Insight: The Clash of Suns, page 1
Editor-in-Chief: Alejandro E. Baca Fernández
Associate Editor: Any Sutherlin
Translator: Alan Porter
Cover design: Luis Tinoco
Art design: Fernando Barba
Copyright © Manuel Garfio, 2022
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To my self of all my past lives...
We did it.
PROLOGUE
My father has never been wrong. He knows the past, present, and future of every plane of existence. I'm glad I didn't believe his lies. He'll be wrong thrice today.
Eons ago, he told me only two things are for certain in the Tunnels of Reincarnation. The first is that, except for the souls in passage, only guardians set foot in this place; the second is that if any soul were to revolt against them, even a celestial one, it could not even scratch their armor.
However, the shattered armors cracking under my feet, among dissipating residues of ergon, prove otherwise. It took me more than half my energy to bury that pair of truths under this place made of luminous energy. My father's first two mistakes.
I observe the Guardians' souls stray from the cascade of luminous figures that flow down the mouths of the tunnels, where the Cloak of Oblivion would have erased their memories and thus allowed them to begin a new life in a material realm. But they didn't have a physical body, an incarnation, to dispose of; in the higher dimensions, they pay the price of dying. Their soul glints for the last time in the sky. They will never return home. It's a small, woeful sacrifice performed to atone for my father's injustices.
If only I had a single one of my energy crystals to help me face what's coming, this mission would be effortless. Regardless, I'll have to manage without it, even in this deplorable condition.
Approaching the torrent of souls, I snatch one from the flow towards its destiny. The unblemished energy, free from any past, caresses the tips of my fingers. While its light begins to flicker like a sky illuminated by a thousand bolts of lightning, I swoon at its sensation of purity.
There’s no time to hesitate. Someone interrupts our meeting. I didn't expect Velian to arrive so quickly.
Before she appears, I drop the soul back on its way through the tunnels.
“How did you manage to get here?” Her aggravating voice echoes behind me.
“What are you talking about? I’m still in my infinite prison, serving my eternal sentence.”
“You were supposed to have barely enough energy to keep your heart beating.”
Velian comes a few steps closer, facing me.
I hate seeing her as radiant as she was in our first life.
“It’s pointless, there is nothing for you here, but humiliation,” she continues and tries to put her hand on my shoulder. Immediately, I walk to the side.
Now, it is she who is watching me.
“I must admit, a ‘mighty’ being such as yourself limping is a pitiful sight.” She raises her eyebrows.
“Still, I defeated the ‘invincible’ guardians of the tunnels.” I smirk at her. “You should tell the Fifth Eye that their puppets were not even good enough for a warm-up. Next time, send real emgis to welcome me.”
“You have killed innocents in vain. The tunnels would spit you out as soon as you tried to enter them.” Velian clenches her fists. “So, stop wasting my time and tell me why you're here.”
“If my people were not the true victims, I would not be here.”
“I made a vow to never again allow others to suffer any more consequences for the sake of ‘your people’…” Velian materializes her souldbond weapon in her right hand: Aktheia, the sword, of which so many feats are told. She looks at the metal debris scattered on the ground and tightens her grip.
“Your vows are inconsequential to me.”
Velian's body tenses for an instant, but then, she puffs out her chest in that unbearable, emboldened pose. I must acknowledge her unwavering will... or stupidity.
Ethereal threads, like smoke, weave across my face as Velian's confident countenance shatters. When Czath's Mask completely covers my face, ergon flows from her shoulders, as it hasn't since we were children. I take the opportunity to channel it against her, and Velian's muscles tighten like the strings of a violin about to snap; even her tongue is paralyzed, and not because of my abilities.
“How did you get that mask?” Her voice resounds inside my head.
“There is more than one sun, my sister.”
I conjure up a blade above my knuckles, and Velian’s face becomes inflamed with despair: the futile struggle to prevent me from ending her existence in a flash. Using the ien, the connection to the whole, she manages to release Aktheia from her hand. Before I can attack, the legendary sword floats through the air and stabs Velian’s body.
The ergon that had imprisoned her disappears and she dodges my attack at the last instant. The blade of her celestial sword becomes ethereal and pierces not flesh, but emotions, extinguishing them like embers on ice. Even knowing this, I chose to confront her.
Before the last wisps of ergon disappear, I manage to use them. My body becomes a trail of smoke that advances like lightning towards her.
“The same old trick?” Velian takes her sword in both hands.
I know your next move, too.
Velian aims Aktheia, this time in its solid and sharp state, right where my body regains its shape. I cry out in pain as the cold blade pierces my side. A trickle of blood spills onto the floor as the Mask of Czath disappears from my face, revealing my smile.
