~November 28th, 2 AH~
~Camp Akra, Command Tent~
Ernst Athelstan, the First Reiter of Akropolis and Commander of the Resistance, paused his writing hand as a sharp pain seared the base of his skull.
It was a long-familiar headache that had started in his youth, one that had become more frequent and persistent as the years wore on. He couldn’t quite recall the genesis of this condition, nor could he pinpoint what had aggravated it this morning as he penned his reply to a memo from the chief engineer. He’d already consulted a handful of Gaertners from the other families, but thus far, none of them had produced much in the way of remedy nor even diagnosis.
Oddly enough, there was much he couldn’t (or perhaps didn’t want to) recall about his life in Old Earth, a fact he never let bother him. He had enough pressing matters to attend to in the present without needing to dig up the past—like being entrusted with leading a war for humanity’s survival. The prospect of having to do that while nursing a constant headache was bothersome, enough for him to break out in a rare cold sweat.
He lost track of time. He kept his eyes closed and his pen frozen over an interrupted letter ‘a’ for what felt like minutes before the pain eased off—not fully, but just enough for him to get on with his day. The words on the page raced once more, albeit not with nearly their earlier fluidity.
His mood, already on shaky grounds after the engineers had rejected his latest suggested modifications to Eidolon design, darkened further in conjunction with his physical ailment. His callused writing hand too ached in time with the throbbing inside his skull as he ended the memo with far stronger language than he’d originally intended.
He threw the finished memo onto the outgoing pile and buried his head in his hands. Something needed to be done about this headache, even if it meant having to antagonize Nayuta Vakta and her Gaertner daughter. And perhaps a second memo to the engineers was in order, one to request the technology to simplify and expedite the process of writing memos.
For as far as Ernst was concerned, winning the war wasn’t the end goal but merely a stepping stone. There was no point to eliminating the Syntropy if the victory didn’t also permit humanity to restore some semblance of normalcy. Humanity couldn’t be allowed to stagnate forever. They needed to hope, to prosper, to progress.
To that end, they needed also to claw back some of the progress they’d lost—like reliable remedies for headaches, or typing memos and sharing them instantly. That… that had been commonplace in Old Earth, hadn’t it?
The base of Ernst’s skull flooded again with renewed pain. He winced audibly, then cursed himself for kicking the ‘hornet’s nest’. By now, he knew better than to test his patchy recollections of Old Earth. Best to keep his focus strictly on the present—and his eyes pointed squarely toward the future…
The future presented itself in the form of a pimply face that poked halfway into the command tent, evidently having waited for some time for Ernst to notice it. Young Janus cut a meek and fragile figure, a striking oddity among the otherwise brawny specimens of the Duodecim stock. In truth, it was a blessing that he alone from his litter had failed to Ascend. It was also something of a curse, at least for Commander Athelstan, who’d been saddled with Janus’s services as his aide.
“Yes? What is it?” he snapped with a touch more tartness than he’d intended, then sighed inwardly as his aide shrank away. Even during a fight for the very existence of their species, humanity lacked not for cowards nor dilettantes. Ernst supposed that some things about life on earth never changed, Old or new—but then, did he really know that for a fact? He rubbed his temples as he waited for Janus’s response.
“It’s… the woman, sir,” the young man managed to stammer. “The woman from the… lower camp.”
Today of all days, Ernst was in no mood to admonish his aide for less than stellar communication skills (and potentially antagonize the Duodecims in the process). Instead, he merely nodded—or tried to, before the pain stopped him. In the end, he settled for a wave of the hand.
The pimply face hastened away from the entrance of the tent. Soon, it was replaced by a second figure, just as youthful as the first.
The Essential woman—really more a girl, likely less than half Ernst’s age—nevertheless stood taller and straighter than the Tetrarch man that had preceded her. Someone had already scrounged together a set of military fatigues for her to wear, though not with much fidelity. The jacket was two sizes too large, hanging loosely on her torso and halfway down to her knees, while the trousers were two sizes too small, clearly outlining her skinny limbs before leaving her shins exposed above the boots.
Ernst found himself momentarily lost for words as he struggled to make sense of his sudden surge of appreciation for a young woman—an Essential, no less—that he’d only just met. Sure, there was a determined air about her that he immediately liked, highlighted by eyes that shone with curiosity and obvious intelligence. But there was more to it than that: something that stirred the hidden depths of his subconscious…
“Do I know you from somewhere?”
The woman’s startled look must’ve mirrored Ernst’s own. She couldn’t have expected the Commander’s first words to her to be quite so mundane—and neither could he. Yet, to her credit, she quickly recovered and set her face in stone.
“I don’t believe so, sir. This is my first time in this part of camp,” she spoke with a fluent alacrity that was surprising for someone of her lowly status, especially for her ‘first time’ in a military setting. Then she added rather needlessly, “But I know you, sir. From… well, everywhere, I suppose.”
This brought out a genuine chuckle from Ernst, which he persisted with despite the accompanying stabs of pain. He asked—also rather needlessly, “Do you understand why you’ve been invited here?”
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“Yes, sir.”
“You’re the first person from outside the Tetrarchy to Ascend. Now, I have to admit this is uncharted territory, not just for you, but for all of us. One thing I can assure you of, however, is the weight of the responsibility that now falls upon your shoulders. All Akropolitans must give something of ourselves to the war, and doubly so for those of us that have been chosen by the Nexus.”
“I understand, sir.”
Her expression never wavered for a second. Ernst almost nodded again, this time with real enthusiasm, then thought better of it. He instead waved the woman toward a corner of the tent where a workstation had already been set up.
