Haarsma - The softwire: awakening on Orbis 4

This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are either products of the authors imagination or, if real, are used fictitiously.

Copyright 2010 by PJ Haarsma

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced, transmitted, or stored in an information retrieval system in any form or by any means, graphic, electronic, or mechanical, including photocopying, taping, and recording, without prior written permission from the publisher.

First electronic edition 2010

The Library of Congress has cataloged the hardcover edition as follows:

Haarsma, PJ.
The softwire : awakening on Orbis 4 / PJ Haarsma. 1st ed.
p. cm. (The softwire)
Summary: As the Scions guardian, Johnny Turnbull is expected to begin training as a Space Jumper, a role he promised his girlfriend, Max, he would never take on, and which might not be enough to save his sister and friends when Orbis is threatened.
ISBN 978-0-7636-2712-6 (hardcover)
[1. Computers Fiction. 2. Space and time Fiction. 3. Mercenary troops Fiction. 4. Science fiction.] I. Title. II. Title: Awakening on Orbis 4. III. Title: Awakening on Orbis four. IV. Series.
PZ7.H111325Soi 2010
[Fic] dc22 2009032482

ISBN 978-0-7636-5238-8 (electronic)

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Stop it! I begged.

I cant, Theylor whispered. Ketheria must suffer this.

When will it be over?

My sisters body convulsed while suspended over a thick block of chrome deep within the Keepers lair on Orbis 1. I turned away.

This is one of the fourteen steps of the awakening, Theylor reminded me. We have discussed this.

But look at her. Her eyes are going to pop out of her head!

The glow is doing that. Her eyes will remain firmly inside their sockets, he assured me. That is nothing more than an illusion.

Glow was a clumsy description of what was happening to Ketheria. Her skin was shining with a lustrous golden light that pulsed brighter, not with each heartbeat but with some otherworldly measure that I was not privy to. I stood by, helpless, and watched as the metal block she floated above refused to absorb the glow, tossing it back while her body deflated with each throb of light. During one convulsion, Ketherias head lobbed sideways and her eyes seemed to focus on mine.

Ketheria! I called out, but her vacant stare just bore straight through me. I dont think she had a clue that I was even in the room with her.

I felt Theylor place his slender hand on my shoulder. I turned and looked into the eyes of his left head. I had grown to trust Theylor over the last three rotations on the Rings of Orbis, and I searched his bluish face now to find any justification for my sisters suffering.

The Nagools have been waiting their whole lives for this moment, he said. They will do everything to make the Scions

My sister, Theylor. Shes my sister, nothing more, I corrected him. We traveled from Earth to work on these rings just like the zillions of other aliens who come here every rotation to do the exact same thing. Once our debt is paid, we get to start a new life of our own as Citizens. That was the deal. Not this! The Scion? The Tonat? None of it makes sense to me, Theylor. I dont want any of it, and Im certain Ketheria doesnt, either. You guys are the ones calling her the Scion. That word doesnt mean anything to me.

Theylor bowed his head before he continued. Even if you do not want this to happen, you cannot deny that it is happening. This is self-evident. Theylor motioned toward Ketheria. Yet for some reason, you resist believing what you see right before your very eyes. Your sister is the Scion, Johnny Turnbull. I assure you that the Nagools will do everything possible to make her awakening a painless experience. I do not understand your anger.

Im not angry, I whispered. Im confused.

Some things are easier to accept if you simply trust the Universe.

That was easy for him to say. He wasnt a knudnik.

Come now, he added. I must get you to the spaceport. There is not much time before the Orbis 4 shuttle launches. Your new work rule has already started.

Despite the fact that everyone believed Ketheria was the new Scion, the Trading Council insisted that we finish our fourth rotation of indentured service, and the Keepers and the Nagools did not argue. They believed that the Scion had to awaken along the path that the Universe had predicted for him or her, no matter how dangerous that path may be. It was a small miracle that they even let me follow Ketheria to Orbis 1 once she got sick. I had hoped she might come out of her awakening and we could travel to Orbis 4 together, but that did not seem likely now.

Please, I begged. I was hoping for a little more time.

I am sorry. I have done everything I could just to let you stay this phase.

Ive been here a whole phase?

Theylor nodded, and I remembered the moment when I had found Ketheria in the middle of one of her spells. It was right before we were all about to leave to meet our new Guarantor on Orbis 4. Ketheria had started doodling those little spirals on the walls while everyone else was packing. Soon afterward she slipped into the catatonic state that now consumed her. Usually Ketheria came out of one of her spells by the end of a cycle, but this time she hadnt. Instead, the glow had started. I told Vairocina, my friend inside the central computer, the moment it began, and she contacted Theylor immediately. Soon Theylor and an army of Nagool masters converged upon Ketheria. As they shuttled both her and me to Magna on Orbis 1, Theylor informed me that the glow was the Source working through her, making connections with the rest of the universe. Max, Theodore, and everyone else were shipped off to Orbis 4.

Johnny, Theylor called. Im sorry, but it is time.

Reluctantly, I turned from my frozen vigil and followed Theylor out of the room, entrusting my sister to the Nagools. When I thought about waking up the next cycle not knowing a thing about my sisters condition, I felt as if a Neewalker had clamped his hands around my throat, trapping the air inside me. It scared me and I hated it.

Theylor paused next to one of the many treelike pillars that supported the largest cavern of the Keepers lair located beneath the city of Magna and waited for me. I looked up to where the deep blue stone pillars made contact with the roof. Bands of yellowish light oscillated from the top of the support with a beat that was oddly reminiscent of the glow. I then followed Theylor as he navigated around huge pools of black water that glittered from deep below the surface.

A small domed craft waited on a rail of shorter pillars next to a platform. I followed Theylor aboard, and we sat in silence during the short trip to the surface. It gave me time to think. What had happened? Why Ketheria? No one had any answers for me, but that didnt mean no one knew. I had heard stories of other Scions and the horrible fates they met. No matter what part of the universe they came from, new Scions were always persecuted by one group or another, tested until they broke. I had also heard tales of the Tonat, the guardian entrusted to protect the Scion once the awakening was complete. Thats who they wanted me to be. But if the Tonat was so important, why was I leaving my sister behind? It didnt make sense, but then when had my life on the rings ever made sense? No one ever explained anything here. Three rotations had taught me that most people on the Rings of Orbis protected their knowledge more than they did an Orodi Orb.