TITANOMACH I | Triumvirate - Chapter 34 - Edumesh, Xabiar (2024)

Chapter Text

ACT III | THE TYRANT’S HUBRIS

***

BERLIN | SOVIET SOCIALIST REPUBLIC OF GERMANY | SOVIET UNION

One by one the well-dressed and suited men and women entered the conference room. The General Secretary could read their expressions; practically sense their wariness, fear, and apprehension over the surprise of their summoning.

They had not been told what would be discussed. They had not been given a reason. They also knew that Clovis Bray did not invest time without cause.

Few of these people were truly dim. They could likely discern the reasons, and almost certainly understood that there was a certain dissatisfaction with their performance.

Each of them were ranking corporate executives of the largest corporations that remained within continental Europe. Giants of business which were worth billions or rubles, and who held uncontested monopolies over entire markets and resources. People who had everything at their disposal to succeed.

Their recent performance had been…disappointing.

Clovis had run the numbers of what remained of the Soviet industrial base under his control. The good news was that there remained enough – on paper – to support his remaining forces and territory. However, this required that the entire industry mobilize and move to reach their full potential.

Wartime measures would need to be instituted. It involved increased production quotas, twenty-four hour shifts, personnel and space expansions, and significant investments and sacrifices on behalf of the corporations in question.

It should have been a simple ask for a Soviet corporation to fulfill. Clovis knew that it wasn’t quite so simple; the consequence of decades of lax enforcement and increased independence of the Soviet conglomerates – a practice that had been in place long before he had become General Secretary.

He was no stranger to how Soviet corporatism worked given his role within BrayTech – and with no shortage of irony did he reflect on his time there, fully exploiting these expectations and norms.

There was an implicit understanding that there would be some level of sloth and corruption within any Soviet corporation, and this was accounted for in the budgets. Clovis had often found this particular problem low on his list of priorities, solely because it had not affected the overall strength of the Soviet Union.

A lesser evil that would expend more than it cost to root out.

Things had changed.

The machine required attunement. The fat needed to be cut. No more would the excess of even minor corruption be allowed to endure. Most corporate executives believed that they held a different status when it came to serving the state. That they were special, that they were immune.

Previously, they would have been right. A previous Clovis Bray might have been lenient considering the state of the wider Soviet Union.

But that man was dead. A better man stood in his place.

This Clovis Bray viewed and held them to the same standard as everyone else – Humans who had been instilled with a responsibility to serve the good of Man, and the good of the Soviet state. That was all that mattered. They were capable, or they were expendable. They would serve, or be replaced.

Today he would find out who among them deserved the life of luxury they had enjoyed.

They had not come fully of their own volition. The message had been delivered by Soviet officers and KGB Exos – with orders that they were to be immediately escorted. He did not trust that all of them would show their faces. Several he expected to flee if they realized what was happening.

His orders had been clear. Those who refused would be arrested, and their immediate successor would represent the corporation in their place.

A few executives appeared to have made an unfortunate decision, as there were some faces that Clovis knew were not the current corporate heads. Their eyes were wide, their breaths short. They were terrified.

Their terror did not matter. What mattered was that they would meet the needs of the Soviet Union.

Red irises watched unblinking as each of them took their seats at the long conference table. Soviet soldiers and Exos stood along the walls, one behind each seat, and subsequently, each executive. Eyeless helmets seemed to stare into the heads of the privileged attendees, who attempted to ignore them.

One by one they entered, until every seat was filled. Clovis let the silence hang for a moment after the door was loudly shut.

Time to begin.

“[We are at war,]” he stated. “[I am unsure each of you grasps the situation the Soviet Union is in. A thorough review of your standing policies, production output, and exports implies to me that the Soviet corporations seem to think it business as usual. Tell me, do you understand?]”

There were sudden, frequent nods as he finished. Very quick, very fast, very fearful.

Some of them had instituted certain measures. Increased production quotas. But not enough, not nearly enough. Measures they’d only taken in an attempt to placate him.

Perhaps now they were beginning to understand.

Clovis raised a binder, the whirring of his machine arm a steel choir in the silent chamber. “[I have compiled output numbers from each of the entities you lead. Your output could sustain us in peacetime. Are we at peace? Have we been at peace?]”

Rapid denials. Shaking of heads.

He’d accept their silence for now.

“[Russia is under the control of an imposter,]” the crimson irises flared. “[Do I need to remind you how much Russia accounts for the industrial output of the entire Soviet Union? No, I don’t think I do. You understand it perfectly well. There exists a gap between your output, and what we need.]”

He set the binder down. “[You are here today because I want this gap closed. I want – right now – your plan to address this deficiency.]”

“[General Secretary,]” Wojceich Szperl, the CEO of Cassoid, the largest military production corporation of the Polish SSR interjected first. “[We have developed measures to immediately scale production to the needs of the Soviet Union. I am certain that within one month-]”

He was silenced by raised metal. “[One month?]”

The machine’s voice was devoid of any emotion. Impossible to discern. Impossible to determine. Yet everyone could feel the inherent…incredulity of the two words. Everyone asking a silent question.

Did they even have one month?

“[I…]” the man swallowed. “[Yes, General Secretary. It will take time to hire more people, adjust the production lines, as well as account for…]” he trailed off again, wilting under Clovis Bray’s unrelenting stare.

“[I do not think you understand the situation,]” Clovis said in a deceptively low, unemotional voice. “[I will explain it to you so there is no ambiguity. We are facing an enemy led by individuals empowered by the Celestial alien. We have no allies. We are facing rebellions and insurrections. We are deficient in weapons, ammunition, equipment, and armor. We are surrounded on all sides by enemies who will come for us once their own conflicts have been resolved.]”

He let the moment hang, so the gravity sank in.

“[You are insufficiently motivated and unwilling to take the necessary actions required by the Soviet state. If you wish to retain your position, this is what you will do,]” Clovis continued. “[You will increase your production output immediately. Extend shifts or move to twenty-four hour operations. Pull workers from the non-labor sectors if you are unable to entice the needed personnel.]”

“[Present your needs to my office,]” Clovis finished. “[And you will receive the necessary labor. Every citizen is under conscription for the war effort – and that includes each of you.]”

His eyes swept across the assembled. “[There are no excuses for failing to serve the Motherland in her darkest hour. You will do all in your power to meet the needs of the Soviet Union – or you will be replaced by someone who can. You have no more privilege. You have no more power.]”

Horror, terror, and even anger flashed across their faces – his words had legitimately caught them by surprise. The reactions were revealing, and Clovis wondered how many of them were already harboring treason in their hearts.

Why not look.

The thought entered his mind after that notation.

See if they Defy?

Clovis considered the idea. He had the Reality Anchor activated, and was therefore currently severed from the insights and power the Sword Logic provided. Perhaps it was worth it to see if Clarity would provide him information that he could otherwise only speculate on.

In theory, based on the Bladed Path he was on, the Logic should reveal who was or planning to defy him. In practice, it might not be as simple. He was still testing and experimenting – but here the stakes were relatively low, and the danger was minimal.

It was a risk worth taking.

With a single command the Reality Anchor shut off, and the sharpness of the Logic became something perceptible. It was becoming familiar to immerse himself in, and subsequently impose his laws upon the lesser. It seemed like they also felt that something had changed. A few slightly shivered, for others their faces twitched at a discomfort they couldn’t put a voice to.

He looked between each person, focusing his sharpened perception over them. There was an unnatural clearness that was imposed; as if appraising them through a barely-visible outline of glass. Most did not seem overly changed; the glass offering a slightly blurred overview of their person. Yet there were a few of them who elicited the opposite effect.

There was a purity, a cleanliness to them as if they were rendered in a higher definition that was not replicated among their peers.

He wondered how the Logic was classifying this difference. Was it intended as identification? Kindred spirits in Defiance? He was not certain of the mechanics – but it was clear that these people harbored rebellion in their hearts.

“[I know that there are some of you who plan to ignore, refuse, or deny me,]” the machine man revealed. “[Perhaps commit treason. I know who they are. Speak and reveal yourselves.]”

The traitors attempted to hide their expressions, and stubbornly kept their tongues closed – while those who weren’t treasonous looked alarmed. They felt fear, because they did not know if he would believe a denial. They did not know he could perceive the loyal and the liar.

He saw that those who continued to defy grew sharper in his vision, unwittingly deepening their guilt with every passing moment. With every second passed, their doom became more certain.

He knew what he would do next. There was a Word, and it came to his mind of its own accord; as if summoned into being by the Logic itself. For he held domain over this aspect of reality here, and it was his to bend to his will.

For it was he who possessed the final authority over the Defiant.

<CONFESS>

The Word was spoken from his modulator, but its power came from somewhere else. It bore into the ears and minds of all who listened. It froze many in his audience who were blindsided by its intensity, some looking to each other to see if they had imagined that display of power – or what it meant.

The Word washed over the blurred forms of those who were not Defiant. It had no power over them, for he held no intrinsic, Paracausal authority over who they were. For the Defiant, the Word could not be ignored, for they were under the authority of the being who had claimed dominion over them.

The Defiant obeyed their master, speaking with robotic intonations, speaking not of their own accord. Clovis did not know if they were aware of what was happening as their bodies followed the instruction, or if the Word compelled them to actively change what they were intending to do.

“[I confess, General Secretary,]” one of the men admitted. “[I intended to flee upon the conclusion of this meeting.]”

“[I confess, General Secretary,]” another woman continued. “[I planned to use my resources to support the insurgencies.]”

More confessions followed. More revelations were shared. Those who were loyal looked on in disbelief, awe, and terror at what they were witnessing. They knew that it was he who had compelled their confession – but they did not know how.

Clovis ignored them. Instead he listened to the traitors in silence.

As each of them spoke, the Defiance in their hearts lessened. It was not fully absent, but the confession had weakened his authority over them, and he was not as certain the Word would work if imposed again.

He noted that as a useful data point. To compel the Defiant to action was to weaken one’s hold over them, and therefore was a tool to use sparingly. In this case, he was satisfied with what he had learned. Today he had cowed them, and exposed the vipers in his midst.

Finally, they finished.

There was only one thing to do. With a single motion, Clovis had the soldiers lining the walls step forward to detain the traitors and haul them away where they would be interrogated and executed. He did not speak again until the last of the traitors were removed.

Clovis’s eyes scanned the remaining executives.

“[Each of you will be placed under dedicated surveillance,]” the General Secretary communicated his intent, which was law, for it was will and Logic. “[If you fail to achieve the objectives I have laid out, or commit treason against the Soviet Union, it will not be only you who pays the consequences.]”

He stood. “[I have provisioned every member of your immediate family a permanent protection detail. Should you fail in your duties, or betray the Motherland, this detail will become their executioners. Let that be sufficient motivation for your service. Do you understand my expectations?]”

“[Yes, General Secretary!]” Terror colored their military-like obedience, but Clovis was satisfied that the consequences had been so clearly outlined. He looked down upon the cowed, trembling, almost pathetically weak Humans.

Weak bodies. Weak minds. Weak wills.

Should he survive this ordeal, he would take appropriate measures to develop a more ideal man.

“[Very good,]” he said in a deceptively soft voice. “[You are dismissed. Glory to the Soviet Union. Glory to Mankind.]”

The soldiers and Exos present saluted, echoing the words that had quickly become a rallying cry to those who understood the stakes facing them. Words that the executives also shouted. A chant that perhaps they would even take to heart.

Perhaps something that would motivate them.

“[Glory to Mankind!]”

***

THE KREMLIN | MOSCOW | UNION OF SOVIET SOCIALIST REPUBLICS

Things were very different from the last time he had visited the Kremlin, or Russia itself for that matter.

Valentin hadn’t arrived directly at the Kremlin, but had instead taken some time to explore Moscow along the way and see what had happened since Clovis’s ouster, and Lenin’s own takeover.

The military presence was heavy. Soviet soldiers were everywhere, both as guards managing checkpoints, or out on patrols. Military convoys sped through Moscow, as entire lanes of traffic were closed or redirected to make way for the convoys. Despite that, there was a surprisingly heavy civilian presence, with the civilians and soldiers having a strong rapport given the occasional cheers or calls of encouragement as soldiers marched or a convoy drove by.

It had the air of an entire city mobilizing itself.

Valentin could practically sense the fervor in the air; the universal sentiment of a nation that marched off to war. Something that was far more intense than anything he could remember; the people were awake, and they were angry. Valentin was surprised by how completely Clovis had fallen from grace – though if anyone would inspire such fervor, it would be Vladimir Lenin.

Clovis himself hadn’t really done himself any favors. Valentin had only heard some pieces of what was going on in Europe, fed to Vigil through the Ghosts of Guardians currently fighting and organizing elsewhere in Europe.

It appeared that Clovis had shed what little of his Humanity remained and sought now to do nothing but cause as much destruction as possible. Any ideological, even principled resistance was gone. There was only one goal that Clovis seemed intent on fulfilling - punishing Humanity for considering any way other than his own.

He did not care if he won or lost, all that mattered was lashing out one final time knowing he was impotent to change the outcome. It was always going to end this way, but rather than prompting reflection, Clovis had elected to throw a tantrum. It was a rather pathetic choice, yet one Valentin could find little humor in.

Not when the consequences would be thousands of people dead who shouldn’t be.

Thus, it was not surprising between Lenin, the brutality of Clovis, and the schism between the Socialist Republics, that the people were eager to rise up and cast down the tyrant. Clovis’s choices would inflict devastation, but the backlash had forever solidified him as the villain of the story, and yet another ruler who was cast down by the people he had abused.

In this way this ending was poetic.

His own arrival and walk through the city inevitably drew stares, but he was not a completely unknown presence anymore. Everyone had at least seen a picture of the Speaker of the Traveler, and the Ghost on his shoulder would dispel any doubts among the skeptics.

Most of the people initially kept their distance, either out of uncertainty, a desire to not interrupt him, or just fear of the unknown. With the mask he had a more impersonal presence, and doubtless the stories around him only added to this air of untouchability. However a few came closer as time passed, and he was able to speak to a few of them.

They confirmed much of what he’d suspected, or had been otherwise communicated by Vigil. They were more at ease the longer he spoke to them, and their boldness encouraged others to come closer. Valentin spent some time with them, but he did have an end goal to this excursion – and that was to meet Lenin.

Eventually he bid farewell to the people, and arrived at the Kremlin. While it was under heavy guard, the Speaker was not accosted as he passed through the lines. It wasn’t clear if they had orders to let him pass or not, but it had the same result. No one was willing to interfere regardless.

Once inside, he made his way to the Officer of the General Secretary - now the Office of the Chairman. He remembered the way well, even as the Kremlin bustled with activity which was only slightly interrupted by his presence.

Valentin found it somewhat amusing that Lenin’s first actions were to effectively tear down the past half-century of Soviet organization, in favor of the conventions and names of the earliest iteration of the Soviet Union. Well, it was practically speaking closer to a rebrand than a teardown – though it opened the possibility of more extensive changes and reorganizations.

Valentin wondered if it was intentional on Lenin’s part – reflecting the Chairman’s perception of the modern Soviet state being a sham – or if Lenin simply preferred his own conventions to anyone else’s.

Either seemed possible.

He opened the door, and entered the office where Lenin stood, back turned to him, and admiring the skyline of the city that must have looked so much different from how he remembered it – presuming that Lenin retained many coherent memories at all.

Be it the noise of his interest, or Lenin sensing him, the Chairman turned to greet him. “[Speaker, welcome,]” Lenin said, his Ghost hovering silently near his shoulder. Lenin was dressed relatively plain, relatively speaking, but Valentin was acutely aware of the fact that Lenin had far greater power in him than other Guardian’s he’d sensed.

He was unsure how well Lenin had been training to use the Light, but within him was a well of power that Lenin appeared very comfortable with. He was not simply going to be a political leader – this power was something that would be used beyond the halls of politics or behind pulpits.

Valentin inclined his head. “[Chairman.]”

Lenin appeared to know he was being appraised, and was appraising Valentin on his own. The expression was not skeptical per-se, but Lenin seemed more wary of his intentions than the immediate trust he’d grown used to expect from other Guardians.

Perhaps because he had questions, and the Traveler had yet to communicate them – or at least to his satisfaction.

“[I understand that you wanted to speak to me,]” Lenin finally continued. “[Considering the circ*mstances, I see no reason to object. There are questions I have for you too.]”

“[Perhaps we can start there,]” Valentin said. “[It seems that you’ve taken control of the Soviet Union without too many difficulties.]”

