Cassian and Ali had known eachother for years. They were business associates, academics and, most importantly, friends. She could still remember the day he arrived in the Shadow District, back then a boy of fifteen, displaced, confused and newly blinded to the world.
Ali lost almost all of his vision his first day in Novus. The visor fused to his face reminded everyone of this. His world was rendered in blue heatmaps from then on: no detail, no colour, no joy.
He was twenty now and thankfully seemed to be doing a lot better. But even then, as he sat running a surgical needle through the gash on Cassian’s head, the markswoman couldn’t help but feel a tad uneasy.
“You definitely alright with that, mate? Can always take over if you-”
“Cass, it’s fine, I can do this sorta stuff close up,” he sighed, leaning closer to Cassian’s head, “Not like we got any qualified doctors around at the moment anyways.”
“What if I sneeze?” She asked, partially to annoy him.
“Don’t sneeze,” Ali replied.
“But what if I do? Will you balls it up?”
Ali inhaled sharply through his nose and put the needle down, “You know what? It’s done anyway. I need to start on Sylvester.”
“Oh? Bangin’,” Cassian sat up from the hospital bed and all of a sudden remembered that Ali’s other friends were still in the room, “Oh wow, you lot look tired.”
The three of them glared back at her; she swore the dark circles beneath their eyes were deepening by the second. Awkwardly she grinned back at them as she shifted off the bed.
In the mirror opposite, she observed the stitched-up scratch on her face, spanning from her cheekbone up to her temple—the sort of gash that wouldn’t budge in a hurry if it weren’t for modern medicine. She sat beneath the infirmary’s MediBeam to begin the process of healing the wound. The device’s green lamp immediately began to work its magic, causing the injury to tingle. Resisting the urge to itch and scratch during MediBeam treatment was difficult without distractions, but she imagined the conversations to come would be entertainment enough.
“So Purples are pulling arms off, pushing people down stairs and literally ripping us to shreds now, huh?” Ali began to thread a new needle and prep some anaesthetic to begin working on a cut in Sylvester’s arm, “Lots of new tricks lately…”
“I took a couple swipes from this hybrid woman with these huge claws,” Felix recounted, gazing down at his own, “Hadn’t been trimmed for months, maybe years…”
“Last thing we need is more reasons to fear hybrids,” Karalee hugged herself wistfully, now unmasked.
She too was a hybrid like Felix, but her genetic origin was unclear. The pointed ears that sat amidst her box braids were one of her only definitively “hybrid” features, and even then their appearance left more questions than answers. She also had a set of claws, which she’d delicately painted a deep plum colour and blunted at the tips. Cassian was unsure whether this was an effort to appear more approachable or if she was just high maintenance. Given her background—which Cassian knew all too well—both were feasible.
“Trust an apocalypse to make history repeat itself,” Felix murmured, hanging his head dejectedly.
“Hang on,” Cassian had become hung up on a small detail, noticing that the cuts and scrapes that covered Felix before were now nowhere to be seen, “You said you took a coupl’a swipes but… I don’t see any injuries, lizard bloke?”
Felix looked back up, seemingly irked, “I’m a Dragorian.”
“Ooo, and I’m a Sagittarius!” She jeered. Felix started towards her, Ali waved his hand between them.
“Hoooo geez, how rude of me! I haven’t introduced you all,” he exclaimed in a panic, ignoring how Felix sat seething behind him, “Cassian, this is Captain Felix Zanin, my friend from Urthus.”
“Captain?” Cassian snickered, “Alright, how many medals?”
“More than you,” He responded bluntly, she was beginning to notice that direct answers weren’t the man’s strong suit.
Cassian’s lips tightened, scorned, “Always thought Urthians were nice people…”
Generally that was true. Despite being a simple Novian cut off from the rest of the world by the border, she was often able to glean from the temperaments of the many Outsiders that were also trapped here what these mystery societies were like.
Urthians, on the whole, were lively and sociable people who made some of the best food Cassian had ever sampled. She also noted how they always seemed to be very cold in Novus; Urthus must’ve had a warmer climate.
Felix, however, didn’t seem to support any of her theory: he seemed abrasive, closed off, and was somehow doing just fine in only a t-shirt.
“What’re you even the Captain of?” She perked up.
“The Dustlands Dragonriders,” he responded.
“Wait, like riding a dragon?.. Dragonrider?” Cassian flummoxed, “Dragons exist?”
“Yes, dragons exist because I am one,” Felix sighed, squeezing his face between his fingers, clearly keen to move the conversation on.
“Ali, how’d you even meet this guy?” She asked in disbelief. Ali was never much of a socialite; how he’d managed to get in touch with a pair of Outsiders at all was a miracle.