“I'm glad you still remember the old days.” Dropping to one knee with my energy almost depleted, I feel Aktheia’s edge graze my neck.
My eyes challenge her, however, Velian thrusts her sword into the ground.
“Mercy has always been your greatest weakness.”
In total serenity, she raises a hand to the sky. The light begins to solidify into blades above my head. There is nowhere to run nor energy left to defend myself with.
Her sharp weapons rain down on me.
My presence disappears.
Breaking his meditation and coming out of his introspection, he found that his father had been wrong for the third time that day. He had assured him that it was impossible to plan something which he didn't see coming. You’re mistaken again… and it won't be the last time.
1
Zed stepped out of the gloom and the meager light of the alley almost gave him away. I think I've lost them, he thought, looking back from the edge of a moldy brick wall. He was in trouble again, and this time, it wasn't part of the plan.
Creeping in the shadows, with the most prized possession of the only person he loved rattling in his pocket like a hostage crying out to be set free, he stopped when the footsteps that pursued him were no longer audible. Zed dug his knee into the ground and felt the rotten dampness seep up his leg. His strides were short, even for a boy his age, and getting shorter. He couldn't go farther without stopping to catch his breath.
He yearningly noticed the end of the alley. A high metallic fence separated him from the main avenue and, despite the years of climbing walls, his limbs were unresponsive. There was no choice but to slip his small body into a pile of garbage, empty boxes, and broken furniture, where an adult couldn't possibly reach.
At last, he had a chance to stop and, while taking big puffs of foul air, which almost made him sick, he wondered whether the others had been caught. They'll manage to escape, he assured himself, and imagined Cole's chubby face smiling when they rejoined on the street they'd chosen as a meeting point in case something went wrong.
But if their separation was caused by Zed's attempt to save his own skin, would they still be waiting?
There wasn’t any other way. If I get caught, this time Mom will definitely send me to a boarding school, he thought, remembering the look of surprise in Arthur's eyes falling down in front of the officers when Zed tripped him with his foot. If he succeeded in jumping over the metallic fence and running a few blocks farther away, sacrificing his companions would not have been in vain.
He leaned down to ready himself to scuttle away from his hiding place and when the moonlight shone on a lock of his auburn hair—which hid his “special eye”—he thought he heard a voice in the wind, the one he was forbidden to speak of.
“Don’t move!”, a woman voice said.
Zed tried to convince himself that it had come from behind a window. However, he'd never felt the voice so close to him; it was almost inside his own head. The first time he'd heard it, the voice had sounded distant, and it had been easy for him to persuade himself that it was another trick of his imagination.
The warning sent a chill down his spine. Although his mother had likewise told him that these voices were ravings of his mind, Zed crouched inside a cardboard box.
He did not know if the voice that had helped him was real or a product of his madness, but he began to be thankful for it. He felt his heart thud in one beat, two beats, three beats, until the light disappeared. Is he gone? Did I win? He sighed in relief, and barely peeked through a crack, when he heard the voice again.
“I said don’t move!” repeated that voice.
A rumble broke the silence. Trash bags and wood chips went flying up. Another blow sent food scraps into the air. It passed so close to Zed that he became even paler than his usual milky complexion. He felt like cornered prey; he hated that feeling almost as much as feeling abandoned.
“No sign of the other brat,” the officer growled through his radio. “This stinks, I'm going over there.”
When Zed heard him walking away around the corner, he waited a moment, hoping to receive another warning. The wind whistled through the walls but did not form words. He came out into the light and brushed off his black clothes, the ones he wore during his robberies and paybacks, that let him blend in with the darkness. He smiled as he patted his pants pocket and verified that the night’s loot was still there.
This joy, however, was short-lived. From the top of a staircase, someone with a golden badge glowing on his chest descended and landed in front of him.
“I won't hurt you, kid,” said the officer, pulling out handcuffs. “I just need you to come with me to the station to explain a few things to us.”
That's what I get for trusting an imaginary voice. Zed bit the inside of his cheek in reprimand. He hated it when great feats were ruined by carelessness, especially when it was his own.
Zed peered through the fence behind him, waiting for his companions to appear on the other side, coming to rescue him. However, all he saw was a huge brown cat licking its paws.
“I didn't see that coming, officer.” Zed turned to him, in a feigned voice, as he always spoke when he wore his black garb, and let out a sigh so deep that it made him drop his shoulders.
“It’s better to let the rats come out of their burrow on their own when they think the cat has gone away,” replied the officer, with a prideful smile, and walked toward Zed. “You can take off that hood now.”
I didn't know we were playing, otherwise, I wouldn't have let you win. Zed's brown eye, the only visible part of his face, jittered from his panic. “Please don’t take me. I didn't want to do it: my friends made me do it.”
