when they are in the safe confines of their barracks.” Kataoka straightened himself, his voice taking on a more aggressive edge. “Unfortunately, this makes the failings of the current administration far too clear. Our civil servants struggle to maintain peace with outdated and unreliable equipment. Dangerous even, if not properly handled.” The politician grimaced. “Three times now the Viscount has received bills on his desk to approve funding for new equipment and renovated facilities here in Kojiki. Three times, he has vetoed the bill, claiming that Norvondire (of all places!) was in more dire need of supplemental funding. I say to you, that this willful neglect is no longer acceptable! I say-”

The data scroll winked off, fading back to an unlit, transparent display. Hal and Vinir's arrival was finally noticed.

“Hal!” Miri and Marcus called out to him in unison, their voices interweaving strangely.  Hers more relieved, his more eager. Marcus rose from the couch, walking quickly behind in the wake that Miri left as she rushed to his side.

“Are you ok?” Miri looked more concerned then he expected. He nodded tiredly. As he opened his mouth to speak, Marcus interrupted with his own more forceful question. “Did you find it!?”

“We did.”

Vanir's silky voice offered an explanation faster than Hal could. “It's somewhere inside Calypsa District University. Hal says it's somewhere on the fourth floor.” She paused only for a split second. “I think he's telling the truth; I could sense its pull when we were close.”

“The fourth floor?” Miri adjusted her glasses. “That's where the earth science labs are.”

“Excellent!” Marcus was thrilled; anticipation and energy colored his voice in bright, expectant hues. “We're already getting our agents to trickle back in from all around the city. We'll be ready to put the new meteor to use immediately once we retrieve it. We go tonight.”

“Wait.” It was Miri who interrupted. “What's the date today?”

Hal shrugged. Vanir tilted her head. “Friday, the 30th.”

“Hal, you can't go tonight! The earth-sci department has that faculty-student stargazing party thing the last Friday of every month. There'll be people there all night long!”

Marcus frowned, not too happy that anyone was offering a reason for not immediately venturing out to seize the meteor.

“It wouldn't do very well if we were detected breaking in, would it?” Vanir asked, the words were more a statement than a question. “Plus, I'm pretty sure the Archbishop has a service to attend to tonight.”

Hal could see the frustration beginning to mount inside his brother. He stared daggers at anyone who met his gaze, including Vanir. His trio of blade tipped tails seemed to writhe and bob with more animation than just moments before. “Let's talk in private.”

Marcus and Vanir walked off to the far side of the expansive room, well out of earshot. Though a couple henchmen seemed to still linger nearby, Hal and Miri were effectively forgotten and left to their own devices. She moved closer to him, one hand reaching for his wrist as her deep violet eyes looked up with concern. Warm fingers gently pressed against a vein, feeling for his pulse. “Hal, are you sure you're ok?”

“What?” Hal turned his attention away from watching his brother's quiet but intense argument. “Yeah. I mean, I think so.” He rested much of his weight on his cane. “Why are you so worried?”

“Don't take this the wrong way, but you look terrible. Like you've been awake for days.” Hal blinked. “Come on, let's sit down.”

She guided him over to the nearby couch and sat him down. Hal couldn't help but sigh a little bit in relief as the supple upholstery molded itself around his weight. Miri sat next to him, reluctantly releasing her touch from his arm. “I do feel pretty tired.” Hal closed his eyes for a moment, allowing his muscles to relax. “It's funny, because I actually ended up sleeping for most of the groundcar ride back from Calypsa.”

Miri didn't seem to find the news heartening at all. “How much did you use your power?”

Hal shrugged, the gesture somehow less pronounced now that he was sitting down. He opened his eyes again and stared out at the inactive wall-scroll. “In total, maybe fifteen minutes? It was a lot of off and on. Very...” Hal wasn't sure how to describe the sensation of snapping back and forth between his enhanced senses. “It was very difficult.” He scratched at his chest. “There's too much pressure out there. Too much noise.”

“Do you feel tired when you use your power?”

She sounded like she already knew the answer. Hal provided it anyway. “No, I feel great. My leg doesn't hurt. It's almost like I have more energy. Sort of like an endorphin rush combined with an electric buzz.”

Miri frowned, silently collating the data. One hand rested on his shoulder. “Its sounds, and it looks, like your power doesn't give you more energy at all. Well, no, that's wrong.” She rephrased her hypothesis. “Rather, energy isn't created for free. You're just borrowing it; like a short term energy loan, you end up paying back more afterwards than you originally gained.”