The boy grunted and carried on with his stitching, which she’d admittedly forgotten about. Eventually Sylvester perked up instead.
“Ali got in touch with me first. Felix and I have been friends for years now,” he explained, but Cassian was distracted by the dark veins that still ran up and down his face.
What was perhaps most confusing about the eldrin man hadn’t been initially clear, but now in the bright lights of the infirmary she could see that his skin was in fact a pale shade of tea green. She wasn’t quite sure how to approach the fact sensitively: When did you notice you were green? felt a tad on the nose.
She decided to put that matter aside for now, instead staring at him expectantly, “Go on then, let’s have the introduction.”
Sylvester quickly became flustered, “Oh, just Sylvester… Sylvester Therendahl… of Siyseursiel… Haha…”
Cassian hadn’t expected his answer to feel so confused, but his Siyseurlian origins explained a lot more than he likely realised: The posh accent, the weird gothic fashion sense, even the horrible social skills…
From what Cassian knew of Siyseursiel, it seemed to be the polar opposite to Urthus. Siyseurlians usually kept to themselves. They were often highly academic, soft-spoken and their culture seemed to run deep with many eldrin stereotypes. More often than not, they had a stiff upper lip, liking things done their way and usually displaying very little tolerance for change or cultural differences. Much of Novus’ society today had supposedly originated in Siyseurlian culture, Cassian could see exactly why.
In Sylvester’s case, whilst his mannerisms were indicative of a Siyseurlian upperclassman, there was a buzzing curiosity in his eyes that she didn’t often see in the other Siyseurlian Outsiders-turned-Shadowers. More often than not they’d struggle to adapt to Novian life, but Cassian felt as though Sylvester would do just fine.
“Well, Sylvester Therendahl of Siyseursiel…” she began, initially intending to mock him. He gazed up at her whilst she was paused and she saw a hint of vulnerability that she felt almost bad preying upon. Her tone softened, “Thanks for savin’ my arse today, mate. Twice.”
Sylvester smiled coyly, “Oh, you’re most welcome.”
“So that… thing you can do, is it magic?” She asked, her interest sincere.
“It’s called tempomancy,” he said, “One of the old magics. It grants the ability to manipulate time relatively. Very few still practise it,” he gestured to the veins on his face, “for obvious reasons.”
“Suckin’ the life outta you, huh?” Cassian grimaced. So that’s what it was.
“That’s… one way of putting it…” He clasped at his knees uncomfortably, Ali sternly took hold of his arm again to continue working.
Sensing matters had come to a close with him, Cassian turned to the final guest in the room. The one she’d been trying her utmost hardest not to lose her mind over.
“You don’t exactly need an introduction, do ya’?” She stood up, stepping away from the Medibeam and sauntering over to the hybrid woman, “Karalee, ex-member of the legendary Novian girl-group: SWEET TOOTH!”
Sylvester suddenly yelped, and Ali quietly uttered “Agh, shit”. He shot a glance back at the two women and narrowed his blue eyes sharply.
All the while Karalee sat there looking like a deer in front of headlights, “You’re a fan?”
“Pfft, of course!” Cassian flipped her hand dismissively, “You’re an international star!”
Ali sighed impatiently again.
“Wow, crazy,” Karalee seemed strangely concerned by the recognition, “I thought the only Novian fans of ours were Purples… You know, with the music being propaganda and all.”
The markswoman’s body drooped glumly and she gazed off into the abyss in a daze, “P-propaganda?”
Karalee pouted, realising the error of her ways and got out of her seat to place an arm around Cassian’s shoulders, “Sorry hun, I didn’t realise you were that big a fan.”
“I have posters of you on my wall…” Cassian murmured, quickly snapping out of her self pity, “HAD! OH MY GOD NOOO, I had posters of you on my wall, the past tense is really important-”
“Cassian!” Ali snapped, slamming the needle down. She turned around to see the boy looking nearly as angry as Felix was earlier, “It’s one-thirty in the freakin’ morning. I’m tired, okay? We wouldn’t be here if you hadn’t messed up the operation earlier so can you-”
“Well technically we would’ve been, because Purples were still attacking the Shadow District so-”
“Please!” Ali cried over her, his body sagging in defeat, “Go home! You’re on overtime!”
Cassian stood there in silence. As she glanced around the room she could see the others were also staring at her expectantly. She’d outstayed her welcome.
“Yeah,” she muttered, eyes to the ground, “I’ll go.”