“[If one can call half of Europe on fire ‘managing,’]” Lenin said wryly. “[But yes, Moscow, and Russia itself is secured. Clovis’s forces will be met and destroyed eventually. But that is something we know will happen. Right now, my focus is on what comes next – something we both appear to have an interest in.]”

“[More than just us. I suspect you don’t intend to step down from your position?]”

Lenin’s smile was razor-thin. “[The Traveler does not speak to me, as She does you. Nor has Echo communicated directives or orders,]” he indicated the Ghost at his shoulder.

Valentin glanced to the Ghost. “[A name you gave him?]”

“[There are blank spaces in my memory, but I remember only the most basic of machines,]” Lenin said. “[Not like the ones I see employed in such numbers, and none that possess the powers of creation, life, and death.]”

He paused for a moment. “[I know now that we cannot die. We have been fundamentally remade. I have spoken with the machine assigned to be my companion, to understand what it was, and its purpose.]”

“[And what did you learn?]”

“[That they are us,]” Lenin said, a contemplative note in his voice. “[An active conscience from the Traveler Herself. They guide us, but they are also shaped and molded by us. They are our echoes. Not the entirety of our personhood, but should we perish…]” he trailed off. “[They remember, and restore. Imperfect restorations, but enough. Just as I am enough to know who I am, but not the same as before.]”

Valentin nodded. “[A good name.]”

“[Returning to my previous point,]” Lenin said. “[I struggle to understand for what purpose I have been returned to life if not to restore the Soviet Union, and complete the revolution that has spread across the world. That is why I have no intention of stepping down.]”

Valentin nodded slowly, with what came next being the critical question. “[And what does the restored Soviet Union look like?]”

“[That,]” Lenin said after a moment. “[Depends in some respect upon you, Speaker. Across the world numerous revolutions and wars are taking place. Nations old and new will return, with leaders from many different backgrounds. Caliphates, republics, democracies, socialist states…and there is only one thread linking them together.]”

He indicated the Ghost by his side, and then nodded towards Valentin. “[Guardians. And all Guardians are linked through one avatar – you. You to the Traveler. What does the future of the world look like, Speaker? What vision has the Traveler charged you with fulfilling?]”

Valentin brought his hand to his face, and slipped the mask from it, allowing himself a brief moment to see the world around him in its unfettered beauty and possibility. The world of white and gold, a million possibilities and futures that he could see, and summon if he had but the power of the infinite.

Instead he only saw what could be. Cities behind him grander and more beautiful than any that had come before them, an idyllic landscape of a region that had embedded itself in nature, and sometimes there was a Spire where the Light shone brightly.

He did not know what future would be the one that would come.

But the answer was clear, and the Traveler needed to say nothing, for it was perfectly clear to him.

“[To bring utopia.]”

Lenin appraised him for a few seconds. “[Whose utopia? There are many definitions.]”

“[One that you share,]” Valentin murmured as he paced, golden eyes boring into Lenin who for the first time seemed somewhat unsettled looking into the golden infinities. “[There are many people who have and will continue to try and define me. I am expected to be a mediator, one that represents divergent views of Guardians. And in that respect, I will do my best, for it is my duty.]”

He paused. “[But I was chosen because of what I am, what I value, and what I believe – and that I cannot, will not change. I am a socialist, raised in a state that pretended to hold these virtues. I was raised in truths that were revealed to later be lies – but that does not negate the truth of what I learned. From Marx, Engels, yourself, and even more contemporary socialists that also understood the truth.]”

He met Lenin’s eyes. “[There was a path to utopia. One that was long, hard, and difficult – but possible. The Soviet Union failed. Worse, they did not try. You said the same in your own speeches. So I will have this utopia realized, no matter if the other states define themselves as ‘socialist’ or ‘communist’ or anything else. The prosperity, justice, and good of Humanity comes before labels, great and small, aligned or not.]”

Valentin smiled faintly. “[If you were concerned that I’m going to let the capitalists return to their old ways, the theocrats to impose their religions on others, and the nationalists to discriminate based on arbitrary lines and races, then I can put your doubts to rest. I was taught a lot about you as I grew up, and I read even more.]”

He exhaled almost wistfully. “[Many of my friends didn’t bother to call themselves socialists or communists when they grew older. The state didn’t believe it, so why should they? But I saw that future, and that was something worth believing in. Curious how fate leads to such outcomes.]”

Lenin nodded slowly. “[That is gratifying to hear, Speaker. It indeed addressed concerns I had about the future – a tightrope that I do not envy you walking. Nonetheless, I am willing to assist as I can. The USSR remains my priority for now, but I will be prepared should you need to call upon me directly.]”

“[I likely will,]” Valentin said. “[And I will need your experience when the war ends, and we begin the true unification of Humanity. There will be many things that need to be done, and a long project ahead. Utopia will be created, but it will not last forever, and it must be an inclusive one for the world.]”

“[This coming threat has been alluded to me,]” Lenin murmured. “[The story you will need to tell me when this concludes.]”

“[Of course.]”

“[You are welcome to stay where you wish here,]” Lenin said. “[Otherwise, there is much that I must still do. I intend to stop Clovis before he sees half of Europe butchered.]”

“[Of which I will soon return to support,]” Valentin promised. “[When Clovis falls, I will be there to see it done.]”

Lenin smiled. “[I would like nothing more, Speaker. And when he falls, so too with the last idol of Man.]”

***

THE WHITE HOUSE | WASHINGTON D.C. | CONFEDERATION OF AMERICAN STATES

The coming meeting was one that Amanda had not ever expected to have. She was finding herself saying that a lot these days, but even by recent standards, this one was particularly unusual.

It wasn’t necessarily because it was with a leader of the Soviet Union – or one of the two currently vying for legitimacy – but because of the person now leading it. And based on what she had heard, the ‘new’ USSR was taking quite a few historical cues.

Perhaps for better, perhaps less so. Revolutions in Russia weren’t usually the most peaceful affairs.

The Confederation’s own war was proceeding well enough for her to be comfortable accepting foreign dignitaries and leaders. Constitutionalist strongholds continued to fall, defections and surrenders were rising, and reintegration efforts were well-underway in reclaimed states.

Optimistically, it was a matter of weeks before total victory would be achieved. The harder part would begin after that.

It didn’t look like it was going to be any easier in the rest of the world.

The explosion of the Soviet Union between the Socialist Republics loyal to Clovis and Lenin was by all accounts far more brutal and vicious than the current American civil war. She hadn’t been sure of the accuracy of the reports at first, because it sounded absurd.

Clovis’s forces gunning down entire protests, assassinations by KGB operatives against anyone even remotely suspected of treason, and publics on each side being whipped into a fanatical fervor as both men fought for the mantle of the Soviet Union.

Most of the violence was in continental Europe, within the Socialist Republics loyal to Clovis, with sustained fighting along a soft border between the two sides. While Clovis was putting down revolts and insurrections, Lenin was building up his own forces, and traveling the world to gain legitimacy.

As the chaos in the Soviet Union had kicked off after the rest of the world had descended into chaos, it was very likely that when the conflicts across the world concluded, the last one remaining would be in the Soviet Union. Lenin apparently wanted to make sure that when the time came, the call would be answered.

She knew he had a Ghost. He was a Guardian. That didn’t change how strange this was, or how he seemed to, among all of the Guardians, have a clear agenda that she wasn’t sure aligned with the Traveler.

He had to though, he wouldn’t have been chosen otherwise.

She heard the familiar snap of cameras as Lenin’s motorcade drove up, and the man himself exited the car in front of the White House. There was something surreal about him that she couldn’t quite place. It was perhaps the attire of a well-dressed man in dark clothing that made him seem like he’d stepped off a history book.

Or it could be the man’s demeanor itself, the careful, calculated glances around him as someone who wasn’t quite sure if he was safe or not. She’d taken some time to study Lenin prior to the meeting, and historically he’d been suspicious of the United States, even when they’d tried to provide aid to the Soviet Union when they were experiencing a famine.

His suspicion and hatred of capitalists was not something to be underestimated, and Lenin had overseen his own share of brutal actions, be it through crushing rebellions to the Soviet Union or the Red Terror of the Cheka – which she understood had been reconstituted following a dissolution of the KGB in Lenin’s USSR.

Obviously, there was more than just that, otherwise he wouldn’t have been raised as a Guardian. Unlike the other figures of history raised, she did know that this wasn’t a man with no memories. Something of Vladimir Lenin remained, and she was both curious and concerned about how much and what it was.

Lenin didn’t stop for questions or pay the reporters much mind beyond his initial survey. The Ghost at his shoulder moved in tandem with his pace as he approached the steps of the White House where she awaited him.

“Chairman,” she greeted once he was before her, one hand extended. “Welcome to the Confederation.”

He took the hand, shaking it quickly. “The welcome is appreciated, Madam President. Let’s speak in private. There is much we need to discuss.”

Both of them turned to enter the White House. There was little small talk between them; neither appeared to know precisely what was appropriate to say, something that Amanda was fine with. Lenin seemed just as wary of her as she was of him.

Only once they were in the Oval Office, and the doors shut behind them, could the real conversations begin. Lenin took a moment to look around the room, as if taking in the classic décor and furniture. “I’ve heard this is one room that doesn’t change in the White House.” He said. “Is it true?”

An odd question to start out with. She wondered if he was leading somewhere with it, or if it was genuine curiosity. She’d never actually heard that one – maybe it had been a rumor of his time?

“Not exactly. Some things change between Presidents,” Amanda said. “Minor things. Some furniture, some pictures. I couldn’t tell you much. I’ve not changed anything from my predecessor. Other priorities have taken my attention.”

“Of course,” It appeared that the question had been strangely innocent, as Lenin sat on the nearby couch, and she opposite him. “To the matters at hand. I did not want to spend much time on asking for proposals or treaties of assistance. We are on the same side, aligned with the Traveler. I trust that we don’t need to say we will aid each other, should our conflicts be resolved before the other?”

She nodded slowly. “No, I don’t think we do. Should we resolve this conflict against the Constitutionalists, the Confederation will move to support the rightful Soviet Union against Clovis Bray – along with the Caliphate, and nationalist movements in Asia.”

His lips twitched. “I suppose that would be the case. It pivots well with what I intend to discuss with you, which extends beyond the immediate conflicts of the world.”

Ah, she had an idea where this was going. His speech had called for a world revolution – and she didn’t exactly think he’d been pretending by saying that. “The future, you mean. Your glorious revolution.”

“Said with such skepticism and disdain,” Lenin said dryly. “I’d expect as much from an American. And we are in a revolution, Madam President. Or do you think that only socialists can engage in revolutions?”

“Of course not,” she said. “Our own nation was founded on one.”

“The revolution I carry out, and will support, is, in the broadest strokes, against the prevailing world order,” Lenin said. “For all mankind. My interest, first and foremost, is that the proletariat are empowered and provided for by the states that succeed the Triumvirate. Socialism is a solution, but not one that will be universally accepted. With that said, we can both agree that there must be changes.”

“I think so,” Amanda said cautiously. “You want my help.”

“In a manner of speaking,” Lenin said. “Your country has a tendency to meddle where it is not necessarily welcome or ideal.”

“Yours as well.”

“The USSR is not a traditional nation-state, but I take your point,” Lenin conceded. “The point is that when the dust settles, we will both be instrumental in shaping the world to come. Power and influence that I would prefer to coordinate.”

“Continue.

“First is China,” Lenin said. “The USSR is in contact with auxiliaries of the Chinese Communist Party, and have information on the current situation you might not. Or perhaps you have greater insight into the Chinese?”

She shook her head. “No. Not enough. What have you learned?”

“The Communist Empire,” he wrinkled his nose – the word appeared to offend him. “Is rapidly deteriorating. Power struggles are breaking out between cliques and sub-factions in and outside the CCP. The Politburo’s control of the Party across the nation is at best tenuous.”

His voice hardened as it rattled off the remaining details. “Local Communist Party officials are acting of their own initiative; entire PLA commands are refusing orders or threatening mutiny. The Politburo retains influence over most major population centers, but the entire country is on the verge of their own civil war that will make ours appear to be a skirmish in comparison.”

Amanda frowned. If what he was saying was accurate, he wasn’t wrong. As far as she knew there were no prominent Guardians in China, and if a true civil war between multiple factions broke out in China, it would indeed dwarf everything else. That was, unless it could be pre-empted.

“What do you propose we do?” She asked.

“We encourage the facilitation of new leadership,” Lenin said, leaning back. “I do not know what you planned to handle the situation in China, but I do not support a revolution from the military elite, especially when a far better alternative exists. Elevate the Communist Party dissidents, and decapitate the ruling Politburo.”

Ah, she saw his angle now. He didn’t even seem to be trying to hide it. “Which would leave the Communists in charge of China.” She finished.

A nod from Lenin. “Yes. What do you foresee following this conflict, President Holliday? What world order emerges?”

“If you’re concerned that I am going to recommend the universal transition to liberal democracy, that isn’t on my agenda,” Amanda said. “I don’t know if you’ve spoken to Gheleon or Valentin, but there is a proposal that would enable a…reasonable variety of governments, contingent on the decisions and needs of the nations in question.”

“Mm,” Lenin mused for a moment. “I’ve heard of the proposal. Valentin and I discussed it briefly, but that alone is not fully satisfying me. Systems of government are only part of the answer. Gheleon’s proposal is systems-oriented – in a way I agree with, but one which misses a throughline.”

“Specifically?”

“The underlying purpose,” Lenin said. “An overarching goal for people. I am acutely aware now that a purported Communist government is not inherently better than a capitalist one if the approach and treatment of its people is the same.”

She nodded slowly. “I think I see where you are going.”

“You are not a Communist. I am not a capitalist,” he said. “But we both align on a few matters. We believe in the proper treatment and rights of citizens. We believe in a capable and active state. It matters less the systems, if the principles that underpin them are similar, if not the same.”

He laced his fingers together. “The Vanguard System proposed is not enough to fend off internal division, and too much reliance is placed on the Vanguard itself acting as the Sword of Damocles. If the Guardians are not to be seen as tyrants eventually, then the system itself must foster natural cooperation.”

“Shared values,” she summarized.

“Yes,” Lenin affirmed. “If Humanity unites, then there must be a shared thread binding all men together. Details can be debated, so long as the motivating foundations are the same. Valentin strikes me as a good man, but an inexperienced leader. Gheleon is a good leader, and shaped by his experiences. He believes in systems, and understands only one part of it well. I want to amend what he proposes. We, as Guardians, have a singular chance to change the world in this way. Mistakes cannot be afforded.”

“On that we agree,” she said. “And I believe there are many who would agree with you.”

Lenin’s smile was thin. “Many who would, many who will not. It is why this debate must be won, first among the Guardians, then used to build the new world that all can live and thrive in. The process will be long and arduous, but it is necessary.”

Amanda looked at his Ghost. “I don’t suppose the Traveler has given you some insight?”

“She is curiously quiet,” Lenin glanced at his Ghost. “And I do not think there are some things She needs to say. As more time has passed, I wonder if this is why I was returned, when others were not. Each Guardian holds some contribution to the future. I believe this is mine, and it is our responsibility to know our purpose, and act upon it.”

“Then in this respect,” Amanda said. “You will have my support.”

“Thank you,” Lenin said. “And in the spirit of this, I believe we have time to discuss the future of China, and how best to lay the groundwork for a better world.” He snapped his fingers, and his Ghost began projecting an image of China, with multiple points of interest on it.

“The Chinese Communists are an intricate and detailed web of motivations, interests, and personalities,” Lenin said. “This will take some time, and you may have insights I don’t. Our wars continue, but this one may be most important.”

Amanda settled in. She hadn’t planned on discussing the next major effort after the Civil War was over, but there was no time like the present – and Lenin was the type of person to do things on his own without waiting if it took too long. And in this case, she wanted to ensure that she had some input.

“Continue,” she told him. “I have time.”

***

TEHRAN | IRAN | RECLAIMED CALIPHATE TERRITORIES

Being the designated Conciliator for the campaign against India was not, as Milya had once naively believed, a relatively simple job making sure people got along and resolved disputes. She did do that, but a large part of the job of late was running around, following up on complaints and reports of misconduct, and intervening.

It had given her a very intimate look at what war did to people, and what they would do when given actual power for the first time in their lives. While she was able to empathize with even the most emotionally charged soldier, some of them not even twenty years old, she wasn't sure anyone - including Shaheed or Valentin - realized what they were doing by giving people who'd been repressed weapons, incentive, and license to attack their oppressors and anyone reportedly associated with them.

