Book 6: Chapter 5 - Twists of Fate (RAW)

The emergence of Esp-actives approximately 76 years ago coincides closely with the catastrophic Second and Third Impacts and the emergence of the dragons. Unlike Meta-human mutations, characterized by physically oriented enhancements, Esp-actives demonstrate pronounced cerebral augmentations. Observations indicate their powers primarily manifest in three categories: 1. telekinesis—manipulation of physical matter without direct interaction; 2. telepathy—ability to transmit and receive thought patterns; and 3. precognition—limited foresight into probable future events. While these mutations appear related to the subsequent arrival of draconic invaders, current evidence remains insufficient to conclusively link the phenomena. Further study is imperative.

- Divergence by Dr. Juno Rath.

They led us onward, not at a sprint, yet never quite allowing the leisurely saunter. Every footfall rang off the angular walls, doubling back as an eerie counter-rhythm that reminded me how alone we really were in this maze of concrete and steel. I refused to let the guards separate Sol from me, more for her sake than my own. I was pretty sure they would think to use her as a hostage should negotiations go south.

A long corridor sloped upward in a slow, unsettling corkscrew. At its apex, an elevator yawned open, swallowing our little procession. With a jolt, we rose—three… four floors?—and the air changed. Gone was the tang of general dirt and disgrace. Here, the corridors gleamed, sterile and lacquer-bright, as though someone had scoured every inch only moments before our arrival. The air and general setting were, in short, cleaner.

We stepped through an iris of smoked glass into what could only be called a reception or atrium. Beneath transparent floor tiles, a lattice of channels carried crystalline water, rippling like liquid diamond under our boots. In the center hovered a holographic fountain: light sculpted into leaping koi that dissolved, re-formed, dissolved again. Walls of polished black basalt framed the space, each panel hung with vertical slips of parchment, their edges crisp, their surfaces brushed with looping, feminine calligraphy that whispered of elegance and threat in equal measure.

A lone attendant rose from behind a matte-onyx desk, bowed, and pressed a discreet panel. A seam split the basalt behind her, parting to reveal an inner sanctum. A wash of emerald scanning light swept over me as I crossed the threshold—yet no one demanded my weapons.

The office smelled faintly of sandalwood and ozone. At its far end stood a woman who seemed carved from both ebon and ivory. Her skin was a rich, chocolate glow; her hair, an opulent tumble of onyx curls that spilled to her waist. A tailored suit, dark graphite trimmed with subtle brocade, balanced Eastern drape and Western edge, its skirt halting just above the knee. Half-rim spectacles framed wide, penetrating eyes, and when she smiled, she showed off teeth so pearly white.

“Welcome… Cataclysm,” she intoned, each syllable weighed, measured, and found profitable. The smile was a façade—a professional’s mask.

She inclined her head toward my once-rude escort; they saluted and withdrew, the doors hissing shut with funereal finality.

“Forgive my security,” she continued, voice velvet over blade-steel. “Their enthusiasm occasionally outstrips their manners. I am Helena Voss. Please—sit.”

A sweep of manicured fingers indicated a leather sofa so plush it practically purred. Sol perched beside me, armor plates clicking. The cushions yielded under my weight; a pang of guilt stabbed through me at the smear of grime my greaves left on the pristine upholstery.

“You’re the owner of the Crucible—and Voss Heavy Industries!” Sol blurted, equal parts awe and accusation.

Voss’s answering grin was that of a serpent’s. “And you are Solarin Varnell, daughter of the late Kana Varnell. Your mother’s passing robbed the Outer Sectors of a most formidable mind and spirit.”

Whatever ancient history bound them was lost on me; I stifled my impatience. Exposition again—another unskippable cut-scene. Just give me the quest objectives and be done with it.

A low table separated us, bearing a porcelain tea set whose steam curled like ghost-ribbons, and fine pastries that looked too delicate to survive a sneeze. My stomach growled traitorously. I removed a gauntlet and wrapped my fingers around a cup; fragrant heat bled into my palm.

“You may continue to call me Cataclysm,” I said, letting indifference color the words.

