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Five years earlier
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Dr. Alon Harven stood in an expansive, white hallway tapping his clipboard with a mixture of impatience and anticipation. Occasionally his eyes flicked down onto the first page, where an image of a woman with steely eyes and stark white hair looked back with a level gaze. Not a single emotion was visible in the woman’s face, which Alon found entirely appropriate for an internal personnel file. Too many times he saw images of people with smiles or perhaps even a tilted head. Unacceptable…
From the image, his eyes drifted onto the spartan expression of his surroundings. The tiles of the hallway had a certain, surgical look to them that made them appealing to his aesthetics, and although bare, he could appreciate the efficiency of both their form and function. There was no furniture of distraction or leisure anywhere in sight, just as Alon preferred it.
The ‘swoosh’ of an automated door alerted him to the object of his impatience, as the woman whose face mirrored the one on his files—the very same, in fact—walked through. She wore a medical coat over regular clothes, sturdy shoes, and with her hair tied up; dressed practically, exactly as Alon had instructed. She took three long steps toward him, before she stopped and stood at attention, eyes cast into the far distance.
“Strider Sylvia Leen reporting for duty, sir.” Her voice was firm and uncompromising, just as her immovable stance.
“Ahh… yes…” Alon smiled at the professionalism on display. He could appreciate the military code of conduct, even if he found it inefficient in everyday conversation. “I’m Dr. Alon Harven. I am head of research in this facility, as well assistant director of Central Research and Development, or CRD. Pleased to meet you.”
Her eyes turned from the distance into a curious look down at Alon’s hand.
“Please be at ease. We don’t stand on military procedure among staff.”
“Understood.” She eased her position and took his hand with a firm grasp.
Once they had released each other, Alon continued. “You are the one they call the ‘White Lily’, correct?”
“That is my call sign,” Sylvia agreed, without her expression changing for a second.
“Do you prefer to go by that title, or would you rather I speak to you as a fellow doctor?” Alon said, curious.
“As I am here in my capacity of liaison to the research division from operations, the proper address should be my rank of ‘strider’,” she said, studying her surroundings with a trained eye, “My call sign is for in-the-field operations only, and my doctorate has been a wall decoration for over a decade.”
“Apologies Ma’am—I mean… Strider Leen—here in research we rarely get to work directly with active riftwalkers, so I have little knowledge of your customs. Let’s get you brought up to speed, shall we?”
“Looking forward to it, sir.”
Alon looked at her, a crooked smile on his lips. “I’m sure we’ll get along just fine.”
With an inviting gesture, he turned toward the long hallway and began walking down it as they talked. “How much have you been briefed on the project?”
“Not much, sir. I was told everything was need-to-know.”
“Ahh… of course,” Alon flicked through a few of the pages to find the information, then nodded to himself, “And as your superior it seems I am the one who has to judge how much you need to know.”
She looked at him expectantly, which made Alon sigh. He hated explaining, when a written brief would be easier. Of course, they could not risk such a brief getting outside, so he understood the necessity. “All right, let’s start with the basics. How much do you know of the riftborn, Strider Leen?”
“It’s a special condition, first encountered 50 years ago in Homerealm when the World Break opened up rifts to other realms. Children born outside of Homerealm are linked to their realm of birth and are occasionally summoned back.” Her response was swift and mechanical, listing off the textbook response, before she added her own interpretation. “Therefore, in a manner of speaking, these children are natural riftwalkers.”
“Indeed,” Alon agreed, “Good. And their rate of survival?”
“I know of no case that has survived beyond three years, sir.”
“Yes you do,” Alon said, half a smile on his lips, “You know of Avalanche.”
She blinked. Alon gave her a full smile this time. “You mean…”
“Yes,” he agreed, “The first leader of the Riftwalkers, and the commanding officer of Operation Moonfall, Helgir Orvason.”
“He was riftborn… sir?”