She'd lost count of how many times she'd had to talk down entire squads of soldiers and officers from shooting captured Indian conscripts in the streets, or worse, Indian civilians who'd just been living in the cities that had been secured by the Caliphate. That wasn't including the other things that some of them had done to collaborators or Arabs who'd also held positions in the Indian territorial administration.

It made her wonder how many of these incidents she didn’t know about, or which happened quietly. Shaheed could try and order his soldiers to adhere to some kind of conduct, but the frank reality was that he couldn’t be everywhere, and even if the overwhelming majority restrained themselves, there was that minority who did not. Others just didn’t care.

She did understand why they wouldn’t. Why would they, when they were on the side with people who appeared to wield magic, and carried weapons that could turn people into crystal statues?

It didn't make it any less emotionally exhausting. She was getting better at it, but it didn’t become easier, because it couldn’t ever be easier. The only reason she was able to talk any of them down from crossing the point of no return was because she understood, and cared.

If she didn’t, none of this could work, and people knew the difference between someone genuine and cynical. It was why she could bring them out of their single-minded fury or hatred. They weren’t always appreciative of her intervention.

But they did listen.

She envied the other Guardians who had comparatively simpler responsibilities. All most of them had to do was fight a war. She had to handle the aftermath, and the aftermath was never as simple as war. And here she was going to be doing this…forever?

She wondered if there was such a thing as a Guardian retirement. She was at least owed a break after the war ended. Until then, she was going to have to keep up the work. She owed the people, and the Traveler, that much.

Luckily, the end was in sight.

Tehran was liberated, and twilight was falling as she wandered around the central government building that had been appropriated by the Caliphate to serve as the headquarters for the interim Caliphate authority. She could hear celebrations all across the city, but was content to stay out of it for now. This was their celebration to have, not hers.

She’d chosen to wander around here because it should be relatively quiet, and gave her some time to think. Although it seemed that it wasn’t as empty as she’d assumed, since as she wandered around, she heard conversation coming from down the hall.

Curious, she followed the voices, because as far as she was aware, there weren’t any meetings that should be happening. She just intended to take a peek, and that was all.

As it turned out, the voices were coming from what she assumed was normally a banquet hall, which indeed a banquet of some kind was taking place. The room was filled with dozens of well-dressed men, all of whom were engaged in a very lively debate, around tables of food and under chandeliers.

There were multiple languages being spoken, but the majority of it seemed to be in Arabic, which she needed to focus for a moment to translate so she could understand what was being said.

“[Democracy!?]” An African man yelled, pointing with his orange juice glass at the other side of the table. “[Why not have the farmers vote on economic policy while you’re at it!]”

“[Oh, because an autocracy is such a brilliant form of government. Why don’t we give all power to a couple of people, what could go wrong!]” Another man, who Milya assumed was a Persian judging from his dress, replied.

“[People, we had kings for a reason. You remove the problems and political antagonisms of picking a leader and partisanships, everyone knows who the leader is,]” a Gulfer Arab retorted. “[Nobody gets angry because their candidate didn’t win.]”

Another Persian was quick to strike back. “[Excuse me, are you suggesting we should run the affairs of all of Humanity by picking someone based on who his mother happened to be? Do you even hear yourself!?]”

“[Just have the military-]” a man in an Egyptian uniform began, before going quiet when the others universally glared at him. “[I see how it is, the monarchist can have a voice, but I’m the questionable one here?]” He was audibly indignant. “[Absurd!]”

That kicked off another round of debate between what seemed to be…well, a lot of different sides. She realized just too late that she’d entered into an argument that had both a lot of people involved, and had probably been going on for a long time.

Watching the group, she was momentarily struck by how…diverse the group was. It wasn’t necessarily something that she hadn’t seen before - the Caliphate armies were filled with Arabs, Africans, Persians, Pakistanis, Palestinians, Caucasians, and even some Indians. However it wasn’t as stark when they were in uniforms and helmets.

Without a battle to worry about, the cultural differences in attire and speech were far more stark and noticeable. It was simple to pick out where someone had come from just based on their dress. Even within the Arabs there were differences between how the Gulf Arabs, Yemenis, Palestinians, and Syrians presented themselves.

With how involved she’d been in the military campaign, she hadn’t taken much part in the civil administration being set up in the wake of their conquest. It was easy to forget that despite the Caliphate being a single political entity, it was equivalent to more than a few different nations, and spanned across continents.

The gathering reminded her of when she’d read Indian history when she was a girl, being fascinated by the richness of its historical tapestry.

India held dozens of different cultures, traditions, languages, and ethnic groups in the subcontinent, most of which seemed to reside solely in history books. She’d wondered where all of that had gone, all of which collapsed or were folded into the modern, overarching Hindu identity.

Although, maybe there was some hope that they weren’t gone, just suppressed. The Muslims had preserved their heritage despite decades of oppressions. With the Hindutva gone, perhaps this could also be India’s future. One not just for India, or the Caliphate, but Humanity itself. A unity like never before, where divisions were a thing of the past.

Well, for the most part.

Arguments clearly would still happen.

Despite that, there was a warm feeling in her chest watching and listening to the spectacle. If this was the future, it was one that she was glad she had a hand in shaping.

“[Gentlemen!]” A Yemeni man suddenly yelled, standing atop the table, and hushing the other participants. “[Let's just ask the Lightbearer what she thinks!]”

They were bound to have noticed her at some point, and there were murmurs and nods of approval as several dozen heads turned in her direction. At one time the scrutiny would have made her jump and run like a deer in the headlights, but she was more experienced now, and the large crowd of people didn’t intimidate her like it once would have. It was preferable to talking down a bunch of very angry and armed soldiers.

Right. Let’s see what this is about.

“[First,]” Milya said after a moment. “[What is the question?]”

“[Which political system should the Caliphate adopt to ensure justice and prosperity for all its citizens?]” The Yemeni asked.

She had unfortunately assumed she’d be asked a political question, which put her in a less-than-ideal situation. Judging from what she’d walked into, and the diverse range of opinions she’d already heard, she could give practically any answer and it would be rejected by a good portion of the room.

A bit of a delicate situation for the evening.

“[Why are you asking a woman about politics!]” Another Gulfer Arab asked with a laugh. “[Since when do women know about politics!?]”

The Yemeni face-palmed, and was joined by some others at the table, along with a few jeers accompanying the declaration.

Milya gave a silent thanks for the unprompted sexist comment. “[First,]” she said. “[Any proper system of government would allow for the representation of each gender, and give them political parity. Or is there doubt as to the competencies of women? Many of them fought alongside men for each of you to be standing and arguing in this room.]”

“[Ah, but since when do women fight?]” An Egyptian asked, oddly amused.

“[God almighty save me from people’s who’s women don’t know how to shoot,]” a Kurdish-dressed man grumbled.

“[Your women don’t count!]” An African replied to the Kurd. There was a murmur of agreement. The sentiment of the men in the room seemingly in agreement that Kurdish women don’t count as women. Milya was now much more confused than she had been before she walked in, and peered closer to see…

Ohh.

She thanked the Traveler that her abilities gave her a little extra insight. There was indeed an argument going on, but, contrary to what she’d assumed, it was less of a serious one, and more of a ribbing between friends. Men did that often already, and this was much the same, though this was poking fun at each other’s cultures.

It was a still rather problematic indulgence in her opinion, but she felt a little better grasping the actual context.

“[So we all agree women aren’t equal to men?]” another Yemeni asked, seeming to pick up that she grasped the sentiment.

There was a nod of agreement.

“[But doesn’t that mean men aren’t equal to women?]” He added.

There was confusion.

“[Why’s that matter?]” One Egyptian asked.

Another Persian added his voice. “[It means they’re better at some things than men, you illiterate Arab!]”

“[You gonna start quoting Rumi at us, you aristocrat?]” Another Arab shouted. “[Another example of your Persian superiority complex!]”

That kicked off another round of shouts, chants, and the Arab-dominated side of the table banging on the table with their fists. and jestingly repeating the words into an off-rhyme mantra. The Persian-dominated side responded in an equally intense manner, and Milya took that as her cue to excuse herself.

Surely they’d tire themselves out in a few hours, and they’d either pass out or were just too exhausted to continue. They certainly had an interesting way of celebrating, and she needed to get some air. She began making her way to the rooftop, grabbing a wine bottle and cup along the way.

She couldn’t get drunk anymore, but that was more of a benefit since now she could drink wine whenever she wanted. And the Muslims didn’t drink, so there was plenty for everyone else.

However when she reached the rooftop, she realized that she wasn’t alone there either. Instead, both Hamaza and Iqbal were seated and engaged in a conversation of their own. Milya paused at the top, considering if she should quietly leave.

Too late. She’d been noticed.

“[Another refugee from the wars of politics,]” Hamaza chuckled, chewing on a date.

Iqbal also turned to look at her. “[Who won? The Arabs or the Persians?]”

She looked between both of them. “[...Is there a long-standing feud I should be aware of?]” she wondered, pausing. “[I think the Arabs had the advantage when I left.]”

Hamza smiled. “[There has been a long standing rivalry between Sunni Arabs and Persian Shia. It is something of an inside joke within the resistance that the Sunnis are led by a Shia cleric. Something that would have been unimaginable once upon a time.]”

She was aware of the difference between the Sunni and Shia Muslim sects - though she’d have been hard-pressed to say if anyone had cared. Even before the Traveler, the Resistance Hamaza had led that quite openly had members of both sects, and infighting and disagreement seemed to have been minimal.

Well, she hadn’t been a part of it, so perhaps it had been more intense than she’d known.

“[I’m surprised,]” she said. “[I wouldn’t have expected it as a source of genuine contention.]”

“[Feuding brothers unite when enemies assault,]” Hamaza replied. “[Many of the sectarian frictions have eroded away with the Resistance. It is, thankfully, no longer as intense as it once was - and a welcome source of humor.]”

She looked between both of them. “[Both of you enjoying the evening? I’m surprised you’re here, Ayatollah, and not with the others. This day was a long time coming.]”

“[I have walked the streets of my childhood, visited my home, and spoken with my people,]” Hamaza said. “[A fully day of joy and work. But I am a theologian, and it is not often one talks with the dead. Thus, my day is not yet over.]”

“[Speak with, or realize the nature of death,]” Iqbal mused.

She nodded. “I can see that.”

“[A question that should seem obvious,]” Hamaza waved her closer, offering her a couple of dates. “[If everything you are is flesh and bones… why is it that you know how to speak when revived from total death? Ought that not be forgotten with the rest?]”

“[Or why one has the same habits and tastes,]” Iqbal added. “There were memoirs about me. I disliked sweet drinks,]” he motioned to the drink in his hand, a lemon-orange juice mixture. “[And I adored citric drinks.]”

“[I presume part of it is genetic,]” Milya said. “[Certain inclinations we have, quirks and traits that stay with us regardless of memory. As for knowledge, language…that I assume is transferred to us by the Ghosts if we did not already know it.]”

“[He has the same intellectual habits,]” Hamaza said. “[The same linguistic ticks. The very same speech patterns. Are those genetic? Or the work of the Ghosts? How would they even know of these?]”

Milya glanced at Sara, the Ghost hovering cheekily nearby. “[Would you care to share?]”

“[Hmmm,]” her Ghost spun in place, before resting on her shoulder upside down. “[Nope.]”

She sighed. “[It was worth a try. Some secrets must remain.]”

“[Why are they called Ghosts?]” Iqbal asked. “[It is so unsubtle it is almost painful.]”

“[Yes, after all, what remains of a dead person?]” Hamaza scratched his beard, looking straight at Sara.

“[Honestly,]” Milya mused. “[I haven’t thought about it. I thought it was a nickname that stuck. That was what we called the machines on Ares One which were watching us. Before we know what they were.]”

“[Theologians,]” Sara complained, springing back up. “[They know too much about esoteric concepts! Don’t you old men have something better than the mysteries of life, death, and the universe?]”

“[That’s what happens when you’re cryptic and vague,]” Milya told her. “[People start thinking and asking questions.]” If the Ghost could grumble, she was sure Sara would have right then.

“[Hamaza has a theory,]” Iqbal sipped his drink. “[I’m inclined to agree with him.]”

Milya waited for Hamaza to elaborate, as he ate another date.

“[The soul is real, and it holds information in a different way than the brain. There is a causal connection. Experiences are retained, even if the memories themselves seem gone,]” Hamaza said. “[Iqbal writes the same way he used to. His handwriting is a one-to-one match.]”

“[I think the same way,]” Iqbal said. “[I read my books, and I am struck with a sense of already knowing what I am reading. That if I was to write, I too would write the same ideas, the same thoughts and beliefs.]”

Milya found that an interesting and plausible theory - and would explain why some of the Guardians seemed to easily fall back into familiar patterns despite the fact they shouldn’t be the same. She was no philosopher, but based on what she’d seen, it lined up many pieces.

“[Do you really think you’d know how to write if all you had was experiences of writing?]” Sara cheekily added.

“[Would I now?]” Iqbal thought.

“[Duh,]” Sara swerved around. “[Would you remember what you ate for breakfast a year ago, Milya?]”

She shook her head. “[Probably not.]”

“[But you remember that cute teddybear your mother bought you when you were six!]” Sara bobbed up and down, proud of herself.

“[Yes, but,]” Milya suddenly frowned, not expecting the question. “[Were you reading my mind? I definitely didn’t tell you that.]”

“[That is-]” Hamaza stood up. “[Clever. How clever.]”

“[See? He gets it,]” Sara replied.

She looked at Hamaza. “[Could you explain?]”

“[The machine is alive because it is an extension of your own life!]” Hamaza said, eyes alight with delight. “[Your machine is, in a very literal way, your very own ghost!]”

“[Eureka!]” Sara laughed. “[See, this is why old men are important, Milya.]” Sara nuzzled against her cheeks. “[They teach youngins’ like you stuff.]”

Milya looked at Sara. “[...that seems obvious in retrospect.]”

She wondered how that worked. If that was the result of the process when she became a Guardian. It had to be connected in some way. The first time a Ghost awakened - or in some cases resurrected - a Guardian, it connected them in a much more intimate way than she’d thought.

But it explained more with that context.

“[How much of our memories are stored in you?]” Iqbal asked her Ghost. “[How much of us is integral to the very force of our life, and how much is last week’s breakfast?]’

Sara wiggled in the air, her eyes glancing back and forth before settling on floating behind Milya’s head, almost hiding behind her.

If she didn’t know better, she would have thought her Ghost was uncomfortable with the question. The question was definitely geared towards the idea of resurrection, and if she died. With a Ghost, did that mean that if she was atomized or her mind was destroyed, that she could return just as she was?

And if not…if there was only some part of them that could be retained, that meant that they were choosing what to retain. Some things may be intentionally left out, but if the experience was strong enough, fundamental enough, they could not fully be lost. Not truly.

Mohammed Iqbal’s Ghost floated forward for the first time. “[Because you must first learn to trust us, before you understand things beyond what your mortal conceptions grant,]” it said in a firm, focused voice. “[Understand this: You. Are. Not. Humans. Not any longer.]”

Iqbal’s Ghost was not like Sara. It was sharper, less boisterous. Direct. And it said something that she’d briefly wondered, while also not wanting to think about.

How Human she really was now.

“[Your species was deeply ignorant of the esoteric sciences,]” the Ghost continued. “[Most species attain a greater understanding in the sciences you’d call ‘religious’ than yours ever has. They would come to understand the nature of ether. The spirit. To even begin to manipulate it through technologies. Yours is impossibly lackluster in such knowledge. You have even regressed in such matters.]”

Milya frowned. “[...Not incorrect. Religion has declined as Humanity progressed, for a variety of reasons.]”

“[Progress,]” the Ghost gave a suffering sigh. “How species give themselves glorious myths of advancement. You did not ‘progress’ along some route to an imaginary future. You become more developed versions of your ancestors. More sophisticated, but the same. Such is not true advancement. It is not true evolution.]”

“[A ghost,]” Hamaza murmured, nodding.

“[It thinks like me,]” Iqbal mumbled. “[Almost-]”

“[A twin,]” the Ghost finished.

“[A second half,]” Iqbal held up a hand for his Ghost who flew over towards the open palm.

“[Qareen,]” the Ghost offered his name for the first time. “[A dignified name for a pseudo-mythical existence now proven false.]”

Much like how Sara was a compliment to her, Qareen was also a compliment to Iqbal. The dynamic was different, but the purpose, and end result, was the same. “[Explain more, if you would.]”