“Indeed.” Voss eased into the opposite chair, crossing long legs with surgical precision. “Unlike Miss Varnell, you are an enigma. No crimson eyes of an Inner, no Ident chip pinging on any of the scanners. Ergo, you must be a Pureblood. Which raises a delicious question: What is a Pureblood doing in Sector 23? And, I have never seen nor heard of a Pureblood capable of dealing with a Meta like Foulgrove.”

“You assume much,” I snorted. “And get most of it wrong. Speaking of assumptions, shouldn’t I be preparing for my next bout?” I sipped the tea, and my regret became instant. I had given away much for next to nothing.

One sculpted brow arched. “I’ve rescheduled tonight’s carnage to accommodate our little chat. I intend to make you an offer, one far richer than even the champion’s purse. Metas are… scarce. Too many accidents in the arena, though entertaining, can prove costly. But before I place chips on the table, I need confirmation. The usual instrumentation has proven… inadequate… to determine the truth of your nature.”

She lifted a sleek remote. Another wall segment folded away, silent as a guillotine blade. What drifted forward was the stuff of fevered nightmares: a naked human brain, slick and glistening, its spinal cord trailing beneath like some monster’s tail. It hovered on unseen fields, like a gross parody of a jellyfish.

“May I present Cognition,” Voss said, composure finally cracking into something taut and wary. “An Esp-active of exceptional caliber. Where machines failed, he may succeed.”

Please remain calm, came a voice diffused through the room, an omnidirectional whisper that brushed the back of my skull. Nowhere and everywhere.

Sol shot to her feet, chair skidding, hand half-reaching for a weapon that was not there. That had never been there.

“It is disconcerting at first,” Voss acknowledged, “but rest assured, Cognition means you no harm.”

I felt it then—a pressure against my mental barrier, probing, polite yet relentless. Please lower your defenses. Verification only, the disembodied voice insisted.

I rolled a shoulder. “Enter at your own peril.”

The entity that was Cognition slipped through the cracks of my consciousness. Here it was sexless, near-formless, a clinical presence mapping every memory-corridor. Yet it was not alone. Other residents inhabited this place and stalked these halls, ancient and jealous. As he advanced, they stirred… and smiled with animal desire.

The dark voices came, round the corners of thought, trailing ribbons of ink-black static. Individually, they were pinpricks, barely felt, but their numbers swelled by the dozen, then the hundred, until they became legion. They began to gnaw, chittering about the grand unmaking, their laughter crumbling into staccato clicks that could have been language or raw hunger.

Cognition recoiled, a ripple of telepathic static prickling the walls of my skull. What are these? Fragments? Reflections? Parasitic shards? His mental voice wavered, syllables stumbling over bursts of—was it terror? This cannot exist inside a sane mind.

I almost pitied him. Almost. Sane? Who was he to judge who was sane? A spark of anger bloomed in the ebony darkness.

As if answering my emotions, from the deeper dark of my consciousness rose the dark choir. From the throats of hollowed-out souls, came the chant of Entropy’s empty lullaby. Their song peeled layers from Cognition’s psychic shell, each note a corrosive solvent. Yet, he still had the strength to throw up a luminous barrier, pale violet, and trembling, but the choir’s telepathic harmonics cracked it like so much sugar glass.

Here in this singular moment, I understood for a fraction of infinity the gifts Entropy had bestowed upon me. Then, its meaning faded, for the human mind could not contain such a vast truth.

An incorporeal tide of non-thought and oblivion, edges flickering where they fed upon my imagination, and now Cognition’s. They coiled around the exposed telepathic pathways opened by the Esp-active, whispering the heat-death of stars, the slow, delicious collapse of ordered thought. For the first time, I felt his panic surge—a cold tsunami beating desperate fists against my temples in his bid to escape.

How do you contain this? Cognition’s voice fractured, split into overlapping frequencies. How are you not—

“Raving? Drooling?” I murmured in a whisper, lips barely moving. “It is not a thing to be contained. And, it is because I am as far from you as you think yourself from the common man. I am chosen and I am the end made manifest and true.”

His terror bled through the link, sharp and metallic. He tried to retreat, but the legion pursued, harrying every backwards step, snipping filaments of concentration until his once-immaculate focus unraveled into whimpering mental static.