She headed to the door, stopping to briefly address them all once more, “Oh, I should’ve said… I’m the Shadow District Deputy, so if any of you have any problems and can’t find President Zhu, come to me, yeah?”
The guests nodded in acknowledgement; she noticed how Felix seemed a little taken back. Perhaps he’d assumed someone of her temperament wouldn’t end up at such a high level of authority?
“Say, Cass?” Ali began to ask, “Don’t suppose you saw what happened when all those Purples fell to the ground, did ya’?”
She froze, tensely clasping her hands together and twiddling her thumbs, “Uhh, no I can’t say I did, sorry mate! You did say they’ve got new tricks up their sleeves lately… maybe the Xytonetwork went offline?”
Ali furrowed his brow, “The what now?”
The weight of her words hit her like a brick, “Oh-uh… the Xytonetwork. It’s the mainframe that the Purples receive their commands from. You know, Xytonetwork, Xytosystems! You ain’t ever heard of ‘em?”
The look on Ali’s face was grave, “Can’t say I have.”
Because only Cassian knew what a Xytosystem was…
She chuckled nervously, feeling the sweat bead on her forehead, “Ah well! You learn somethin’ new everyday I guess! ‘Course I have to know all the juicy details as Deputy-”
“Wait, Cass, do you know where I can read up on-?”
“Anyway!” She ignored Ali, quickly leaving the room. “I should really go and get on with… stuff. Ta-ra!”
The infirmary door slammed and the four of them were left in complete befuzzlement. Ali glanced at Felix, who shrugged casually.
“Weird woman,” He remarked.
“Yeah,” Ali said, “Not usually…”
“Did she say the Purples are receiving commands?” One of Karalee’s ears flopped inquisitively.
“If that’s the case,” Ali began, finger to his mouth in thought, “Then someone’s on the other end programming those commands…”
Felix turned to Ali, “Then that means it’s a question of who, not what.”
“My thoughts exactly,” Ali replied grimly.
It seemed something sinister was at play.
*****
Cassian stomped through the streets of Novus, prosthetic arm brandishing her gun, firing aggressively at any Purples who got in her way.
“Fuckin’ idiot,” she muttered to herself through gritted teeth, “He’s gonna have your head.”
Arriving at a skyscraper with an enormous front entrance, she stood in front of the doors and watched as a laser scanned across her body. The two heavy steel doors eventually slid open in unison and allowed her inside. She stormed past the front desk, manned by a single well-behaved Purple woman.
“Good morning, Cassian,” she spoke softly, as though she was beginning to lose her voice.
“It’s not the fuckin’ morning,” Cassian snarled, jamming her finger into the elevator’s summon button, “One A.M is nighttime.”
“I’ll remember that,” the Purple replied monotonously.
The elevator doors opened and Cassian stepped inside, “No you won’t.”
Purples never retained new information, they weren’t capable of it.
It was all intentional, but not many knew that. There were a lot of things only Cassian knew.
As she rode the elevator up to the penthouse of the apartment block, she couldn’t stop thinking about how trapped all this knowledge made her feel.
“And now we’ve got to have a talk,” she spoke to herself as she often found herself doing in private. She clasped her hair in her hands, “You couldn’t have screwed it up more if you tried!”
In a fit of rage, she spun around and kicked the wall of the elevator. The whole box rattled. She stopped still and hoped it would continue to move upwards. Eventually it did.
Often she found herself forgetting to think before doing things; calculation wasn’t her strong suit, which was unfortunate given the situation she was in.
Calculation was expected of her. Order was expected of her.
The lift doors opened into the front hall of a lavish penthouse decked in varying shades of white, purple and grey. As she approached the living area she passed through a shimmering purple barrier which seemed to instantly transform her attire as she passed through.
It was Cassian McConnell who stood there in her freshly adorned uniform, awaiting her telling off. The Shadowers were unaware of her last name and she intended to keep it that way. They could never know, because if they found out, they’d realise that she wasn’t at all the woman they thought she was.
“Se’seethen Dolaria,” she called out into a living room so sparsely furnished her voice echoed off the walls. Footsteps slowly approached from the kitchen.
“Se’seethen Dolaria,” the voice replied. The same voice she’d spoken with on the VisoCom. The same voice who’d stopped the Purples.
The creator of the Xytonetwork.
Darius McConnell stepped into the light, his white coat splaying out behind him almost regally as he walked. He came to a stop in front of Cassian and clasped his hands together behind his back.
“About time we had that talk, no?” He said in an austere tone.
“If I talk…” Cassian took a deep breath and raised her head to him, accusation in her eyes, “Then you’d better talk too, Dad.”
Needless to say, this wasn’t one of those conventional father-daughter relationships.
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