“[An analogy,]” Qareen flew back towards her. “[Your body is a vehicle. Your soul is the driver. The windows are blacked out. You can only see through cameras, hearing through the microphones. The vehicle has a certain dimension. What happens when you place an object four times the volume within the vehicle?]”

“[It doesn’t fit.]”

“[Now consider this. You must change the vehicle, and the rider, while undertaking repairs, without the original schematic. You do not understand the connections, you cannot grasp the language the plans are written in.] Qareen continued. “[What would occur if you simply placed so jumped and incoherent a thing back together?]”

“[It wouldn’t work correctly.]”

“[Your very own soul would reject its body, you would shatter instantly,]” Qareen hovered intensely over her. “[Sounds become meaningless. Thoughts emerge without origin. Memories without explanation. The result is an inhuman thing in an inhuman body.]”

“[Stop,]” Sara mumbled, curling against Milya’s neck.

“[The shock of death. The pains of a lifetime. The insight into your nature as an entity more than a vessel. A vessel, and a flame,]” Qareen continued undaunted. “[Such consequences beyond measure. Enlightenment is an insanity beyond comparison. A total unhinging; an untethering of what is understood to be causality itself.]”

One hand absently reached up to cup the Ghost against her neck, as she listened to Qareen attentively, just a little unnerved by what he was saying.

“[It is not progress you and your species will undertake. It is change. To change a thing so quickly would break it. Flash-frozen metal reheated bursts apart,]” Qareen’s tone dimmed. “[Your memories are poison to you, now. An albatross around your neck. Forsake them. Change. You are reborn in the Light. No longer what you once were.]”

Milya frowned, innately rejecting the idea, while also not entirely clear if he was saying what he seemed to be. Unless…

“[We are going to live forever,]” she said after a moment. “[And we are going to die. Lose parts of ourselves. Memories. It’s inevitable, isn’t it? And we need to accept that.]”

“[It is cruel to allow a child to hurt itself in its tantrums,]” Qareen spoke. “[To give you that which will hurt you? Which will stunt you? Which allow you delusions of being that which you are not?]” the Ghost shook itself in an implicit denial.

“[I don’t like this conversation,]” Sara mumbled.

She looked at Iqbal. “[He doesn’t mince words, does he.]”

“[It is strange to hear your own voice speak at you.]” Iqbal said quietly. “[To look yourself in the mirror, and have it tell you that which you do not wish to hear.]”

“[I imagine it would be.]” She answered in an equally quiet voice.

“[I’m sorry, Qareen, that you are burdened with such a choice,]” Iqbal said. “[How difficult a burden it must be.]”

She understood that the Ghosts were not just their counterparts, they were in a very literal sense, their copies. They held experiences and memories within themselves - but they could not hold everything. They had to choose what they could keep, and what would be lost if forced to return their Guardian to life who had been completely destroyed.

It was a burden she found difficult to contemplate; like making a choice of what to preserve from a twin, and if you had to bring them back, you would understand what had been lost along the way.

“[...you weren’t supposed to tell them…]” Sara said, addressing Qareen. “[Not yet.]”

“[Ignorance is weakness, only truth in knowledge can bring strength,]” Qareen replied sternly; unapologetic. “[Trust is not mere blind love. It is reasoned belief.]”

Milya wondered how many other Guardians knew, or wanted to know. She wondered if Valentin also knew, and would share it more broadly later. He had to know, but then again, he was even more different from all of them.

“[Did we choose it?]” Iqbal asked. “[Did we choose it?]”

To become Guardians.

She had chosen it. It had been her decision. But Iqbal hadn’t - nor had others who’d been killed. Yet they had been brought to life all the same. Qareen returned closer to Iqbal.

“[Choice? No,]” Qareen replied. “[Your spirit cried out. It howled. It had more. The task was not yet done. Calling out. Crying out. Yelling for all to hear,]” the Ghost’s eye briefly closer. “[You said ‘ I am not done.’ The Traveler heard your soul call, and She sent me to answer.]”

“[... a warm little star singing…]” Sara whispered.

“[A raging blaze with a pen of its own bone in hand.]” Qareen stated.

It wasn’t just the souls of the dead who were listened to.

It was everyone.

There was a surreal feeling that filled her as she listened to Qareen speak; what he said. And he said that the dead were alive, in their own way. Even if in a different form, they could be heard, they could be understood. That was what the Ghosts sought and listened for, among the living and dead alike.

That was why some of the dead became Guardians, and others did not. Why only a few of the living were chosen, among the billions. The Ghosts could see their own souls, they could see who and what they were, what they wanted, and all of them wanted to come back, and desired a purpose greater than themselves.

And when they died, their souls remained, and would be brought back, so powerful was their call into the intangible causality. In that sense, they were responsible for their own immortality. If they weren’t, then the Ghosts might not be able to find them and bring them back.

Perhaps it was because of the conversation, or her own unconscious attunement in the Light, but she could tell that Sara was nervous about her reaction. Presumably this was something that she wanted to tell her later. Not unprompted by Qareen, and knowing that if she died, she might be brought back different than before.

And she was afraid that Milya wouldn’t trust her anymore now that she knew.

It made sense that Iqbal had been told sooner by his Ghost. Assuming he hadn’t determined it beforehand, since he seemed to have insight into the more philosophical aspects of the Light, he had already died. He was comfortable with its existence, and what came after. His memories had been lost, and they did not hold him back. For everyone else…

It was not as simple to let go of your Humanity, and accept that you were something different. Something more, but something different to what you had been, or thought you were.

It’s ok. She told Sara silently. I understand.

Sara didn’t speak, but the Ghost settled comfortably on her shoulder.

“[Ghosts,]” Hamaza whispered. “[Your Guardians are undead. You’ve made them all into revenants. What horrors are out there that your Traveler goes so far? That you have made them instruments designed to die, only to rise again that they may die again?]”

“[You already know, theologian,]” Qareen replied. “[Every species that evolves knows it. Or did you think your myths of gods and devils were simply songs of old? Superstitions of your ancestors.]”

Hamaza sank back slowly into his chair. “[No…]”

“[In the foundations of existence itself rings the truth. Your own soul reverberates with the knowledge of things you could never rationally know. So you attempt to give words to the echoes of eternity trapped in your mind,]” the ghost said. “[The Light. The Dark. Heaven. Hell. Gods. Prophets. Devils. Demons. Saviors. Judgement. The war for the soul.]”

The Ghost went quiet for a moment.

“[Do you think this war is fought over territory?]” Qareen asked Milya and Iqbal. “[Resources? Manpower? Stars?]”

She knew that he was not talking about the conflict against the Triumvirate. In the grand scheme of the universe, this was barely worth notice or interest. She only had a vague idea of what lay beyond the Solar System, but she understood it was far larger than she could understand, and Neptune had been a taste of it.

A profound feeling of dread grew after the question.

What all of this was being fought for.

No, it wasn’t for anything material. It wasn’t for resources, territory, or even species. It was both far more grand, far more fundamental, and far more encompassing. Light, and Dark, the power and Paracausality wielded, there was only one thing that mattered.

Who would control and define existence itself.

It was nothing less than a war over reality.

“[It dawns upon you,]” Qareen’s voice was a bone-chilling whistle. “[You cannot even comprehend the meaning of this war, though you understand the word. Existence. Life itself. The fundamentals of all things.]”

“[The pillars that hold up the heavens,]” Hamaza murmured.

“[To be a mortal among gods is to be crushed,]” Qareen stated. “[You have been elevated, Guardian. Changed. You are no longer Human. You merely wear the facade. Unaware of how different you have become.]”

Unaware for now.

But all of them were going to change. It might be slow, it might be so gradual they did not realize it. But this was their future.

She, and all other Guardians, were no longer Human. For now they were, but a hundred, two hundred, or a thousand years from now…what would they be? What would she be?

You will be something beautiful, as you are now, and always will be. Sara said to her. And I will be with you, Guardian. Forever.

Milya looked out over the rooftops of Tehran, with the stars twinkling in the black sky.

“[You are now creatures of sacrifice, both of you,]” Qareen stated. “Sacrifice demands devotion. Devotion demands bravery. Bravery demands sacrifice. Undeath is the price. Never to die. Never to fully live. Between two worlds, to embody duty that would break others. Guardians of the Gates of Paradise. Never enter it yourself. Not until there is victory. Not until the Dark is vanquished.]”

“[What is the Traveler planning?]” Hamaza demanded from Qareen. “[Answer me! Machine! Tell me!]”

“[That is not dead which can eternal lie,]” Qareen replied. “[And with strange aeons…]”

“[... even death can die…]” Iqbal finished.

It was an ominous note to end on, and neither Iqbal, nor the Ghosts was willing to elaborate further. Hamaza looked truly disquieted, and even Milya was uneasy as Qareen’s words echoed in her mind.

Because it implied to her that the Traveler had intentions for the dead. They were being tended to, perhaps led. To where? Or for what?

She did not know, but for those souls who had been chosen to serve, their future was not one that would be led into Paradise, but somewhere far more terrible, where awe and dread would be experienced in equal measure.

A place where they would bring the Light.

She needed to talk to Valentin. She needed to know fully what had happened on Neptune. Because Neptune was just the start. She’d been content to leave it alone until after the war, but now…

Now she knew what they were.

Now she needed to know what was coming for all of them.

And from what was implied, it was going to be coming much sooner than any of them were expecting.

***

PARIS | SOVIET SOCIALIST REPUBLIC OF FRANCE | SOVIET UNION

There came a point where theory and practice began providing diminishing returns. At a certain point, risks needed to be taken to gain critical experience or advance one’s understanding or skill.

That did not mean that risks weren’t undertaken smartly – with certainly contingencies enacted in case something went wrong. Yet at the end of the day, putting one’s life on the line was a significant risk.

However, Clovis Bray considered it ideal to do this now against the mortal, before he faced individuals of true power.

The machine man walked the streets in a section of Paris closer to the outskirts of the city, which was less protected or patrolled. In this case, part of it had been intentional, as he had instructed forces to reduce security. He had not given a reason, and most likely assumed it was part of a trap or larger strategy to draw the insurgents in the city out.

They were technically correct, but not in the way they thought.

However, the bait had been taken, and he’d confirmed exactly what he wanted to. He was being tracked, watched, and followed. The lack of a security presence had emboldened the Parisian resistance, and they were making mistakes.

Not major errors, but ones that had betrayed their presence to him.

All according to plan.

There were dissenters, traitors, and enemy operatives in and around Paris, despite the efforts of the KGB to root them out. They were impotent currently, but not gone. Tonight they were active, because they had intelligence that indicated that there would be a period of time where he would be vulnerable. Alone.

The KGB had been instructed to leak this, and had protested quite heavily, stating that to put himself in danger for practically no gain was an extremely high risk.

They didn’t understand. They didn’t need to.

It was time the Sword Logic be put to a more practical test. He knew that he was becoming more attuned with the Paracausal power, but it was one thing to experiment, test, and speculate.

Placing himself into a life or death situation was significantly more valuable of a test, of both himself, and his power. The risks remained real. It was entirely possible there would be a Guardian among their number, especially with so tempting a target.

However, he didn’t expect one. If there was a Lightbearer operating in the area, someone would have heard of it. Nor had he ascertained there was a Lightbearer among the people presently following him.

A majority, he suspected, would dismiss the leaked intelligence as a trap. Yet there were those who were following the lead, careful, cautious, because they also suspected a trap. Ironically, there was not one.

Not that they were expecting.

Tonight they were going to kill him. They had the weapons, they had the means, they had the intent. If it was merely Clovis Bray walking a dark Parisian alleyway, alone, unprotected, and isolated, he would die.

It was a fate almost certainly assured.

However, he no longer marched to Fate’s rhythm.

There was an additional sense he was becoming attuned to, which was impossible to classify with his suite of sensors and tools. It was esoteric, intangible, and surprisingly difficult to become used to since he had become an Exo. He suspected it would be easier if he retained a biological form, but he had acclimated.

He would learn whatever was necessary to wield the Sword offered to him.

This sense allowed him to perceive things; tunnels of probability and destiny. He could perceive the rifles being lifted by the two men following him. Each weapon loaded with a bullet intended to wound him. He heard their sharp intakes of breath; could sense their raw, unadulterated triumph as they had the opportunity to make history.

The bullets in the chamber were so real he felt that he could touch them. He had a special attachment to them, for each one marked his death, as did each projectile in the magazine. All of them armor-piercing; of truly exceptional quality. Bullets that were strong enough to penetrate tanks. Easily potent enough to pierce the chassis of an Exo.

The rifles were aimed. Fingers on the trigger.

He only needed to say a single Word.

<NO>

He knew they were behind him, and he turned absentmindedly, without any care whatsoever as the two stalking guerillas opened fire. The sudden Word seemed to catch them unawares by its power, but it didn’t stop them from squeezing the trigger and condemning him to a certain ignoble death.

The auto rifles unleashed their full magazines. Dozens of bullets exited the chamber, aimed directly for his person. Clovis tracked the individual projectiles, one by one, as they whizzed past his face while he stood impassively. He noted the little deficiencies, the unsteady hands moving in directions sufficient enough for their shots to miss each time.

He would have smiled as the reality sharpened around him, bending itself to deny the fate written for him.

No, he would not die.

This trap would fail.

He was not to fall today.

Not here.

Not now.

Not ever.

So he told fate No, and reality acted to make it so. It was a Word of simple meaning, stated quietly enough that he did not know if the two men heard him, so full of adrenaline were they.

He decided to test his luck, and took a step to the side. Their weapons attempted to follow him, firing rapidly, but his movement didn’t change anything as each bullet still whizzed past him.

The rifles went silent, their ammunition exhausted. Clovis Bray met the eyes of the men who had just tried to murder him, which were wide and openly shocked at the fact that they had unloaded two magazines of bullets at near point-blank range – and not a single one had hit him.

They could now perceive that something had changed.

They saw that nothing short of providence itself could have intervened to deny them his death.

Acting likely on instinct, one of them reached towards their waist and withdrew a grenade, throwing it towards him. It landed at his feet with a thud.

Slowly, deliberately, Clovis reached down and picked up the inert grenade. His eyes scanned the device, seeing by what mechanism it had failed. Had it been a dud? Failed to activate? What manner of luck had turned this vessel of death into something inert and harmless?

He missed the ability to smile. Not necessary out of enjoyment, but satisfaction that he was right.

He could allow himself just a brief moment of enjoyment.

He tossed the grenade to the side, and without reality to obfuscate its function, it uselessly exploded. The two would-be assassins stared dumbly at the shrapnel littering the ground, and the scorch mark against the nearby wall.

The General Secretary spread his arms, exposing himself fully to them. “[Well?]” He demanded. “[Take your best shot.]”

They turned around and began to run away without another word. In a moment the tables of destiny had turned, and if they stayed, they would also die. Their own Defiance rippled into being; sharpening their forms as they ran. It was an almost invigorating, beautiful thing, for the roles to reverse so rapidly, and the hunters to become hunted. For they too, wanted to defy what was set in stone.

Perhaps if they were stronger, they might have.

But this was his domain, he had the right to decide if they lived.

No, not tonight.

He wasn’t done.

<STOP>

It was a weaker invocation of the Logic, but these men didn’t even have a nascent understanding of the power he held, nor did they have a Reality Anchor to protect them. So they froze in place, unable to move, unable to act. The first manifestation remained in force, and Clovis withdrew his own pistol, circling the men.

He aimed it at one of them, and fired.

The moment he did, he felt a sudden resistance to the action. Fate struggling against his will. It seemed that the power he had invoked to protect himself extended to all who wished to impose harm, regardless of source or target. An unintentionally consequence, but a very useful data point.

In this split-second, he knew he would miss his shot – but he had a potential option those men didn’t.

He could force the bullet to hit. For he was the master of Defiance, not its servant.

No, not yet. He wanted to see.

The shot missed. Clovis had aimed perfectly, yet the round had missed. Not even he was immune to the Logic, so long as he didn’t try and fight it. No doubt that he would become more adept at refining the expression of his power, but this was a very valuable lesson – what he did might have unexpected consequences.

He lifted the pistol again, and fired – and when that moment came where he understood fate would be defied, he forced past it. He overrode his own Word, and the bullet danced. It bounced off of walls and the ceiling and the floor.

In defiance of any probability, of every simulative trajectory he had calculated for it.

It struck true, striking one of the assassins in the head in a red burst of blood and gore. Such a simple manipulation, but it was an excellent confirmation.

More data. More results.