Outside, Helena Voss leaned forward, eyes glittering with something perilously close to fascination. The floating brain juddered, membrane pulsing erratically, as though every heartbeat were a hammer-blow.

Enough! Cognition shrieked, a soundless psychic screech that rattled glass in the physical room. With a final wrench he tore free, severing the link so abruptly I felt the lash of recoil like a concussion. He hovered, wobbling in the air.

Helena’s smile was as thin as a razor. “Well,” she breathed, "Cognition?”

He should not be. He should not be. He should not be, was Cognition’s answer. A stupid refrain that was repeated, again and again, as a small trickle of blood dripped down from my nose. Inconvenienced, I reached for a tissue on the table. 

“Gilly here has level-10 Psyindro defenses,” Sol claimed with a confidence I was sure she did not feel. I had to stop myself from giving her an inquiring look lest I endanger her ruse.

Voss’s expression remained unperturbed. The woman’s insides must have been made of steel. “Intriguing to see that you can resist the abilities of a very powerful Esp-active. This display just reassures me that you are just the man I am looking for.”

Helena crossed her arms before speaking into the piece of jewelry on her lapel. “Please send someone to take Cognition to our medical facilities.” Then she turned and smiled at me. “Please, enjoy the tea and refreshments; we prepared them just for you.”

It was a truly strange experience, drinking tea in a relaxed fashion while a floating brain continued to quiver in mid-air, spouting only madness. Eventually, orderlies came—swift, efficient men and women who trundled Cognition away in a wheeled glass container.

“Now then, it is time to talk business,” Helena said primly, adjusting her clothes and flicking off a piece of lint that did not exist.

“Speak plainly and speak fast. I came here to earn money so that I might acquire passage and access to the Inner,” I replied, letting my annoyance lace my words.

“A Pureblood wanting access to the Inner. Perhaps I misjudged you.”

“That would be twice, then,” came my obvious retort. “What is this business you speak of, and how well does it pay?”

Without missing a beat, Helena replied, “Two hundred thousand credits. You are a very hasty man, I think, but I can’t say I dislike it. There is a certain eager efficiency to it.”

“That’s enough to buy, like, half of Sector 23! But why Gil?” exclaimed Sol.

“Two hundred thousand and stock options in Voss Heavy Industries,” Helena offered. “A client of ours, one of their progeny has passed away. It would not be impossible to amend certain records. So, I can offer you genuine access to the Inner City.”

They were all meaningless numbers to me; stock options even more so. Save for one thing; access to the Inner City.

She must have seen my reluctance, for she quickly asked, “Is there anything else?”

“You have not explained exactly what it is that you require of me,” I said, biting into a small, delicate pastry and not expecting much. But there was an explosion of flavor… things felt more real for one reason or another. Here, in this place, my senses seemed heightened. Food, of late, had started to taste so bland, I realized. 

“What services must I render you, Helena Voss?” 

She looked at me, her gaze intense. “We need you to recover something… a simple enough task.”

“You still haven’t answered. Why Gil?” Solarin insisted.

I was glad that I had brought her along.

“Gilgamesh is invisible to Ident scanners and, it seems, even to Esp-actives’ psionic detection, and he appears to have very aggressive defenses in that regard. In short, he is untraceable. Mighty as we are, we cannot afford to draw the scrutiny of the other organizations,” Helena explained.

“And they fear intervention from Apex,” Casia’s voice crackled in my ear from the device there.

“And you fear intervention from Apex,” her granddaughter concluded almost at the same time, in near-perfect sync.

Helena merely nodded, accepting the point. “I cannot go into further details unless Gilgamesh agrees to the proposition.”

“I feel insulted. Did you know, Helena, that there are some things even money cannot buy?” I said flatly, feeling a stirring I had not felt in a long time. “Solarin, thank you for coming and for your support. But there is something I must discuss with Miss Voss—alone. Certain issues.”

“Suit yourself, but don’t think you can cut me out of this,” she said acidly.

I grinned a dark, evil grin. “All of the money is yours, Solarin; I care little for the lie that is worldly wealth.”

Sol just shook her head as she left, but the telltale grin on her face told me that she had well and truly been mollified by the offer.