The workstation was a rather ugly contraption full of tubings and metallic parts that seemed to barely fit together. But the Kurators from the Shiranui clan had assured him that this was the most direct method for a Seher’s consciousness to interface with the Nexus.
After the woman took her seat, Ernst too ambled over to occupy the space opposite her. He did so slowly and awkwardly, careful not to jostle his head any more than necessary. In place of pain, however, anger flared. How am I to pilot an Eidolon in my current state? To lead my people to victory? It didn’t use to be like this…
As he settled into his own seat, he became aware of the woman’s curious gaze. He eyed her sidelong, as if to give her permission to speak.
“Are you unwell, sir?” She took the invitation. “Should we… do this another time?”
“I’m in no worse condition than usual,” Ernst lied, though only partially.
In truth, he knew himself to be breaking apart at the seams. And barely two years into the war! It was this that frustrated him most, left him in dark moods in the mornings, far more reliably than any ineffectual aide or unhelpful engineer could: his own frailty, and what it portended for the future of humanity…
Yet, perhaps, this young woman sitting across from him could be the cure. Mutobi Shiranui, who’d been in charge of the inaugural Ascension Standard, had been rather vague in his report. Ernst knew only that this newly Ascended Essential woman defied categorization into any of the five Seherschafts—that she might serve an entirely novel purpose, one that could directly enhance a Reiter’s performance.
To assess the truth of that conjecture was of far more urgent priority than worrying about some headache. Ernst steeled himself against the pain, then turned to continue with preparations.
The woman flinched slightly as the Commander grabbed her arm without warning. But she raised no objection, and barely reacted as she watched one of the tubes fill, first with her own blood, then with the pale blue of Anamnium.
Only as he fiddled with his own connection did it occur to Ernst to wonder if he ought to have arranged for an assistant. It would’ve made the process faster, less painful for him, and likely less stressful for the woman. He quickly dismissed the notion, however. Today of all days, he needed to prioritize privacy—given that he quite literally had no idea what was about to happen.
The session began like any other. Ernst called to the Nexus, and felt it answer in kind. A distortion in the edges of his consciousness told him that the woman beside him had done the same, though her lack of control too was apparent.
“It’s alright,” he murmured, and felt his thoughts reverberate within the Nexus. “Relax and give into the Nexus. Let it guide you. Just like at the Ascension Standard.”
Despite his hopes, Ernst also kept his expectations in check. He wasn’t a Kurator, after all, and he doubted he could guide a brand new Seher through a journey of self-discovery. Yet, even as he braced for disappointment, he felt the edges of the woman’s consciousness settle, then bend themselves—with purpose—before fusing with his own.
~~~
An enormous city rose toward the sky and stretched as far as the eye could see. Sleek towers and their blinking spires penetrated the clouds and the dark shadows that lurked therein.
A lone red flower danced amidst a coastal breeze, slick from sea spray. An old man sat beside it, back bent and bathed in sunlight as he shielded the flower from the wintry sea.
A hairless ageless creature bent toward its core to hug itself. A young man reached in and joined his hand with the creature’s. The two of them drew closer, better to bask in each other’s warmth.
An ash-laden phantom flew amidst a swarm of obsidian beasts. The swarm fell away as carcasses in the phantom’s wake. The phantom flew and flew, to seek the boundaries of its world. To meet the death that awaited beyond the planet’s haze.
Laughter pealed across an alleyway as a girl sprinted through it. A boy ran after her, but not with enough speed to catch her. He checked his pace, loath to let the moment end. Loath to let her laughter fade.
~~~
Ernst Athelstan lost track of time. He kept his eyes closed and his arm frozen across the workstation for what felt like an eternity before reality returned to him—and he to it.
When he opened his eyes again, he realized that they’d become wet with tears. His tears. When was the last time he’d cried—allowed himself to cry?
“What did you do to me?” he murmured with a voice that sounded strange even to himself, then he saw with a start that the woman too was weeping. Silent tears. Shoulders that shook with the daintiness of a lone flower.
Had the woman seen and felt everything he had? She must have. But how? Some of the imagery had clearly been from distant Old Earth, surely far before her time. While some others, as impossible as it was to comprehend, hadn’t even—
Ernst shuddered to banish the thought. He braced for a fresh bout of pain: his punishment for straining the limits of his memories. But the pain didn’t worsen. In fact, he didn’t feel any pain at all.
For the first time in what felt like years, his headache was completely gone.
Ernst sat with the realization—the discovery—for some time. Then he turned to his companion with a smile: absent cynicism and full of hope for the first time in what felt like years.
“I should’ve asked much sooner,” he remarked. “What’s your name, soldier?”
The young woman wiped away her tears with the sleeves of her too-large jacket, then stared back at the Commander with eyes that shone with curiosity and compassion.
“Daisy, sir,” she said. “Daisy Yim.”
“Well, Daisy, I’m sincerely pleased to meet you. And welcome to the Resistance. I suppose… we ought to give you a title. Something to denote your special brand of Seherschaft.”
This truly was uncharted territory. Akropolitan society, such as it was, comprised two groups of people: the Tetrarchy, and all others that served the Tetrarchy and their war—the Essentials. Before Daisy Yim, no one outside the Tetrarchy had ever Ascended. Therefore, she defied categorization in more ways than one.
Ernst Athelstan the First Reiter sat with the question, turned it over in his mind and nudged it through the gaps in his memories. It didn’t take long for the answer to reveal itself: echoed from a distant past, whispered from a far-reaching future—and reflected upon an ever-present mirror.
“Spiegel.”