Clovis withdrew a simple frag grenade of his own, primed, and tossed it towards the feet of the last terrified assassin. The grenade should have exploded and ripped him apart – yet it remained inert – and the sensation was tangible to him. With a single command, he could allow fate to take its natural course.

“[Pick it up.]” Clovis ordered the assassin.

He stood there, shivering, terrified, staring widely at the grenade at his feet.

He was trying to fight it. Trying to figure out what was happening.

The machine repeated the command.

“[Pick. It. Up.]”

With trembling hands, the damned man knelt down and took the grenade into his hands, clutching; staring at it as if he took his eyes off it for a moment, it would explode. That, however, was not under his control.

It had served its purpose well enough.

Clovis let fate resume control, and the grenade immediately exploded in the hands of the assassin, leaving a bloody, destroyed corpse behind. He appraised both bodies a few seconds later, and let his hold over fate fade away. The familiar comfort of reality set in again, and the sharpness of the world faded.

He had learned much tonight, exactly what he needed to.

It was a successful field test. More would need to be conducted before he could face a Guardian, but he had a far better idea of the power he had, how to use it – and how he could grow.

Under the full moon, Clovis left the mutilated bodies alone and departed back into the center of the city.

This time, no one followed him.

***

PARIS | SOVIET SOCIALIST REPUBLIC OF FRANCE | LOYALIST SOVIET UNION

The endgame was rapidly approaching. There was a time to take risks, and a time to bail, and Hayden Fox knew that staying in his role any longer would be pushing his luck too far.

Fox didn’t know if Clovis harbored suspicions or not, but he knew it was only a matter of time before he did. He’d seen enough to know that Clovis would turn his attention to him sooner than later – and Clovis had become uncannily good at figuring out who was loyal, who was wavering, and who was a traitor.

That he still wore Luka’s face was almost certainly the reason he’d been able to avoid suspicion – and had a strong alibi for operating away from Clovis. But Clovis’s machine mind was going to notice that things were not lining up soon, and demand explanations. Fox no longer trusted his ability to lie to Clovis.

He was not sure how Clovis was able to discern the truth with such clarity now – but he did, and Fox did not think it was natural.

Something substantial had changed around Clovis Bray.

It wasn’t that he had abandoned yet more of his Humanity in pursuit of his ambitions. It wasn’t his calculated ruthlessness and cold logic that he’d imposed on the Soviet Socialist Republics loyal to him. It was something more intrinsic; more fundamental. There was an alien confidence that should not be there. There was something that he’d been able to actively perceive.

And that alarmed him.

Clovis was employing some form of Paracausality, but he had no idea what it could be – Watcher-7 wasn’t certain either, but he also concurred that whatever Clovis was using, it wasn’t normal.

Assassination was an impossibility from his perspective, as the sheer number of Reality Anchors Clovis surrounded himself with made any attempt too risky.

Though curiously, they were often turned off when Clovis was around as of late. It would have been tempting to take that risk, if Fox hadn’t known that Clovis was a machine, and it would take a millisecond to turn them back on. It struck him as a particularly clever trap, with irresistible bait – but he wasn’t sure that’s all it was.

Irrelevant now. He’d done what he could. KGB operations were fully known to him, and with his departure, Clovis’s intelligence apparatus would be effectively decapitated. Whoever took over would also be crippled, as he was taking every KGB code and cipher with him.

The KGB could find another loyalist easily enough, but they wouldn’t be able to retool their entire encrypted systems and networks without months of work, even with Clovis forcing it to be done in half the time.

All of the intelligence he could gather on active operations and operatives had already been funneled to allies across the borders through Watcher-7, which had already decimated KGB loyalist rings in Russia and other allied territory.

He would only need to do one thing before he left. One final gift for Clovis Bray before his departure.

They were gathered in a previously empty, unmarked building, in an unmarked room. No one knew they were there, no one would suspect it was occupied. The faces of those present were grim, hard, and focused. Fear and doubt were not permitted at the highest levels of Soviet Intelligence. Any existence of such was carefully hidden, as their duty was to serve, no question.

Soviet loyalty was sometimes commendable, but the dogmatic adherence and trust was too easily exploitable. He had firsthand experience with that now, and was going to be taking many lessons when he eventually developed the Guardian intelligence apparatus. The idea that the Guardians might infiltrate them had never seemed to occur, despite the displayed power.

A fatal mistake.

The people he had gathered were the most senior officials left, from the KGB, GRU, and Soviet military intelligence. Officers, operatives, and analysts all. The head of the chimera that had ensured Soviet domination in Europe. One that was now going to receive a rather damning revelation as to their actual knowledge.

Any redundancies? He asked Watcher-7

Negative. They came per the orders. Alone. No contingencies. No backup.

Excellent. Blind loyalty has its uses.

Fox, wearing the face of Luka, nodded towards the woman who’d just entered. “[Lock the door. No disturbances.]”

She obeyed without a word, and took her seat at the long table, at which he sat at the head. The office room was bare, with dim lighting, and blank electronics. This was verbal only. A senior KGB official took out a small device, and at Luka’s nod, turned it on, filling the room with white noise.

“[Thank you for coming,]” he began. “[This will be a brief, but important message. One that is critical to the security of the Soviet Union, and highly sensitive.]”

He looked between their faces, maintaining the facade of complete seriousness. “[Only the General Secretary knows what I am about to tell you. This will not go beyond this room until you receive direction. Is that clear?]”

There were nods and affirmatives around the room. Fox let the moment hang. “[There is evidence that the Guardians have successfully compromised our networks. Some of you are aware of the collapse of HUMINT rings within the Motherland. We know the reason why. We have confirmed instances of Guardians shapeshifting into previously mythical creatures. We know they can also replicate this by mimicking people now.]”

Faces shifted, eyes narrowed, lips pursed. He could tell there was a sudden alarm in the room. They could guess why they were all here now. The seed had been planted, and for his own amusem*nt, he was curious how far they would take it. “[I believe,]” Fox said. “[This individual is attempting to gain access to the General Secretary to assassinate him. And they are getting closer.]”

“[Director, are you laying an accusation?]” One KGB operative interjected carefully.

Fox met the man’s eyes. “[Not today. Not…now. But we know this Guardian is active, and if their methods change following this meeting…]” a thin smile crossed his face. “[It will be telling.]”

The atmosphere in the room had become decidedly oppressive, suspicion had been planted, and it was almost a pity that he wouldn’t be able to see how it could develop after this. Paranoia, mistrust, all of it would be effective. “[The good news,]” he said. “[I know for a fact that no one I invited is a traitor.]”

There was a moment of relief – and then alarm.

Some of them realized the truth.

Just a little too late.

“[Because that Guardian is here,]” Fox stood, as the Light suffused his features, changing and morphing them into his own skin for the first time in quite a while. It felt good to smile with his own lips, and see in their faces the dawning horror when they recognized him. “[And he has served his role well.]”

They knew he was supposed to be dead. They’d known for weeks now.

There was just enough time for them to realize just how long they’d been compromised; how every failure and disruption had come from within. How not a single one of them had noticed until now.

“[Enjoy your last breaths,]” Fox said, the Light suffusing his form. “[No one will hear them.]”

With the Light he wrapped a thin barrier around him, as he lit a small paracausal flame in his hand that would rapidly cannibalize the oxygen in the room that he’d now sealed. Sudden panic and paranoia gripped the room as the shallow atmosphere became apparent, and they grasped their throats, panic making them take in more and more gulps.

Some pulled out their weapons, and fired pointlessly against him which were stopped by the barrier around him. Some tried to charge him, which he stopped by a motion before forcibly expelling all oxygen from the man’s lungs, sending him convulsing to the ground.

Soon all of the oxygen in the room was gone.

All of the greatest leaders, operatives, and minds of the Soviet intelligence organs soon lay curled or convulsing on the ground, and Fox did not let the flame fade until their bodies had stopped moving. When the last corpse was still, he let the barrier fall, and took a breath as he surveyed his handiwork.

His job was done. It was time to return to the Guardians and finish this war more openly.

“Dispose of the bodies,” he ordered Watcher-7. “We’re done here.”

“As instructed,” the silver Ghost began flying to each body, and reducing each one to its composite atoms. It did not take long for the room to be emptied, and all trace of life erased. With any luck it would be several days before anyone realized what had happened, and another few wasted days trying to find the bodies.

That was unless Clovis did not deduce the truth first. A possibility, one that Fox was interested to see play out.

At last though, his role was over.

It was time to leave.

***

INDIAN NATIONAL CONGRESS | NEW DELHI | REPUBLIC OF INDIAN TERRITORIES

Tehran had fallen.

It appeared that there would be a pause as the Caliphate took some time to secure the hold over the city, but there was no ambiguity as to their ultimate destination. Their next march would be unobstructed - and aimed towards the subcontinent.

The fall of Tehran was a point of no return; the point where the dam broke and dissent began expressing itself en masse like never before. Social media was alight with protests, riots, and conflicts breaking out across India. News commentary was just as breathless as they speculated how the government would respond – which until now had taken an uncharacteristically soft hand.

Bose moved through the crowds that were gathered outside the National Congress, where the Indian government was prepared to give a statement. There were chants, shouts, and demands from the crowd which was being held back by a line of soldiers and riot control. It was peaceful for now, but the air was tense and ready to ignite.

The gathering of the National Congress was aimed to be a show of defiance against the encroaching Caliphate, and the wider anti-Triumvirate sentiment. It was to be a reaffirmation of the unity of the Indian people.

Or so was the claim.

Bose didn’t think that it was necessarily a lie. There were rumors and intelligence floating around about what the Congress, and the President intended to address. The expectation was that they would declare a full mobilization against the Caliphate, presenting the encroaching army as an existential threat to the Indian state.

They weren’t necessarily wrong.

Misguided, but not wrong.

At one point, that might be enough. There would have been enough loyalists to the government that they would have accepted such measures. Looking at the crowds in the heart of New Delhi changed that presupposition.

Anyone who was not a blinded fanatic saw what was coming. They had seen or heard about the individuals wielding divine power. They’d seen them march across the entire Middle East with hardly a pause.

So it was reasonable to wonder – how could they stop them now?

Of course not all of the protests were pushing for peace. In the National Congress there were two competing groups – those who were demanding that negotiations be held with the Caliphate. The others were demanding that drastic measures be taken to actively exterminate any suspected traitor – in this case primarily pertaining to the northern Indians and Muslims across the subcontinent.

It was, unfortunately, not an isolated incident, and Bose had grimly noted that the government appeared in many cases to be directing both groups to fighting each other, leading to the majority of violence. Two very different futures were presenting themselves, and they were wildly incompatible with each other. The Hindutva had identified their enemy, which were the minorities of India, and were demanding the government take action.

Things were going to get worse before they got better.

Bose remained incognito as he walked towards the police line where he would need to pass. Devata was cloaking himself, as a Ghost would attract too much attention right now. Bose found a spot where there was some distance between the people and soldiers, and approached them.

The soldiers who were guarding the checkpoint immediately tensed as he approached, hands resting on their weapons and ready to use them. They were on edge but hadn’t turned hostile – yet.

“[Access is restricted,]” one soldier began, before stiffening – Bose could tell that he recognized him. The other soldiers did as well. “[Why are you here?]”

Bose lifted one palm vertical, facing the soldiers. Atop his palm glowed the symbol of the Traveler, the three-sided shape with rounded points. The Light appeared to burn the symbol into his hand, glowing with white-yellow purity. The crowd could not see it, but every soldier facing him could.

They knew for sure what he was.

“[I am here to preserve India from those who would destroy us.]” Bose answered.

The eyes of the soldiers shifted, towards the crowd and to each other. Bose suspected that some of them were looking for his Ghost, and when no immediate answer came he wondered if they were paralyzed by not knowing what to do. They had heard every story about what a Guardian could do – and with his face, they feared what he was capable of harnessing.

Something changed, and the soldier closest to him stepped to the side. “[Good luck,]” the soldier murmured. “[Stop them before they destroy everything.]”

Bose answered with only a short nod as he made his way into the National Congress. The soldiers closed the gap behind him, and while his entrance seemed to cause some commotion, it had been relatively uneventful.

As he entered the National Congress he resumed communication with his Ghost.

I am inside. It is our time to act.

I have informed our allies. Devata confirmed. All India will know what happens next.

Good. This is our only opportunity.

Bose knew that the moment he interrupted their session, which was to be broadcast all over India, they would send orders to cut it to control the narrative. That was what they would try to do. Thanks to identifying the right people, along with issuing some promises of protection, and a little historical persuasion, there would be enough who refused the orders from the Congress.

And if they somehow were able to end the broadcast, there were contingencies.

The main chamber of the National Congress was a massive building with rows upon rows of seats for each of the Representatives, with a high dome that gave a grand atmosphere to the entire chamber. Along the walls were beautiful painted murals of various parts and figures of Indian history and myth.

Towards the back of the chamber was an elevated platform where the ranking members of the Congress sat, with a podium for addresses to the wider Congress and beyond. The room was bustling as hundreds of Representatives took their seats, and aides and employees rushed to and fro.

Bose waited on the outskirts of the chamber, taking a moment to observe and assess. The route had been memorized by him well in preparation for this moment, and he waited for a moment, knowing that he had gained some attention from the security. They didn’t know him yet, as their focus was on the organized chaos of the chamber.

President Sardar himself was present before the podium he’d be speaking at, preparing his own address, and surrounded by aides and advisors around him. The start of the address was approaching, and when the session started with the Indian anthem, that was when he would make his way forward.

There was movement. They were approaching him.

“[Sir,]” a voice said right beside him. “[I need your name and ID.]”

Bose turned to the two approaching guards, who suddenly froze when they saw his face. He smiled, putting one finger to his lips as Devata appeared behind both of them, and with a brief flash teleported both of them away before they could even react.

The relative obscurity of where he was had ensured no one else noticed him – yet. However the clock was now ticking, and he couldn’t take too many risks.

He wasn’t afraid of dying here, but a fight was not an ideal outcome. A fight would just lead to a bloodbath, not just here, but across the subcontinent. If everything went well today, the violence would be minimal. Most of the Representatives were seated, and Bose moved a few steps forward.

There was an announcement for the Congress to stand for the national anthem of India. As the gathered stood as one, that was when the broadcast would begin. He only waited a few more seconds until the first notes played, and began walking towards the elevated podium.

The President would not give his speech today, and would never give another one.

Once he was finished, the Indian state as they knew it would be gone forever, consigned to the depths of history. It would be one day remembered as a black mark on India – and a lesson for any tyrants who thought to emulate the height of the Triumvirate.

It was always hubris that brought them low.

They who believed they could defy the divine.

Ready? He asked Devata.

Let’s begin.

Devata became visible, and hovered above his shoulder while he walked, the Ghost’s iris glowing a bright yellow. His walk was noticed almost immediately, with expressions initially confused or outraged – which turned to awe, surprise and terror once they saw the Ghost. The other guards were instantly alerted, but didn’t move to stop him, instead placing their hands on their impotent weapons.

Bose saw the clear and honest emotion in their eyes as they all understood what was happening.

The realization of their worst fears come to pass.

He ascended the stairs to where the President stood, and whose attention to the anthem was lost the moment he locked eyes with Bose. There was nothing in his eyes but panic and terror. He knew what was coming next, and paralysis rendered him only an observer.

Every camera in the chamber turned towards him, and journalists who’d been preparing notes seemed shocked at what was happening before them. The last notes of the anthem faded, and a stunned, almost surreal silence that descended upon the National Congress. Every Representative present did not dare to speak.

All eyes were on him, in this room, and around the nation.

Bose placed his hands on the podium, looking into the crowd of men and women who had come here to declare their unity; their allegiance to the old world one last time before the Caliph came to burn it, and consign India to the fires of judgement.

Not so any longer.

So he began speaking, but his speech was not for them. It was an address to the nation – one that was very different from what had been planned.

“[They came to tell you a lie.]” He began.

He let the opening hang.

Orders went to cut the broadcast as anticipated, Devata informed him. As expected. Broadcast is still live.

It had worked.

“[This President, this government, these leaders, to whom they are entrusted the sacred responsibility of statesmanship,]” Bose continued. “[It was to them the safety of the state, and all who reside in it, was given. Leadership. Protection. Wisdom. Prosperity. That was their mission. Their responsibility.]”

He paused. “[They have failed. This I, and all others know – as do they. They know the truth, they have known it for a long time, and instead of confronting, addressing, and changing it – they came to lie. For they cannot let go of what they held on to for so long. They cannot accept their failure, even if they condemn everyone else with them as a consequence.]”

