Connor – 35 years ago

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That’s my sister standing over there. Molly. My last connection to this earth. She’s smiling at a grave marker. Weird. Shouldn’t she be like…crying or something? I guess that’d be worse, honestly. It was fifteen years ago our parents died in the car accident where I went missing. Of course, no one knew I went missing. I was projected dead, too. Convenient for the Tribunal. Purposeful convenience.

I should be thankful. They saved my life. At the end of the day, I am thankful. Truly. Mostly. I’m just missing something, and I’m convinced that something’s my sister. I need the familial connection. Probably because my brain wasn’t fully developed when they converted me. Some childlike notion persists of blood bonds being stronger than the artificial Tribunal tethers. I can’t shake it.

Yeah, they nabbed me early at fifteen. Had to, supposedly. Otherwise, Karma would’ve snuffed out my light. Molly was five at the time. Ten years younger than me. Now she’s physically older. Guess that makes me her big, little brother. Technically.

This is likely the last time I’ll ever see her. Not the first time I’ve skipped out and snuck a peek, but every time I defect, they seem to tighten my leash a little more. It’s near choking me now, so yeah, likely the last time I’ll get the chance to see her. She’s smiling extra hard today. Something else I should be thankful for, yet I can’t find it in me to be happy for her happiness.

I’d apologize to my superiors if I were in any way sorry. I take my licks like a champ as punishment, but no matter how hard the ass-kicking lessons are, I can’t seem to stop myself from repeating history. It’s my history. Everything I ever was. I can’t let it go and move forward. I’m stuck here drifting, unable to find solid footing without something tangible to hold me down. She’s that something. I just know it. I give zero fucks what they say. Letting her go won’t help me. It’ll only guarantee my ultimate demise. I need her. She’s my gravity.

The reason I can get around strict orders to cease and desist is because my conscience justifies these visits as surveillance. I’m a Sentry Scout, after all. That’s what they’ve trained me for. Watchful waiting. Observation. I’m just doing my job, except it isn’t a job I was ordered to do, so it falls along the lines of AWOL. Semantics.

She seems happy enough. More than happy, actually. She’s unapologetically gleeful. That should placate me. It doesn’t. It makes me miss her more. I need her more than she’ll ever know.

What if she could know? What if this really and truly is the last chance I’ll ever have to let her know I didn’t abandon her? To let her know I’m still alive? Would it be worth breaking the golden rule demanding I not do exactly that? Would it give her peace? Would it give me peace?

No, better not. Better just keep on keeping on in my suspended animation while she carries on in blissful ignorance. She really does seem blissful. Why does that stab at my heart instead of soothing it?

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Maybe I’ll eventually grow out of this, if they don’t go ahead and recycle my ass like they’ve threatened. I agree I’m getting to be more trouble than I’m worth. I don’t make anything easy for them. Yeah, I’m a standard unruly teenager. Moody. Broody. Bucking the system at every turn. Proud shithead. That’s me.

If I somehow manage to escape corporal punishment this time, hopefully, outgrowing this heartache doesn’t take as long as outgrowing this adolescent body. Generally speaking, I don’t age. My aging stopped the second they converted me. To grow, I have to toe the line of an empty energy well, which is torture. Fuck, does it ever hurt.

Sorry, I should rewind for a second and explain. I’m an Earth Sumair. I was handpicked to become a Sentry Scout by the Sinsear Scholars. As I mentioned earlier, they brought me in prematurely, subjectively saving me from the accident that wound up killing my parents. Molly survived. Car seats for the win. I don’t remember that part. It’s a blur. That’s why I said subjectively. For all I know, they caused the accident in the first place. Seems like something they’d do.

Anyway, feeding works like this. Humans are the bottom of the food chain. Solathairs, which are innate elemental magic wielders, feed on human essence. Let’s call them energy vampires for simplicity’s sake. If the human doesn’t die from getting their essence slurped out of them, voilà a Sumair is created. Sumairs feed on Solathair essence.

During the slurping, some of the Solathair energy stays inside the human, creating an immediate addiction to said energy. The cravings are severe. Like, not survivable kind of severe withdrawal. Letting that stolen energy drain down to dregs is the closest I’ll ever come to being human again.

When the pool is shallow enough, I age. Slowly. Painfully. It’s an excruciating process with minimal gain. I’ve aged about six months on my physical form in fifteen years. I mean, at least the horrific suffering does something. In another hundred and thirty-five years, I’ll be old enough to call it quits…assuming I survive that long. Every time we delay my energy intake, I lose another piece of myself. I need her. My sister. Molly. She’s my only hope from going berserk while I’m trying to age this body of mine. Hindsight is a real bitch. If they’d been smart about my extraction, they’d have locked me in a cell and waited the clock out in Sheelin instead of instantly converting me. I was their hard lesson. Lucky fucker, me.

My heart nearly trips over itself when Molly smiles, waving at me on her way out of the cemetery. Then it cannonballs right to the pit of my stomach when I realize she doesn’t have a damn clue who I am. No recognition whatsoever.

The hard knocks just keep coming, too. I smell them before I see them. Time’s up. At least I got one last look at her. Worth it.

“Third strike,” Phelan barks.

I nod. What can I say? He’s not wrong.

“You’re not letting it go, are you?” he persists.

I shrug.

“It’s out of your hands now.” He presses his lips together and shakes his head, obviously disappointed in me.

I lift my chin defiantly. If I’m taken out, it won’t be with my head bowed like a chastised pet.

“We’ll wait until dark to pull her in.” He stares at me impassively as though he didn’t just relay a plan to turn my world upside down…or rightside up.

One thing’s for certain. She’s never forgiving me for this. I’m never forgiving me for this either. I’ll allow it anyway. I need it too much not to. I’ll make it up to her. I’ll make it right. I’ll give her every bit of sunshine I have left in me. With any luck, it’ll be enough to help her through the darkness I’ve inadvertently dragged her into.