The analogy seemed to make a lot of sense. In fact, Miri may have been right on. Her face appeared close in front of his, her hands on both shoulders now. “Hal. You can't keep using your power like this. It looks...” She didn't seem to want to say the words that followed. “It looks like it's actually killing you.”

Hal felt that he had always known this, from the moment that Mordecai showed him that x-ray. He hated it, yet also a part of him felt like he had already resigned himself to the inevitability of it. To see Miri discover the same truth, however, left him feeling emptier than he ever felt before. “It's not that easy, Miriel.”

“Please, Hal. You need to promise me.” Her voice wavered a little. “I can't watch you be destroyed, slowly, in front of my eyes like this...”

Hal wanted to find some comforting words, some easy line to dispel the fear that gripped them both. But he didn't know if any such words existed. If they did, they were eluding him. He wasn't sure how quickly the meteor was destroying him, or if things would change if he never used his power again, but one thing he did know: There was not enough time in his world anymore. It couldn't be spent carelessly.

“Miri, I...” He hesitated. A thousand different lines could complete that sentence:

I want to live.
I love you.
I'm sorry.

His heart wanted to blurt them all out at once, but his courage faltered. He blinked and swallowed, finding it once again and holding onto it. She had been waiting for his answer for far too long.

“Are we interrupting something?” Vanir's voice ambushed him from behind, startling him with its rude and altogether impossibly inconvenient timing.

Miri stood, her expression and tone colder than a Starfall gust of stinging snow. “Did you finish your discussion?”

“We did.” Marcus appeared to be back to his usual self. Whatever words were said or promises made between the two, they were no longer in conflict of opinion. “We're going to take the meteor back tomorrow night. We can't afford to reveal ourselves prematurely, and it will be less risky tomorrow.” Vanir smiled, sliding in close to Marcus as he did all the talking. “You should get plenty of rest. It looks like you could use it. Tomorrow will be a big day for us all.”

Hal stood, steadying his weight with Miri's help. He was angry at their sudden reappearance, and turned that into the fuel for his demand. “One thing first.” His tail curled in close around Miri in an unconscious protective gesture. “If you want me to go back, Miri is coming with us.”

“What?” Marcus didn't take kindly to the sudden demand. “That wasn't the agreement.”

“It is now.” Hal forged ahead. “She knows the university better than any of us here, and I won't let you keep her locked away in your secret little base like some bargaining chip. We both go, or neither one of us goes.”

Marcus started to get enraged again, but Vanir quelled it partially with a squeeze of his shoulder. She gave Hal a serious, no-nonsense stare. “You wouldn't happen to be planning to do anything... reckless... would you?”

“If you hold to your side of the agreement, so will I. Everyone still wins. You get your meteor, and we get to walk away.” Hal's smirked. “Or, you can just shoot us both now, and look through every single office, lab, closet, and desk drawer on the fourth floor of CDU. Assuming the meteor isn't moved somewhere else by then.”

A tense silence marked time for a couple of heartbeats before Marcus responded. “Fine.” He pointed one sharp talon at Hal's chest. “But don't make me regret this, Hal. You're far too bold for your own good.”

“I wonder where we get it from...”

Marcus harrumphed and stormed off quickly, leaving Vanir to linger. Her guard seemed to be on high alert. “Don't make me regret this either, hero. One mistake can change everything in an instant. You would do well to remember that.” She nodded to a pair of celestial henchmen, who dutifully responded to her summons. “I think you two should call it in early night, rather than stay up and cause more trouble. These fine gentlemen will bring you back to your room.”

* * *

When the door shut behind them, back in the same small room they shared before, Miri finally spoke up. “Spirits, Hal! What was that all about!?” It was as if she had been holding her breath through every second until they were alone.

Hal wiped his face blearily. “With you trapped in here, there's no way you can escape unless Marcus allows it. If you come with us, you might be able to slip away and break free in the middle of things.”

“But what about you?”

“I'll cover you as best I can. Marcus won't kill me. He might be a egotistical prick, but we're still brothers. Besides, once he has the meteor, I don't think he'll care anymore.”

Miri sighed. “That sounds like a pretty weak plan.”

Hal started to unzip the jacket he had been wearing all this time. “Look. Worst case we just behave ourselves, get that damned rock, and then finish the deal like before. I don't know if he'll abide by his word, but that's exactly why escaping is plan A.”