“He was indeed. It is a closely guarded secret, along with much of the information pertaining to the riftborn. You can drop the ‘sirs’ Strider. An informal tone is more efficient when communicating.”
“Force of habit, s—“ She stopped herself with a shake of the head. “Why the secrecy?”
Alon shrugged and said, “Power, what else? The riftborn aren’t just unlucky children, summoned to another realm at random, they are also psionically gifted with powers unavailable to common humans. If such knowledge was widely spread, then every ambitious and unscrupulous family in Vanguard would send their pregnant into rifts just for a chance at birthing the next Avalanche.”
“Is that really such a bad idea?” She said, brows furrowed, “We’re not exactly in a position to be choosy with our means.”
“And that is exactly why we’re here. Central Command was always intrigued by the results of Avalanche, but we have hesitated due to the… ethical concerns. After Operation Moonfall cast us adrift into the Inverse, there was not exactly much appetite in performing human experiments… on babies.”
“But that was 34 years ago,” Sylvia pointed out, “You’re saying things have changed?”
“Oh, they did. 12 years ago, in fact,” Alon agreed, a satisfied smile on his face, “With little progress on a path back to Homerealm, Central Command decided it was in Vanguard’s best interest to prepare the next generation of leaders in-house, so to speak. Over the decades, a stockpile of rift eggs was accumulated, allowing us to send multiple subjects across the Inverse without alerting public attention. This effort is what brings you to me and Project Daedalus.”
With dramatic timing, they passed from the surgical hallway into a glass tunnel, overlooking a wide open space on either side, tiled with the same surgical, white squares as the hall. Down there, a throng of adolescent kids stood in a practiced formation, each with their own virtual training dummy, performing coordinated attacks in perfect unison. Alon could not help but feel a sense of accomplishment from seeing the scene, as well as the wide-eyed response from the riftwalker beside him—cracking her stoic facial expression was, somehow, a feat he doubted he could repeat.
“This… This is…” She mumbled, trying to get a hold of her emotions.
“Strider Leen, let me introduce you to the next generation of Central Command—and welcome you to ‘The Maze’ as we call it.”
“How many…?” Her voice cracked slightly.
“Originally, we had one-hundred subjects, however, we lost about a tenth to… summons. Another tenth have been isolated due to mental instability, while a final tenth have been deemed ‘qualified successes’, and have been moved to another facility. The ones you see down there represent our two-thirds success rate, which is higher than we first projected.”
“Qualified successes?” She said, latching on to his previous words.
Making a face, Alon answered honestly, “They have awoken their riftborn abilities, however, they are marked by either disability or a sharp decline in intelligence. We hypothesize that they awoke too early, and thus had both body and mind put on immense stress. They’re still useful, just not… leadership material.”
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“But these are… useful?” She said, eying the kids in the training room, one of which just broke the rhythm of the unified training to rip their virtual dummy apart—a crazed scream echoing across the field.
Alon snapped his fingers, which activated a macro on his Netlink. Seconds later, two assistants entered the field, grabbing the young trainee in a flurry of movement, and proceeded to exit the training room in an orderly manner—dragging the screaming and kicking kid along with brutal efficiency.
Annoyed at the scene, Alon looked down into his papers while he brought up the child’s profile on his netlink. This is unacceptable, he thought, taking careful note of which specialist was responsible for the child’s mental health, This should have been caught in screening. He wrote down the name of the one responsible on his papers, circling it a few times for good measure. He would have a serious talk with that one… later.
“It’s still a work-in-progress, Strider,” he admitted, smiling as best he could to alleviate the awkward tension, “We’re working out the kinks.”
“I see…” She said, looking down at the many children with a facial expression that Alon could not fully discern. After a moment, she straightened her spine and her face turned into a stoic neutral. “What are my duties, sir?”
“Ahh, yes, this way,” he said gesturing further down the glass tunnel, “And please, if you must use honorifics, I prefer ‘Doctor’.”