“If so, you should make different friends when you get out of juvie. We've been chasing a hooded brat for months. He always manages to escape by a hair's breadth.”
“It wasn't me! My friends gave me this costume!” Zed backed up until he hit the fence. “Now I know why they gave it to me.”
“There's no point in resisting, there's nowhere to run,” said the officer, grabbing him by the wrist.
“You’re right...” Zed put his fists forward as a tear rolled down his cheek.
“You should think things over before getting into trouble, kid.”
The officer opened the handcuffs. Zed didn't have to see them to know this: he had heard that sound more times than anyone even twice his age had. However, when the cold metal grazed his wrist, he took a step toward the officer, standing almost against his body, and knee-struck his crotch. The man doubled over in pain, and, in the blink of an eye, Zed was climbing over the fence.
“Come back here, you brat!” growled the officer in agony.
As Zed was about to leap towards freedom, something stopped him. A kind of luminous smoke, like particles of blood-colored mist, was emanating from the officer's body. Zed was dumbfounded. Before, they had been just ethereal wisps coming off from people; now, he observed a continuous torrent.
Mesmerized, not so much by what he saw, but by the sweet taste of power he felt, he barely noticed the voices of other officers approaching. He shook his head and closed his eyes repeatedly. But the smoke did not disappear as it had on other occasions; it continued to issue from the officer as he hurled curses at the boy.
“I've got my tricks, too,” Zed scoffed, and hopped down to the other side of the fence. “I always win!”
As he ran toward the main street, he searched the windows of the alley for the source of the mysterious voice that had aided him. It must have been someone else, I'm not crazy, he kept repeating to himself, watching the car lights and the flow of pedestrians get closer and closer.
As he blended into the crowd on the sidewalk, the shadows left him and the mass of people enveloped him like a perfect camouflage.
On the way home, he called Arthur and Cole on his cell phone, but neither answered. I couldn't risk waiting for them, he tried to convince himself the rest of the way. We succeeded! That's all that matters. He shook his fist to the rhythm of his steps.
Proud of himself, he pulled out of his pocket the diamond necklace, which rivaled the brilliance of the stars that night. It was the kind of jewelry that an actress would wear on a Hollywood red carpet, escorted by several men; not for the safety of the wearer, but that of the priceless piece. Undoubtedly, this necklace would be worth enough to feed for a lifetime the dozens of homeless that lined the sidewalk on which he walked, lying on newspapers, which served as their blankets and mattresses. The rest of the people didn't seem to notice them unless it was by having to hold their noses and look for the source of such an unpleasant odor. Zed, however, watched them closely: for some strange reason, helpless persons made him melancholy.
He adjusted his hood and checked that his mouth was covered with a facemask hanging from his neck as he approached a woman whose baby, wrapped in a filthy rag, was crying louder than the rattle of the can she held.
“Please, a coin,” she cried, with rancid breath.
Zed did not respond.
“Are you lost, boy?” she added. “Where are your parents?”
If only I had parents who cared about me, he lamented, feeling his heart shrink.
He nonchalantly dropped the necklace into the woman's tin cup, and she was mesmerized by the diamonds’ sparkle. She had barely opened her mouth, probably to thank him, when Zed put his finger to his lips to signal silence.
“Don't tell anyone about this, or they will do anything to take it away from you.” He pointed to a trio of vagrants with dilated pupils and scarred arms.
The woman took Zed's hand, covered by a black glove, and kissed it. He nodded and turned away.
“I almost forgot.” He stopped. “Don't try to sell it in one piece: a lot of people will be looking for these gems. Sell it diamond by diamond in different pawnshops so that you can get your baby out of this place.”
Zed walked away with a big smile on his face. He had accomplished his task, but the most important part of his plan still awaited him.
2
A few blocks before reaching home, two figures charged at Zed from the shadows.
“Guys, we did it! I was worried the cops had caught you.” he exclaimed, recognizing the faces of his companions and welcoming them with open arms.
However, none embraced him. Both looked dejected.
“I still can't believe what you did.” Arthur greeted him with a shove.
“What are you talking about?” asked Zed. “I just ran like you did.”
“Do you want to see the bruises you left on my back?”
“It's hard not to step on you! Haven't you seen how big you are?” Zed laughed. His companions, however, didn’t even smile. “All right, I tripped and fell on you, but the important thing is that we didn't get caught.”
“No thanks to you. If Cole hadn't gone back to rescue me, I’d be in a cop car right now. Who are you trying to fool, Zed? I felt it when you stuck your foot out to trip me and get me caught, instead of yourself.”
“I told you, I didn't mean it!” Zed shouted, losing his temper.
“What a coincidence! Things like that always happen when you have to save your own skin.”