He lifted his chin. “[My name is Subhas Chandra Bose. I am part of India’s history, dying for the struggle of our independence. And again, today, they attempted to silence me, and halt news of my return. Because they know why I have been returned – it is to lay the truth bare.]”

“[I look at what India has become. I have read what has been done. I speak to Indians of all colors and creeds, and I do not feel pride or joy at what has been accomplished, but shame at what the legacies of those who led the fight for independence have been turned into.]”

Eyes flashed across the chambers, upon each of the Representatives frozen in place. “[What is this mockery of India that has been created? A state captured by fanatics and radicals, who see it their divine mission to destroy the diversity and harmony of India for the sake of elevating the chosen people – while abusing those who are defined as lesser.]”

His eyes bored into the representatives. “[I will brook no ambiguity, and let all across the subcontinent and beyond hear my words: India is not only for the Hindus or those of the appropriate skin and dress. What right do we have to invade, oppress, and exploit others of the world. Was that not what was done to us for centuries?]”

“[No,]” he said quietly. “[What India has become is not a nation broken free of the British imperialism that once chained us. It has become its successor.]”

There was a ripple for the first time in the crowd as the weight of that particular judgement fell. Fear was plainly felt; a dawning of all of their sins returned, and broadcast to the world.

“[And now,]” he said, his voice soft; quiet. “[Your judgement comes. The reaping of what has been sown for decades upon decades, each of you believing you were insulated from consequences. Understand that no one who has taken part in this evil will escape the justice that is coming. You know what form it will take, and it marches from the north.]”

He lifted one hand. “[That was your fate. It has been changed. It is not the place of foreigners to render judgement upon you. It will come from within, and it will come by my hand. Under your leadership, you would drag and condemn all of India in a war you will lose, because you have not been given the divine authority that has been instilled by the being who has come to liberate not just this nation, but all nations.]”

Bose’s hand glowed with the Traveler’s symbol. “[The Republic of Indian Territories has come to an end. It is part of a dying, deteriorating world. There must be a new India, one capable of rebuilding, or reconciliation, and of healing. I am here to bring this about. I seek not to cause civil war – but to initiate change.]”

He closed his hand, lowered it, and turned to Sardar. “[President Sardar, there are two paths presented to you – which will define your legacy, and determine your fate. Step aside, and dissolve this state and the authority that yet remains. Or refuse, and face a judgement of swords.]”

Sardar’s mouth began to open, but whatever he was going to say was interrupted.

Something had snapped finally, and pandemonium broke out. Guards were firing at each other, and into the crowd of representatives. In seconds there was only chaos. He saw one of the Guards raising his rifle at him, and with a motion a white-transparent shield appeared, absorbing the bullets.

With the Light he reached out, and performed a little trick he had been practicing. With a nudge, the soul of the one who’d shot him became weakened and minimally tethered to the corporeal body. The guard’s mouth opened in a wordless scream, paralyzed in place as the body attempted to reconnect itself with the soul.

He wouldn’t be getting up anytime soon, but Bose wasn’t happy with what had happened. His lips pursed as he took in the chaos, knowing that a truly peaceful resolution was now impossible. First, the situation here needed to be resolved.

He could only hope that across India, the violence was contained.

But no matter the crimes of these people – they would not face punishment today.

Their judgement would come later.

Now though, he was known, and would act, and with the Light in hand, Bose stepped forward to restore order.

***

TEHRAN | IRAN | RECLAIMED CALIPHATE TERRITORIES

There didn’t seem to be a better time to visit the rapidly expanding Caliphate with their capture of Tehran. Valentin thought it a fine way to finish out his world tour, and out of where he’d visited, this was one of the developments that struck Valentin as more…conflicting.

Religion was not something he had particularly cared for. The Soviet Union had not been as anti-theocratic as their earliest incarnations; a necessary evolution with Europe under their control - but religion was at best portrayed as another extension of Communist thought.

It had never been particularly compelling propaganda, especially since the official secularism of the Soviet state made sure that any religious entity was fully controlled. It had been a policy that he’d never really felt strongly about one way or another. History had given few reasons to see organized religion as a force for good.

So to see something like the Caliphate rise was…strange.

It remained alien in many ways, but following his ascension to Speaker, he now felt like he understood a critical part of the religious puzzle that had always been absent. The belief and faith. He could never have imagined putting either in an absent, invisible entity that you prayed too. Faith had never worked for him, because he’d seen no reason to believe.

He understood faith a bit better than before.

Shaheed had formally invited him to visit Tehran following its liberation. Most of the celebrations were now over, and the Caliphate was focusing on restoring governmental functions. Business, politics, and the future was likely to be the order of the day. To that end he’d also brought Gheleon along, for several reasons.

The first was because Holliday wanted the Confederation to build a good relationship with the Caliphate, but Valentin figured this would be a good test of Gheleon’s Vanguard system. Valentin was unclear how the Caliphate was run and organized - and it would be best to see how this ideal fit into the Vanguard framework.

Gheleon also seemed ready and eager to put it into practice. If the system could accommodate a Caliphate, a quite literal theocratic state, it could accommodate anything. In that respect, this was a very important case study.

He’d also have to get Shaheed on board with the idea, along with anyone he was working with. Valentin believed that the merit of the system was clear, though Shaheed may be more skeptical. He didn’t want to necessarily force restrictions or laws, but as Speaker, he did need to come away with this with a solution one way or another.

Both of them arrived relatively incognito, and his robes were a lighter tan rather than the familiar white. His mask remained the same, but he didn’t stand out as much. Gheleon was similarly dressed in attire more befitting the region.

They walked the main street towards where the main capitol building was, which served as the center of government for the reconstructed Iranian administration. The street was packed and chaotic. He and Gheleon drew stares, but most of them kept to themselves since they rightly assumed he was on business.

Gheleon took a moment to look at the building they were approaching. “It looks new.”

Valentin took a closer look - and he was right. In contrast to the surrounding buildings, it was clearly built from newer materials, and lacked the weathered tear and grime, making it stand out rather starkly. It was much more ornate and creative than the more traditionally efficient office buildings. A place rebuilt by the Guardians within the Caliphate?

He would have to ask Shaheed. Knowing what had happened here, it seemed plausible that this was once some monument or building that the Indians had torn down or destroyed during their occupation, which had been restored. In record time too, thanks to the Light.

It wasn’t just the building that caught his attention, among the chaos of the streets were plenty of merchants, vendors, and other people on the street vying for attention. It definitely hadn’t taken long for some kind of normalcy to reestablish itself.

One of the voices caught his attention, and Valentin moved closer to it to make it out.

“[God almighty has sent judgment upon the tyrants!]” a preacher was yelling to a small crowd of gathered Iranians. He spoke Farsi, and Valentin had to take a moment to adjust the Light to allow him to interpret his words. “[An angel has come! The Traveler! To smite the wicked oppressors from their thrones, to tear them out! One and all! Root and stem!]”

Around him the crowd murmured in angry agreement, whispering of the jihad to liberate India. The purification of disbelievers and infidels from the world by divine might. Simmering, tangible resentment churning into boiling hatred.

“[Join the armies!]” The preacher declared. “[Live a hero, or die a martyr for the end times approach! Pay them back. Blood. For. Blood!]”

Behind him, the green banner of the Caliphate was spray painted on the wall. A green field with a black circle centered around a white eagle. “[Spare none!]” He cried. “[All the tyrants and oppressors! Let none escape judgement!]”

All of them! The crowd breathed in the electric air. Some immediately marched off towards a recruitment Officer standing at the edge of the street within sight of the preacher. Others ran off to grab their friends or other bystanders.

“[Look up! Behold! Her sanctified favor to our holy wrath against the enemies, a divine sign.]” The preacher declared. “[We. Are. Commanded to annihilate them all. No matter the price. No cost too precious. No price too steep. Long live the martyrs, hail, hail to the Caliphate of the Traveler! Of God almighty! Of his chosen people!}”

Eyes wild with fervor and hatred, the earnest honesty of his words and passion whipped the crowd into being enraptured. All of them mesmerized by the words and sense of grandness. The roiling crowd cheered before finally dispersing, a few going up to speak to the preacher.

“Well,” Gheleon commented. “That’s not good.”

It was not exactly the kind of message he’d wanted to hear - and he knew for certain that the Traveler would not want people to become fanatics in Her name. The conflation of the Traveler with existing religion, making Her an agent, or embodiment of any deity, was one that struck him as particularly…sacreligious.

However, it did make him realize that for the common person, especially those religiously inclined, what was the Traveler if not a manifestation of divine will? And She was divine - but not in the way these people understood.

Though that nuance didn’t matter, because there was a more powerful factor at play.

Rationality.

The greatest weakness of religions was that faith was all they could point to. There were anecdotes, claims, and isolated stories of miracles. But nothing anyone could ever point to as real. God could not be proven real. The supernatural was a myth, and miracles didn’t exist. It was easy for religion to fade when faith was shown to be insufficient.

Now though, all of those things did exist. They could not be denied.

Divinity was tangibly, factually, real. Everyone had witnessed it across the world. There was no coherent rationalization for what the Light was capable of, except that it was divine, and those who wielded it were agents of the divine.

Valentin realized that this development was one he’d not given much thought to. His focus had been exclusively fixated on the Triumvirate, the development of his fellow Guardians, and the future that came after.

Not about what the people were believing, and what they were doing now.

He’d been running from one war, one crisis to the other, and on the streets he was now seeing what was being cultivated. He remembered he’d also felt it in Moscow. People who were being driven to take up arms, for they were driven by something stronger, and were assured that they had the divine on their side.

And so many of them were angry.

Now those angry people now had a chance to strike back, and wage a war that was not just personal and material, but in many ways, holy.

Gheleon raised an eyebrow in his direction, noticing his stillness and silence. “First time seeing a street preacher? I know that wasn’t common in the Soviet Union?”

“No, it wasn’t common,” Valentin said.

“I’m not particularly familiar with Islam,” Gheleon said, rubbing his chin. “But I’m very familiar with Christianity. Catholicism dominates South America, and the mainland had many evangelicals. This?”

He jabbed a thumb towards the preacher. “Heard a lot of this kind of thing before.”

“Was it as popular?”

“Usually not,” Gheleon said. “That started changing once the Traveler arrived. Do you want to know an interesting fact?”

“Tell me.”

“When Amanda called up people to volunteer, the largest group of people per capita who answered were Christians of every sect,” he said. “We had pastors and priests asking how they could support the effort. They gave sermons that, to summarize, said to follow Holliday or end up in Hell.”

He glanced around the street, which had returned to its bustling chaos. “Do you want to know who were our best sources for the intelligence we got on the Constitutionalists? Churches and Christians passing us tips. Troop movements, officer locations, deployments. Even people who housed agents and allies.”

He clicked his tongue. “Everywhere else, where we control, it’s a bit different. I don’t think Holliday fully understands how she’s viewed by people. Anyone who isn’t going along with the program? We had more than a few cases of pastors who denounced the Traveler as an antichrist being murdered.”

Valentin remembered his discussions with Lenin. How, in the course of discussing how he’d secured the state, he’d casually mentioned how loyalists had detained or executed those still loyal to Clovis. How there were crowds of thousands who listened to him speak, and mobilized across Russia.

It sounded eerily familiar to some things Gheleon was describing. There was some irony in that Lenin, despite being a firmly atheist man, seemed to invoke a similar religious fervor, though one whose ideals were Communist, not religious. All rallied in the Traveler’s name, who would bring them utopia.

All of that brought to the forefront something else that made him wonder - how much of this sentiment could be controlled. This anger, it could be harnessed, but there was an event horizon somewhere, and he wondered if there was something even he could say to defuse it. He, and every other Guardian.

He needed to think on it, and find an answer, before it was too late.

“Let’s go,” Valentin said, seeing more people pay attention to them. “We don’t want to be late.”

Gheleon nodded as both of them finally entered the building.

Caliphate soldiers whispered prayers as they saw Valentin pass, recognizing his mask, and seeing the Ghosts which had materialized by their shoulders.

It was a beautiful building, which made Valentin wonder if whoever had built it - be it Shaheed or another - had architectural experience. Regardless, it was a pleasant walk, and eventually they made their way to where Shaheed had asked them to meet. The Caliphal Courtroom, which was impossible to miss given the ornate door - and the helpful signs pointing the way.

The soldiers at the doors pulled them open as they approached, and both men stepped inside.

Laying flat against a floor-level couch, Shaheed stood up to greet them.

“Take your shoes off, please,” he requested. “This must be your first time in an Arabian -” Shaheed struggled, searching for a word. “We call it a majlis,” he said, motioning to the cushioned seatings that were almost ground level. “I am trying to find an adequate word to explain the concept, but I am unable to. Please, take a seat.”

“A beautiful building,” Valentin said, as he obliged with the request, taking off his boots, with Gheleon doing the same. “One recently constructed, I see. Who created it?”

“A Persian Guardian, one with a concerning enthusiasm for cultural architecture in the name of, and I quote, ‘an epistemological reclaiming of native culture in civilisational organization,’ and so forth,” Shaheed said. “To which I have realized I am entirely out of my field and informed him so long as it was safe, livable, and good looking, he could do as he wished.”

“He did a fine job,” Valentin took a seat, and decided to take his mask off, setting it to the side, and letting the golden radiance suffuse his vision. Here, it seemed appropriate, and he was familiar enough with it now that it was not as overwhelming as it once was. He could see the chaos still, but he also could control how much it was.

The golden purity suffused everything, but he could sharpen it to see detail in everything far more than he ever could have before.

“Gheleon, was it?” Shaheed asked, turning his attention to the American. “We’ve never met before. European?”

“Indeed. Jonas Gheleon, acting Vice President of the Confederation of American States,” he inclined his head. “President Holliday sends her regards and congratulations on your victories. She intends to visit once our own domestic affairs are sorted. And while I am of European heritage, I am most assuredly American.”

He took a seat on the ground. “It’s a pleasure to meet you, Caliph al-Najar.”

Shaheed glared for a moment, then winced. “Apologies, force of habit. I’ve yet to get used to the idea of Americans being friends. I’m more acquainted with American speeches regarding being a terrorist and drone strikes.”

“In fairness,” Gheleon’s lips thinned into a smile. “Your people earned that moniker. Perhaps for justified reasons, but we need not pretend we’re angels. The Traveler brought us together, and certainly sees in us great potential - but our pasts remain, and are remembered.”

“One man’s terrorist,” Shaheed began, letting it hang.

“Yes, I’m well aware of that, though the phrase relates to motives, not actions,” Gheleon said with a chuckle. “I’m well aware your actions were, quite reasonably, justified. But at the end of the day, you had your suicide bombers, car bombings, and I haven’t quite forgotten when a group of gunmen massacred the US Congress.”

His smile remained. “Bastards, almost all of them. I didn’t mourn too many of them, but all the same. Let’s be honest with ourselves, yes?”

There was a long moment of quiet, as Shaheed met Gheleon’s eyes unblinding. “You seem a little confused, I’ve never engaged in those manners of attacks. That had always been Osiris’ philosophy, never mine. He and I have never seen eye to eye,” Shaheed said, reclining against a stiff-arm cushion. “Though I will admit, perhaps I have been even worse than him when it came to enemy soldiers.”

“War is an ugly and amoral thing,” Gheleon said. “I saw enough of it firsthand. I don’t find it useful to judge or condemn. I do, though, think it important to be honest. I saw enough revisionism in my time in the Soviet Union.”

“It’s strange,” Shaheed mused. “When I was a guerrilla insurgent, I respected what Osiris did. In the way one respects a vicious lion. But now, here. Calmer. Older…” he looked away. “I wonder how long it would have taken me to reach the same place he did?”

Valentin looked at Shaheed, and saw the entirety of his being. The infinite mutabilities and possibilities. Now he was calm, reflective; he was not a man who was inclined to the same darkness that had been, and still was, part of Osiris.

“Time,” Valentin said after a moment. “Is not what changes people. It is experiences. Losses. Impacts. Osiris did not become ruthless, indifferent and callous due to time alone. He lost his home. He lost his family. He lost his brothers. It was a culmination of many different factors. It would have been the same for you. Only you know what you think you cannot live without.”

Shaheed nodded silently, and seemed to indicate a silent acknowledgment to move to a different topic of discussion. “Have you toured the city, Valentin?” Shaheed asked. “Tell me what you think of it.”

“I spent some time in its streets,” he answered. “I listened, and found a comparison I didn’t expect. The feel of the city. A fervor in the air, the charge of men and women rallying under the banner, readying for battle. Do you know what it reminded me of?”