She gave him a sharp nod, all professional once more. Alon returned the gesture with a tight smile, glad to see how she was handling the information. He’d had to excuse some instructors who forgot the greater purpose of their work; for the good of all. Hoping she would be different, he led her past the training room, then down a side corridor, through several security locked doors. As they walked, he continued to explain.
“You see, aside from the aforementioned groups, there’s a small, separate category of subjects which we are having difficulty with. The outliers, so to speak. The kids you saw down there have all been summoned regularly since they were born, and with each survived summons, they return with cumulative traces of psions, expanding their intelligence, strength and speed. Once they awaken, they will be miles ahead of their peers outside of Project Daedalus. However, a few individuals have shown little to no adaptation or progress, while others have… mutations that make them unsuitable for our purposes.”
“Mutations?” Strider Leen said, eying him.
“You’ll see,” he said, sighing, “We are not monsters, Strider. We provide these kids with the best care and training that money can buy, however, we expect to see an equal gain in ability or skill in return. Without recognizable progress, we cannot afford to waste resources on our subjects.”
They walked through one final security door, which accepted Alon’s netlink signature with an well-oiled sigh, as it retracted into the walls.
“Here we are,” he said, pointing down a narrow hallway with alcoves at either side, cropping out at regular intervals. Each alcove was connected to a large glass facade that Alon knew to be one-way mirrors. Behind the glass were the subjects that Strider Leen was here for.
“The first on the right is one of the aforementioned… mutations. He may look imposing, however he shows no signs of increased aggression, or indeed any aggression at all.”
Strider Leen stepped into the alcove and inspected the subject inside with furrowed brows. She turned her head back and said, “You said this project is twelve years old, sir?”
“Planning began then. Following inception, our subjects are now about ten years old.”
“So you’re telling me that this kid, who looks to be in his late twenties, is in fact just ten years old?”
“That’s exactly what I’m saying,” Alon sighed and stepped up beside her, to look at the subject in question.
He was tall and broad—taller than a fully grown man, and about twice as wide. His massive shoulders moved visibly up and down in tune to his breath, as he sat quietly and worked on what looked to be an intricate puzzle—his thick fingers dwarfing each piece and making the dexterous task nigh-impossible. Just like the rest of him, his face was wide, with a broad nose centering it, and his eyes were large and brown. He looked quietly satisfied with his small task, as if this was all he wanted in the world.
“According to his reports, the realm he is summoned to is pitch dark and covered in walls. An actual maze, in fact,” Alon said, looking down at his notes, “We believe his physical mutation is a result of his birthrealm emphasizing size over psionic density. It makes him very big, but his psionic capacity is extremely low.”
“What’s his name?” Strider Leen looked at the enlarged boy with an intensity that Alon recognized from when she had seen the children.
“We call him Mino.”
She looked back at him again, eyebrow raised. Alon smiled and shrugged, “Look, you put a dozen researchers together; you’re going to get pretentious naming. It fits, though; he’s our little minotaur in the middle of Project Daedalus’ Maze… except, he’s as far from being a bloodthirsty monster as one can imagine. In fact, he’s quite the gentle soul.”
“Which I suppose is not a trait that this project is aimed toward.” she noted and nodded.
“No, not really,” Alon admitted, “He’s very strong, but has shown no real improvement in training toward controlling that strength. He’s a danger to anyone he practices with, as well as a danger to himself… He feels almost no pain at all, which has resulted in him returning from his birthrealm on several occasions with debilitating injuries and life-threatening blood-loss.”
“So, he fights when he is summoned?”
“No,” Alon made a face, “He lets whatever’s in there, in the dark with him, use him as a chewtoy when he’s in danger… We can’t even get him to crush insects.”
“Ahh…” Strider Leen looked at the young kid again, her mouth set in a straight line.
“Aside from his size, he has shown no signs of awakening the powers of his birthrealm, which might be the one thing that could turn things around… as it is, we’re on the verge of giving up on him.”
“Is that my task, sir, to make him awaken his powers?” She asked, astutely.