He threw his jacket over towards the desk, sighing in relief of some weight being shed off of his shoulders. Miri gasped in surprise all of a sudden.

“Hal!” She caught herself, lowering her voice as not to attract the attention of the guards that surely stood guard outside their door. It was a loud, alarmed whisper. “Since when did you get a pistol!”

His jacket removed, the shoulder holster he wore was now visible, along with the two-shot pistol Jonny had lent him. Hal was so accustomed to wearing it now, he didn't think about it. “Does Marcus know you have it!?”

“Yes, though, it's never come up again. I think either he forgot that I'm armed, or none of them consider it a big enough threat to address.” He pulled the weapon from the holster to show it to Miri. “It only holds two shots, and it's slower to reload than the fancier magazine-fed versions. There are a lot more people to fight through than I have shots.”

“Where did you get that?” Miri seemed almost afraid of the weapon. Unlike Hal, she hadn't lived a life around less-than-legal citizens where black market weaponry was a real thing. Hal popped the breech open and unloaded the bullets, rendering the weapon safe.

“An old friend lent it to me.” He held it out sideways, non-threateningly. “Here. You should learn how to use it.”

“What? No, I've never held a gun before in my life! Besides, I could never shoot someone Hal. That's terrible.”

“Miri.” Hal didn't have the energy to be impatient. Instead, he calmly talked her through it all.“I know you don't want to shoot anyone. I hope you never have to.” He stole a quick glance at the door to their cell. “But you've seen what these people are capable of. They'll kill without hesitation. If things go wrong, you might need to use a springer to protect yourself.” Hal frowned. “A firefight is the last place you or I want to be, but it's one of those things that you never get a second chance at.” He let his gaze look deep into her own frightened eyes.  “You either make it... or you don't.”

Miri reluctantly approached Hal and the outstretched weapon, hesitant fingers closing around the grip. As Hal pulled his hands away, the pistol dropped several inches. She was unprepared for the heft of it, but adjusted quickly. “Ok... just give me the basics.”

Hal did his best to find his weight beneath him as he used both hands to help her through the tutorial. Without his cane, his knee protested loudly, sending sharp rivulets of pain through his nerves. He tiredly but patiently explained the different features: how the bullets were loaded, how the safety worked, how she had to cock the hammer between each shot. She listened quietly, letting Hal demonstrate. She didn't appear to enjoy the process the same way an eager boy might, but she seemed to understand the importance of it, and took it seriously with her usual concentrated focus.

“Ok.” Hal stepped back and fell heavily onto the end of the bed, letting his leg rest. “Go ahead and practice shooting at the wall.”  Her concerned glance looked unwilling. “Don't worry. It's not loaded. Nothing is going to happen.”

She nodded, turning slightly and taking aim at an invisible point on the wall. She held the pistol with both hands like he showed her, pulled the hammer back with her thumb, then flinched forward as she attempted to pull the trigger. “It's not working.”

“The safety.”

“Oh.” She belatedly clicked the button over to the not-safe position and tried again. She still flinched quite a bit, but the hammer dutifully cycled forward, slamming into the firing pin with an audible click.

“See? It's easy. The trigger is light once the hammer is cocked. Try not to flinch. Nice and smooth is all you need.”

She handed the pistol back to Hal, eager to be rid of it. “Alright, but I think you should hold onto it still. I don't want a gun.”

“Fair enough.” He took it back and carefully loaded it with bullets, setting the safety before returning it to the holster.  Once it was done, he leaned back heavily, an obvious sigh of relief escaping his lungs as he tried to relax again. Fatigue was the closer companion again tonight, and in the war of that day he was losing the battle to keep his eyes open.

“You look tired Hal.”

“I know.” His tail nodded. “I am.” Hal let out a long, drawn out breath.

“I know it's early, but I think you should just sleep. You need your energy for tomorrow.”

“I think you're right about that.” Hal didn't argue. He worked his way down to a horizontal position, heavy head sinking deep into the pillow. It felt so good to lie down, Hal wasn't sure if he would ever have the will to stand up again. He could already feel his consciousness begin to slip slowly away into merciful sleep.

“Hey Hal?”

“Mmmm?” He couldn't muster the willpower to open his eyes.

“Thank you.”

He felt the tender, gentle touch of her lips on his cheek, as she kissed him goodnight. He didn't have the time to ask why she was thanking him, or to even appreciate the kiss, before his mind slipped the last bond of awakening and fell down into a deep, dark, and welcome rest...

[End Chapter 16]