“The Bolshevik revolution?” Shaheed attempted, tilting his head.

“Or the one in Moscow today,” Valentin answered. “I came recently from Moscow. Despite completely different cities, environments, histories, and governments…it felt exactly the same. The intensity. The fervor. You feel it as well, don’t you?”

“It haunts me,” Shaheed said after a moment. “Valentin. I’m the son of a bedouin carpenter who has done nothing his whole life except fight in the desert and kill soldiers. An insurgent guerrilla. All those people, coming to me, looking for answers…”

“And you wonder why,” Valentin finished, his own eyes shifting elsewhere. “My parents came from rural Siberia. No one of consequence. Agricultural workers. Becoming a Cosmonaut was more than they had hoped for. But I was just one of tens of thousands. And out of everyone…”

He looked at Vigil. “It was me She chose to be Her Speaker.’

“You’ve been all chosen, because you are all faithful,” an old dignified voice said. “Earnest devotees. Honest. Genuine. True believers.”

Valentin turned his head, and saw a new man entered. A much older man, with the ornate attire of an Ayatollah. This, he surmised, was Hamaza. A man he’d heard much about, but this was the first time that they’d met in person. The infamous leader of the Resistance, who in the end would see what he’d built succeed.

“I have…” Hamza started, sitting there, at the threshold of the doorway. “Wondered. Deeply. What is it that this great scheme of the Traveler is? The Ghosts. The politics. I realized, then, you are all religious adherents. You simply do not know it yet.”

It was not what he would have ever described himself as, but he did wonder about it now. The divine were real, and he served one. Was that as simple as being a religious adherent? Was it truly faith if it all was real?

“Human psychology, Speaker, is universal. All Humans are fundamentally human. All fanatics are the same. Communists revering the altar of Lenin, just as the Catholics pray to the tombs of saints. Systems of Beliefs are just that. Call them ideology. Call them religions. The Arabic language has a more elegant word of it. Deen. Systems of Beliefs,” Hamaza looked old and tired in that moment. “Beliefs. This is all it comes down to. You can see it now. You must be able to see it. The threads are being weaved. The cloth of beliefs.”

“Beliefs,” Valentin said in a soft voice. “There is a picture that is becoming clearer. I do not…see like I used to. I see everything. Too much sometimes. It is overwhelming, but it is becoming clearer. The threads though, the threads I see being spun, even if the tapestry is still being woven. The Light is infinite, until it is shaped.”

“Tell me, Speaker, what is the difference between magic and science?” Hamaza asked, taking his sandals off and crossing the boundary to sit with them. “What is the line between faith and reason?”

“If you had asked me once,” Valentin answered. “I would have said that science is repeatable, provable, and can be tangibly studied.” In his hand he snapped his fingers, and a small white candle-like flame ignited above them. “What I just did is scientifically impossible. It should not be possible to do. Yet it is. Clearly our methodology, our mindset, was flawed.”

“There is magic, Speaker, in the birth of every child. There is magic in the serene breeze,” Hamaza said. “You do not see it as such, merely because you understand it. But do you know the science of the zygote? The formula of thermodynamics? Magic is the word we use for things we do not understand. Forgetting that everything has a reason. There is nothing truly magical.”

“Everything has an explanation, an order,” Valentin mused. “We just may be blind to it.”

Hamaza sat down, cross-legged before Valentin. “I understand you are a Communist, or were, once. Religion is something you are deeply unfamiliar with. To you, religion is belief in the supernatural, in things without evidence, an emotional irrational thing.”

Valentin thought for a moment of how to answer. Best to be honest. “Yes. My experience with organized religion has been at a distance. There was little enticing to me. I had little interest in an apathetic god.”

“Then perhaps you will find something useful in what I know,” Hamaza said. “The greatest logicians of Humanity had been the faithful; they who were masters of reason. I have spent lifetimes among men whose knowledge and intellect dwarfed me, in my young age. Now I stand the master, where once I was student.”

Hamaza’s voice was thoughtful. “Religion is the foundation of all civilisations and arts. It is the source of all reasonings. The fundamental reason. No magic. No supernatural. The science of the ultimate structure of reality. I have studied that science for a lifetime, seeking the fundamental truths of reality.”

Valentin listened, curious how he would finish.

“You are the servant of the God mankind has always heard in their dreams, your Ghosts have all but acknowledged it. Your Traveler knows it; why do you think She does not deny it?” Hamaza asked. “Why do you think you are the Speaker for an entity that can speak for itself?”

“Because I am to be a conduit; a representative,” Valentin said. “A leader, a Guardian. To shape and guide Humanity into the future.”

“Yes, but that is more than you think. You are the link between Man and Divine, she is gathering to you the multitude of every shape and dress of faith. She is asking you a question you are not yet hearing; she is waiting for a reply she knows will take time,” Hamaza stated. “Call it ideology. Call it religion. It is all faith. It is all belief. It is the reasoning of systems of belief that guide men.”

“Ah,” Gheleon suddenly smiled. “Succinctly put, Ayatollah. It is interesting to think of systems outside the conventions of state and ideology. Interesting.”

“That is what the Traveler is forcing us all to do,” Hamaza replied. “I can see it more clearly now. We are all bound together, forced to understand each other beyond the boundaries we believed to hold true. To see beyond the arbitrary lines.”

As Valentin listened, he indeed saw what was being said here, and how it fit into what he already knew.

His role was not just to lead and guide Humanity, it was not just to institute a new world order through tangible governments and administrations. All of those would be needed, but they weren’t the unifying factor. It wasn’t to be just the safeguard against Human nature - because the Traveler would never expect them to be so passive.

They - He - was to define the new ‘system of belief’ as Hamaza had called it. A system not for any specific people, nation, or ideology, but for all Mankind. To cultivate a new kind of belief, a new faith, a new system that would achieve what nothing else had been able to in Human history.

This was his test, and only by understanding Humanity could he hope to do this.

This was why so many different Guardians had been raised. From different nations, different religions, even different periods of history. Together they formed a complete tapestry of Mankind, and together they provided comprehension; understanding. However, he had to take the knowledge, and build upon it.

Only together would they be able to lead Humanity into the Light.

“I look at you, Speaker, and wonder if this is how the Isrealites felt when they saw the sea split,” Hamaza said. “Knowing that generations to come will forget what had been seen. That miracles are always forgotten. That all that remains afterwards is logic and truth and belief.”

A small smile crossed Valentin’s face, fading as he thought about what would come later. “Eventually, perhaps they will forget. But there will be new miracles, new discoveries. I’ve learned that when we assume we understand everything, we can very easily be proven wrong.”

“It is the nature of men to wonder, to want magic from the divine,” Hamaza mused, smiling back at him. “Not knowing there is no magic. There is no supernatural. There is only what is, and what is not. Something either is, or it is not. There is only the truth.”

The old man raised his wrinkled, tired hands, marked by age, an age now gone. “All the belief systems of man; all religions and ideologies and faiths…They have sought the truth. The truth of creation. What an irony that the truth itself should come to us after seeking it for so long.”

Valentin wondered what the reaction of a person of faith would be to learn that their God was not an omni-potent deity, but merely an alien of immense power. Would it be denial? Disappointment? Anger? That would be a valid question, were it not for a very simple truth.

An alien. What did that mean? Would angels be aliens? Describing what something was and what it meant were two entirely different things.

The Traveler was divine. And it was alien. And She was divine. None of that was questionable. Or irrational. The meaning was beyond clear.

She had been called an alien. Her power had been called magic. Impossible. Unscientific. Yet undeniably real. He knew what this power was. Paracausality. It was not an enigma to him anymore, not something as crude as magic. It was perfectly understandable, perfectly rational.

But it hadn’t been his first instinct, nor millions of other people. It wasn’t how they thought about the universe in terms of the unknown or intangible.

“Speaker,” Hamaza said. “All the religions of man are built upon a fundamental logic and reason. It is the flaws of men in seeking perfect truth, that results in imperfect beliefs. Look. Look around you, at the evidence you embody. Where do you think the reasoning of man leads him? Moses split the sea once. What if he never died? The Prophet spoke divine words. What if he never ceased speaking?”

Valentin initially didn’t understand what was being said - until he realized the implication. Those who had been present for the miracles, and preached the divine of God - they had eventually perished, and their lives and stories at best recorded and retold. Yet eventually they faded into legend and the mythologies arisen in their place.

But Guardians did not die.

So long as the Traveler’s Light touched this world, the Guardians would remain Her chosen servants and vessels. There would be no misunderstandings or warped beliefs. For the Guardians would remain.

Forever.

“That’s the missing link.” Gheleon suddenly said.

Valentin turned to him. “Elaborate?”

“Lenin and I spoke when he visited the United States,” Gheleon said. “He highlighted something important in the Vanguard System. The system itself is sufficient from an administrative standpoint, but it was missing a connective aspect. The unifying force. The Vanguard alone cannot just be what connects us if there are a dozen different nations, under different systems, we merely get a world much the same.”

He looked at Hamaza. “The system requires belief. Shared expectations, shared values, a shared faith, if you want to use this term. No single word captures what is needed. In addition to a system of governance, it requires a system of belief to accompany it.”

“All great civilisations arise with great beliefs,” Hamaza said. “Islam. Christianity. Buddhism. Rome’s Pantheon and Persia’s Zoroaster. The seeking of greater values, greater things guide reason towards purpose.”

“That was why the Triumvirate failed,” Gheleon said. “They lost their purpose. Their mission. The purpose of their existence. The Triumvirate was born of mutual interest, not shared purpose, not a true mission. If there had ever been one, it has been one long forgotten, and power became the justification in and of itself. Each member drifted apart, focusing on their own ambitions and plans.”

“Left without purpose,” Valentin murmured. “Power they didn’t have anything to use on, but their own desires and entertainment.”

“They became their own false idols,” Hamaza said. “A glorious golden calf.”

“I thought that it was changing for a time,” Gheleon said. “I wondered why Clovis, who seemed to possess a vision, and ideal beyond the vapidness of so many leaders, ultimately failed to convince so many.”

“Because it was for him,” Valentin finished. “He appointed himself as the leader and savior of Man. He believes it. But it is a self-fulfilling prophecy for him, where without him, there is no future, no Humanity. By pursuit of his vision, he shut himself out from all other possibilities.”

“It is an Islamic axiom,” Hamaza started. “That all men worship something. Either themselves, their pleasures, or higher values. The only question is what to worship; what to serve? The divine is a compass, to which we seek to emulate and reach. A direction to head towards. A purpose of things.”

“Humanity possesses something unique among many species,” Vigil suddenly floated forward. “A myriad of religions and spirituality. Species often have ‘priests’ or an equivalent. Some who hold a high status, others less important. Human words make communicating the differences difficult. They all seek the truth of reality. They all undertake this ‘science of truth’ attempting to find the ultimate purpose of life. They all arrive at different understandings. Different beliefs.”

His fins rotated as his core seemed to fixate on each Guardian. “Humanity is unusual in this regard, because despite your inclination towards the spiritual, you have not advanced your own understanding of this aspect of reality until She arrived. Yet the Traveler is pleased at this aspect of your people. Her journeys take Her many places, and it is a dull journey if it is all the same.”

Valentin was surprised to hear that. He hadn’t expected that, of all the things that would make Humanity unique among the stars, it would be their religious and spiritual inclinations.

“Your Ghosts await you to discover things, before they further push you aboard the paths of the discovery,” Hamaza said. “I have attempted to ask Eagle questions, he does not answer me.”

“I am entirely under no obligation to answer your insightful questions,” Eagle replied, briefly departing from Shaheed’s shoulder. “There is a process to revelation. The Traveler has a plan.”

He knew that She had a plan, and now he had an idea of what that might be. Every religion he could think of, and those secular philosophies to challenge them, had attempted to answer a fundamental question of why they were here. What their ultimate purpose in life was. What did they matter in the scheme of the universe?

He’d never been bothered by the idea that they ultimately didn’t matter, that when they died, that was the end. He didn’t need a grander purpose to go on. Now though, there was more. He understood more.

So maybe now he could ask the question, one which Vigil seemed to be waiting for, as did the others in the room.

“What is life’s purpose?” He asked.

But it was not Vigil who answered. It was Her.

|| Amidst the endless Skies ||

Lights radiated off of each of the Ghosts, their shells segmenting and their cores channeling the pure, overwhelming Paracausality that pierced everything. Hamaza ran to the edge of the room as Shaheed stood, covering his face with both hands, being pushed back a step with every breath.

Gheleon’s face became blank, eyes wide and sightless, mouth opened and reeling backwards, uncomprehending of the voice ringing without sound, the sight without vision, the taste without a tongue; the raw meaning spoken without words.

|| There is a place without a whisper of evil ||

The material world faded completely, and he was overcome with a vision of the Sky, in its impollute, radiant infinity that he had glimpsed through the Gate in the Spire. He was for a moment nothing but a luminous being, who was tempted to release the bonds of matter holding him together and join the place he belonged. He felt Her focus on him, so intense it was manic.

|| A place where not even a fly would be hurt, where the lion sleeps with the lamb ||

Light rippled through the world, the very communication of these concepts unraveling the place around them. Segments split off, drifting to spaces beyond. Dimensions deeper within tomorrow and yesterday moving closer, the world expanding.

Atop a sheared segment of a room that reflected itself, Gheleon drifted. He was dancing with someone he didn’t know, laughing with them. They looked like Gheleon himself.

Shaheed was huddled between hundreds of men and women, all of them patting him on the back. All of them looked like him. The uncanny resemblance was familial. They were being pulled into every direction.

Expanded.

Stretched out.

|| Where joys will never end. Where time is now and before and after ||

He saw himself, there was a glass in his hand, the color of its contents a kaleidoscope beyond the visual spectrum; but the figure was not him, for its skin was as white and smooth as a Ghost shell, and the eyes were Vigil’s eyes. The Vigil-Valentin smiled, and on his skin he saw a faint reflection of himself, which met him a much older man, yet whose vigor remained the same.

It did not matter how old he was or looked, because time did not have meaning anymore.

|| The lost will gather again ||

There were countless shades that he saw; figures which stretched as far as the eye could see and away from the senses of imagination. Features of faces that continually shifted and changed. Billions upon billions, an infinite, uncountable number of everyone who had died, and would ever die. Spirits of the fallen, a prophetic mass gathered before him.

|| Each of them to drink at the banquet of Eternity ordained ||

He was to lead them to Her.

So he led.

He led them through the Sky, through the beautiful, incomprehensible eternity, until he reached a place as infinite as Mankind's collective dream could conceive; a banquet hall, a horizon within a horizon where the served food and the offered drink were bound by no restriction.

He found in his hand a cup. He lifted it in a toast. The endless joined him in raised celebration.

|| From the first Ancestor to the last of the Descendants. The multitudes never to be touched again by sorrow or hardship ||

Around him the shades seemed to fade, and the details of the hall became more obscure. Something was different; everything around him became more tangible and he was in the center of something that was of a purer, brighter, hotter radiance than ever before.

Light, in its holiest form, and in the center, just steps away from him was another figure; an ethereal being whose form shifted and roiled and danced like liquid in a container, whose limbs ran with golden veins, skin that was as smooth and solid as porcelain but which bent like flesh, and whose face lacked any permanent features. It did not allow itself to be shackled by limitation, save for a pair of eyes that burned with star-glory.

And like twinkling comets they shone, suffusing him with the warmth of those rays that had let life rise in their little blue ball. This place did not evoke an overloading of the senses, but gentle comfort, like being swaddled in a blanket. He knew there was a smile behind those eyes. He knew who She was.

|| A place of Good, for there, all shall choose of their own will Good. It is the final place. The last form. The Boundless Shape ||

The Traveler raised Her hand, and it unraveled into misting golden vapor that flowed into a cup. Divine ichor. Holy blood. She raised a cup of the stars made of the fabric of hope, incandescent joys sparking in her eyes, her hair woven from suns.

With a hand sculpted from divine alabaster, She offered him a cup. The cup he held was made of resolve, it had a name, it was called Speaker. It had a purpose, to bring joys. It had a singular form; an endless fractal that spilled over.

|| Without flaw or imperfection ||

It was now that he heard the noise. Silence imperious rebuked the concept of distraction, every single atom in his body grew ears to listen, and every single instance of the man that was Valentin Kozhukhov across the brow of time and space felt the ponderous lullaby of a beating heart.

Thump.

It was everywhere.

Thump.