“No, no,” Alon said sighing, “Awakening their powers forcibly has shown itself to be counterproductive, bordering on dangerous… remember those ‘qualified successes’ I talked about before?”
“Very well… then, what am I here for, Doctor?”
“I think this next subject will make it clearer, Strider,” Alon said, gesturing toward the next alcove, where another subject stood in a sterile room. The boy had none of Mino’s massive size, in fact he was quite the opposite: small and scrawny, even for a ten-year-old. He had ash-gray hair, cropped, matching his gray eyes that looked intently into the rooms empty space. He took a combat stance—left arm outstretched in front, while his right held a black dagger in a reverse grip—then proceeded into a sequence of moves that mirrored what the kids in the larger training room had gone through.
“He’s…” Strider Leen’s expression changed from confused to worried as she looked at him going through the motions.
“…Weak,” Alon finished for her, nodding, “Yes, incredibly so.” They both watched as the boy labored through the exercise, before collapsing on the ground after just one sequence. After a few moments of breath, he stood back up and repeated the movement from beginning to end, collapsing for a second time once he was done.
“According to his reports, his birthrealm is a field-type, which is highly unusual. It is also extremely large, potentially planet-sized.”
The strider’s eyes widened as he talked, and her mouth went slightly askew.
“However, its name should tell you all you need to know. It’s known as ‘Ashlands’… there’s literally nothing but ash and dirt. Which means practically no natural psionic activity, and the size of the realm means that whatever psions are there, are so diffused that it might as well be nothing. His initial reports were promising, in fact we had a lot of hope placed on him, purely based on the size of his realm. That’s why we named him ‘Ark’, as in…”
“…The ship?” she said, finishing his thoughts this time.
“Yes. I’ll refer you back to my previous comments on researchers and naming.”
“But he showed no improvements?”
“None at all. We had to outfit him with gear, just to ensure his survival,” Alon said, nodding toward the black dagger, “However, even that expense has proved itself useless. He barely managed to imprint on it, and it has shown no signs of growth.”
“He’s tenacious,” she said, nodding toward Ark, as he stood up to go through the exercise once more.
“He’s decently intelligent,” Alon admitted, “He understands what happens to those who do not meet expectations, as well as how his survival is tied to the training we provide him with. Also…” He trailed of, uncertain as to how much he should reveal.
“Also what?” She prompted, noticing his hesitation.
Screwing up his face for a moment, Alon decided the information was worth sharing, then said, “There is one particular area in which he excels.” He pulled up Ark’s chart on his Netlink and send it to strider Leen with a wave of his hand. “He has proved nearly impervious to psionic mind attacks.”
Strider Leen looked through the virtual document for a while before returning her attention on Alon. “He’s immune?”
“Nearly immune,” Alon corrected, “We have an internal psychic specializing in breaking down mental barriers. She’s very dedicated to her craft, and enthusiastic about the live training dummies at her disposal, and yet she has never managed to break him. Not even once.”
“That does not seem like a trivial detail,” Leen noted, her voice level.
“You’d think not, however, it is a double edged sword. That very same trait makes it almost impossible for him to sense psions, not to mention manipulate them. He’d be very good at keeping secrets he does not wish to share, but you should know better than anyone what kind of abilities are required of a riftwalker.”
“So… he does not meet your expectations…” She said, studying the boy behind the one-way mirror.
“No, he does not,” Alon agreed, shook his head, “Maybe for a civilian, but for what we are attempting to create? Nothing short of perfection is acceptable, Strider Leen.”
“And what does happen to those who do not meet your expectations, sir?”
Alon smiled, a bit sad, “Like I said: we’re not monsters, however, we have goals to meet. These subjects have proved unreliable assets, which means we will be cutting them loose. That is your task, Strider. See to it that these subjects have the necessary skills and knowledge to survive when we release them from this facility and into Vanguard at large—without creating chaos or disruption wherever they go.”