The heartbeat of everything.

|| My Pale Heart ||

|| Through it pulses life ||

With hands steadier in Her presence, he reached and took the cup. He felt the love pouring out of Her, and he could only reciprocate in the very few ways his Human comprehension allowed him to. She was perfect in every way; the embodiment that any of them could only dream of reaching.

And She offered Her gifts to them freely, such was the love She gave them. Such was the trust God held for Her son.

He drank from the cup.

It was an ask; a desire. A covenant sealed. An eternity that She wanted to spend with them.

One he too desired.

|| My Pale Heart ||

|| The conduit of the Sky ||

The Traveler was more than an entity; She was the living gateway to the Sky itself. The gateway for all the living, and the shepard for the dead. She was the gate, and he knew in an instant the answer to the question for himself.

Thump.

His purpose was not just to be the instrument of change. It wasn’t to prepare his species for an apocalypse. Life was more than the Darkness that threatened it, for it could not dominate all aspects of life, lest life no longer be worth anything but the journey to war.

Thump.

The heartbeat had become more intense. As if his own marched in tandem with it. A heartbeat that shook his body, dominated his senses. He gasped as the Light surged through him, a fire through his veins that was boiling and mellow at the same time; intensity tempered by pleasure.

And he heard Her words, and understood.

|| My Pale Heart ||

|| Where death will die ||

Love. The purpose of life was love. Divine love. Perfect love. Human love. True love. The purpose of life was to live in love.

Thump.

In his hazy desire, there was still one question that came to him. One that was two words, but which he now needed to know. Why, out of all of the people on Earth and beyond, whose virtues, ideals, and beliefs were superior to his own, those who had spent their lives believing in Her without realizing it…

Why me?

Hands that made his heart weep, and his eyes gush with rivers of golden tears cupped his cheek. She held him like that. So intimately. Without shyness or reserve.

|| Why not? ||

He laughed. One that bubbled into an undignified giggle. The answer was so simple and unexpected.

Why not indeed.

Maybe there didn’t need to be a deeper reason. She saw everything he was, and knew that he could do what She desired. She knew that he could fulfill what was demanded of a Speaker.

Maybe that was enough.

|| Beloved Valentin ||

|| The path ahead is Bladed ||

|| Filled with thorns ||

|| Beset by beasts ||

|| Infested with sickness ||

The vestiges of what he had seen within the Communion returned; seeming to be drawn out by the Traveler’s presence, brought into the Light after being burrowed into his mind. The Logic that demanded Order. Making him pursue it. Seek it. Impose it.

For him to wield the Light with Order, and impose a new tyranny on those who would step out of its perfect radiance. The Logic wormed and whispered, and he saw how it played in his mind; a subtle, tempting influence.

|| Salvation is earned ||

|| Not given ||

|| Love is not earned ||

|| Only given ||

There was something he sensed; a lessening of the intensity. This audience was going to come to an end, and he did not want it to end.

He wanted to stay forever.

With Her.

Forever.

And ever.

|| Make a gentle garden ||

|| Ring it with spears ||

|| Let the flowers bloom ||

|| Cut out the weeds||

She let go of his cheeks, running Her hand against his face, up across his forehead, and down onto his nose. As if memorizing his features, as if She was blind and needed to feel all he was.

|| Your purpose of existence? ||

|| For you were born into this world ||

|| That is the only reason I need ||

|| My Valentin. My Speaker. My Champion-Of-Ages ||

Her hand fell from his face, and She seemed to watch him, suffused in Her brilliant gaze as if She were about to say goodbye.

|| Build. Grow. Protect ||

|| My Speaker ||

|| Show them the Light ||

It faded just as quickly as it had appeared.

Valentin knew immediately that this had not just been a mere vision. For a period, he had been somewhere else. Somewhere perfect, intimate, and beautiful. It had been Her. He had heard something Felt something. Been somewhere. The Pale Heart. The place where She resided, where few were allowed inside.

For too short a time he had basked in Her warmth, Her comfort, Her love. All of it infinite, and he felt all the more strongly why the Darkness he had faced was worth his hatred.

The Light brought life and laughter. The Dark promised death.

The Light offered eternity. The Dark promised an end.

The Light gave you everything you needed, it filled holes you didn’t realize existed. The Dark could not give freely; everything had a price. Everything had a cost.

The Light had more to it than war and conflict. The Dark demanded an eternal test of oneself, until they were sharpened into a blade evolved beyond flaw, or they broke upon the anvil.

He sat there in a state of numb, almost paralyzed disbelief. He only became aware that everyone else had experienced some vision of it as well. Gheleon’s eyes were bright; for the first time Valentin saw the man elated.

“I know the answer,” he said in awe. “I know it now.”

Both Hamaza and Shaheed were still in disbelief. Valentin was worried that the intensity of whatever Hamaza had seen might make his heart give out. But all of them were here again, alive, and their eyes were open.

“The Vanguard,” Gheleon said. “The Vanguard,” he stood up, he stumbled. “I understand everything.” He ran out of the room.

Valentin watched him leave, mouth partway open to ask, but realized that he wasn’t going to get through to him right now, and Gheleon was already out the door.

“What was-” Shaheed gasped, hands on his throat. “-What did we just see?”

“The Absolute Truth,” Hamaza whispered. “The Boundless Shape.”

“Paradise,” Valentin murmured. “Eternity.”

Laughter. Hamaza broke into sheer, maddened, laughter. It spilled over and out into the room, echoing through the place with an unnatural din. The laughter of a lifetime vindicated.

Shaheed fell on his knees. Heaving for air. “Time stretched. On and on and on. I saw an infinity in a moment,” with lost eyes, he looked at Valentin. “I saw Her there. I took the cup. I heard my family. I can hear it. Beating. It’s not mine. It’s not mine.”

Thump.

All around them.

Thump.

Inside of every Guardian.

Thump.

Inside every living thing.

Thump.

Connecting all of them.

“I can hear reality beat to the symphony of a -”

“Heart,” Valentin said. That was the moment Valentin realized he wasn’t hearing his own heartbeat. That singing core was not his.

Thump.

It was Hers.

Or perhaps She was merely the embodiment of the connecting heart. That symphony ringing from star to star, between planet and planet, unifying all peoples who chose to hear it in supreme peace. He understood at that moment that what he had drank had not been a simple illusion, but an awakening of his understanding that had permanently changed him. For he could perceive the heartbeat all around him. With each pulse he saw the golden expanse ripple; echoed a thousand times, through a million million souls.

The heart was power.

And he understood something else.

So long as within him beat the Pale Heart, he could not die.

He was synchronized to the lifeblood of reality itself. A law of the Light written into being.

And so the Traveler’s heart beat within him, as for now, he allowed himself to smile, and bask in its steady comfort.

Thump.

He had been wrong in one way when he had told Lenin that he intended to bring utopia.

Thump.

His mission was far greater than that.

Thump.

It was to bring Heaven itself.

***

THE MORNING STAR | EARTH ORBIT

Earth lay before Clovis Bray.

More specifically, the station’s orientation hung over continental Europe and Eurasia. The General Secretary had been spending more time on the Morning Star lately for a variety of reasons. It was a location where he could most effectively prosecute this war, from a position where even Guardians couldn’t reach him.

They would eventually, but not yet. Not until he gave them sufficient reason.

And that was coming soon.

Resistance across Europe was being crushed. Dissidents and insurrectionists were being uprooted and exposed. Factories were churning out weapons, munitions, and equipment at an acceptable pace.

The motivation he had instilled was demonstrating results, even as it was chewing through personnel at a far faster pace. All within acceptable margins. People could be replaced, and when his forces moved to properly face Lenin’s revolutionaries, insurgency would once more be inflamed – but far weakened from its previous state.

Indicators were trending upwards. It was more for the people, not for him. He knew it would not be enough.

Nothing could ever be enough.

But that wasn’t the intention anymore.

More importantly, his understanding of the Logic grew every day. His ability to seize and define this concept was strengthening regularly. Several more field excursions had been conducted, and each time he’d learned something new, and something important. He was reaching the limits of how much he could sharpen himself against mere mortals, unworthy of what he was becoming.

How well would it stand against the Guardians? He would find out soon. The moments of truth were coming, and he could only be so prepared. He was confident now that he could put up a sufficient fight – but that was a situation one could only assess when they were in it.

There were other less fortunate developments in addition to the overall upward trends.

The Warminds were being worn down by Rasputin, to either be destroyed or assimilated into the rogue AI. Clovis estimated that at most there were days before every cyber element was functionally useless.

Lenin had seemingly completed his consolidation of his rival USSR, and was mobilizing the Russian Soviets for a true offensive. Tens of thousands were gathering on the Russian-European border, and his adversary could launch his invasion at any point – he was perhaps holding out for more allies, or other assets such as Rasputin.

The rest of the world was just as dire. The Caliphate had pushed India out of the Middle East, and was organizing a final offensive against a collapsing India which was experiencing its own civil war between the Hindutva and an arisen Subhas Chandra Bose, of all people. After Lenin, Clovis could not be surprised that a similar tactic had been employed here.

China was isolated, and by all accounts was on the verge of a total implosion as military cliques, CCP splinters, and popular mass movements were all vying for power and influence. He was genuinely surprised that Holliday was just mopping up the Constitutionalists, and hadn’t already destroyed them.

Perhaps the most grievous blow had been from within. Too late he had realized that the man he had relied upon had been a traitor, and had been dead for weeks at least. He could not feel much at knowing Luka was dead, and his persona had been puppeted by Hayden Fox. It had been a mistake to not take stronger measures to ensure any Guardian was truly dead.

It was his mistake. He paid the price. It would not be repeated.

The Lightbearer had crippled the entire Soviet intelligence apparatus, rendering it completely compromised and useless. Clovis was considering simply disbanding it. It didn’t matter anymore, and wouldn’t matter with what was coming next.

Soon, very soon, all of the Guardians would turn their sights to him.

So let them come, and watch as I Defy their future for me.

Defiance was a double-edged sword, as paradoxically, the more he succeeded, the weaker his ability to use the Logic against them became. Yet simultaneously, by warring against him, they defied him, and therefore empowered him, while exposing themselves. There were different perspectives at play.

It was up to him to discern how best to exploit and utilize them.

Yet ultimately, they were coming for him.

The moment of truth would be known. He would have a weapon for them once they came. He had charged the Black Armory with creating one, and they had presented several options. Many conventional, one that was not. The one that was not had, in his view, been submitted to round out the submissions.

But it was a feasible design. There were many inefficiencies with it, despite its potential power being far greater. They had clearly not understood why he had chosen it – but they did not know of the Logic at his command.

What better a weapon than one that in itself could defy expectation and limitation?

His time approached.

“[General Secretary?]”

The machine man did not turn at the voice of the officer, who approached with clear nervousness in her voice, even as she tried to hide it. “[The Morning Star is in position. It will fire on your command.]”

“[Good. You are dismissed.]”

When she was gone, he briefly affirmed his connection to the station. What would come next was something he had no intention of leaving to chance. There were too many who would hesitate at pulling the trigger, and fail to see the ultimate purpose justifying this most grand of steps..

There were many who would call him mad, genocidal, and any emotively negative word that sprang to their mind. He did not care. Such labels no longer had much worth to him. They were easily filtered by those of weak wills and hearts.

There were so few weapons at his disposal. It was imperative he use them before the choice was removed for him. If they could not see such necessity, then they were unworthy of consideration to begin with.

He operated no longer on fallible Human instinct, emotion, and motivation, but now Logic facilitating a higher understanding of reality's designs, refined by the clarity of a machine. He was superior. He was better. He was above any Human who had come before him.

He had been thinking of his last conversation with Valentin on Neptune. The Speaker had been correct in one critical matter.

The Gardeners and Winnowers. There was no gain without sacrifice, no evolution without pain, no victory without expenditure. For he saw now what would be required for Humanity to stand alone in this vast, terrible universe. The Logic had given him the perspective he had lacked until now.

One hundred deaths a tragedy. One million a statistic.

He had long passed the tragedy of the cost he expended. Millions would die before this was finished, and such was necessary. He knew what happened next would inflame the hearts and wills of every Human – one way or another.

For he represented a future – and men would either serve, or defy. By service, they would deny the divine. By Defiance, they would give him strength, he who would seek a Throne. He whose will rewrote the words that sought to kill him.

He wondered what to call what was about to happen. A military operation? A contingency?

Or perhaps a ritual?

Such religious-fueled terms he would have once scoffed at, but what were these moments if not sacred ceremony before an offering was reaped? A quite literal Human sacrifice, that would grant him the power to survive, and continue the only mission that mattered?

Provided of course it had the desired effect.

At one point he would have felt sorrow at this decision. Perhaps even regret. Heretically, possibly hesitation.

Yet he no longer was constrained by the limitations of emotions, or mortal morality, nor the limitations of men of weak will, spirit, and mind.

People would be replaced. Buildings could be rebuilt. Science would heal the earth.

Destruction merely laid the foundations for something greater.

One time he might have hesitated.

Now he did not wait for a single moment.

He felt nothing as he consigned statistics to the flames.

When the Morning Star reached the necessary coordinates, he sent the digital command to the missile tubes that held nearly all of the remaining nuclear missiles on board. Several had been expended on Neptune, and today more would be sent towards where the traitors to Humanity resided.

The first barrage fired. Then the second.

Like a meteor shower, he watched the orange streaks descend towards the Earth.

Towards Russia.

***

Lenin sat within the Kremlin, engaged in a half-serious conversation with his Ghost concerning Communist theory, before it was rudely interrupted by a sound that neither of them had expected.

Air sirens.

He only hesitated for a moment before pulling up the security systems, utterly confused as to what was happening. There had been no indications that Clovis Bray had the ability to launch an offensive, even a surprise one. He wasn’t particularly worried because Moscow’s defenses were significant.

Then he saw where the origin point was detected.

Orbit.

The Morning Star.

He’d known about Clovis’s space station which had apparently played a major role in the Battle of Neptune. His mind ran through the armaments, and a chill ran through him as he recalled what the station carried. He’d watched videos of the apocalyptic power that were atomic weapons.

Surely he would not…

No. This was Clovis Bray. Or something worse than Clovis Bray now. Someone who wouldn’t hesitate for a moment to take revenge against whoever he saw as his enemy. He might die, but he would cause as much chaos and pull as many as he could to the grave with him if allowed.

A single glance at the trajectories conveyed a simple outcome. Millions of people were going to die.

“[Send an emergency alert!]” Lenin ordered Echo as he stood, the Light gathering around him as the sirens screamed of the incoming rocket. “[Send-]”

There was an impact, the Guardian encased himself in a golden bubble shield as an atomic weapon detonated over Moscow.

***

From the skies a barrage of atomic warheads descended towards the west of Russia. Each one aimed towards a city along or near the border where soldiers were gathering. Kursk, Belgorod, Smolensky, St. Petersburg, Veliky.

Moscow.

It could not be stopped.

Little balls of orange became visible on the globe's surface, each one signifying something that had once been a city now reduced to nuclear radiation and waste. Millions of lives, entire histories, unforgettable symbols, all of it erased by his orders.

None of it mattered.

Humanity needed no ties or historical chains to ascend beyond ignorance. It needed no attachments to understand what was important. The Traveler wished to see the world destroyed to a degree that would fundamentally alter the essence of their anima. If She wished to do so, it would not be by appropriating the accomplishments of Humans long past.

He witnessed the infernal pyres cleansing the rot of the world below, the Sword cutting a line of ignition and carnage that left a divide between Lenin’s treasonous armies, and his Soviet Union. He doubted Lenin had been killed, but that was unimportant. In his mind he calculated the likely casualties as the Morning Star informed him of successful hit after successful hit.

Below him, the world seemed to grow sharper. The Logic was closer at hand than it had ever been before.

A new kind of clarity was emerging.

The machine would have smiled.

It had worked.

The end was coming.

And when the Guardians came to slay him with righteous fury, he would be ready for them.

Because billions of years before this day of days, a single cell lived in an endless ocean. It was not the first. It was not the mightiest. But it endured nonetheless. Despite probability, despite competition, despite the fact that it was small.

A solitary cell, and yet it was the only being whose descendants survived all the way to the present.

Consequential.

He could feel the Blades swing. Every death in service of Defiance. Every sacrifice feeding the engine of his roar. Nuclear flame forging iron that would never again dent. A hundred second suns heralding a rising dawn. He walked the Path, and the Path took what no longer fit what he was in the process of becoming.

Consequential.

No, what he had just become.

His name was Clovis Bray, the Last Universal Common Ancestor of the Future Man, and his fate was his to make.

***

TO BE CONTINUED IN CHAPTER XXX | CLOSURE