Chapter 10 Conversations
Conversations
Jace and his father had bounced around the Moon for an hour.
They’d written “hello” in footprints, had a contest over who could jump the farthest and highest with the Moon’s much weaker gravity, and even did some shooting practice with the rahirs.
Many aluminum cans lost their lives in this process.
They decided that before they sparred with the laser swords Jace would train his father so a reverse Luke x Vader incident with Jack losing a hand would not occur.
Finally, they tumbled back into the Storm Spike, aluminum cans laid out for burial on Earth, for the ride home.
His father decided that Jace should fly the way back while he stretched out and simply watched the stars and Earth come closer.
He did make sure that his father wasn’t just giving up control to please him.
After all, Jace would have plenty of opportunities to fly, but Jack might not.
But his father waved him off, seemingly completely content in the co-pilot’s seat.
Jace finally had his hands on the controls of his beloved ship.
“I’m totally going to crash when we get back,” his father said with a jaw-cracking yawn. “It’s been a day.” Then he looked wryly at his son and said, “I can only imagine how you feel, Jace.”
How did he feel? After ending the lives of those in the Khul ships, he had felt like he’d been hit by a Mack truck. But eating snacks with Khoth and Gehenna had actually re-energized him. He realized that he had been emotionally exhausted but his body was perfectly fine. It was up and ready to go!
“Surprisingly, pretty good. This new body has so much energy,” Jace explained his thoughts to his father. “But, I admit, the thought of laying my head on a pillow doesn’t sound like a bad idea. I wonder what kind of room the Osiris has prepared for me.”
“Knowing the Osiris it's probably some glowing pool,” his father responded with a grimace.
Jace let out a bark of laughter then his forehead furrowed. “Oh, God, you’re probably right. I sincerely hope that I don’t have to sleep in that for some reason.”
“Maybe it’s only if you’re injured. Like the Bacta tank that Luke Skywalker was in on Hoth,” his father mused.
Watching Star Wars together was one of the things his father and him had bonded over. So Jace found his inner geek beaming as his dad now compared that movie to their lives.
“You’re going to have to totally relearn your body now,” his father continued, lips pursed and brows drawn together as he clearly thought deeply about this.
Being an experimental pilot, his father had to keep himself incredibly fit, especially as he’d gotten older.
Jace was always fascinated by how his father had known his body so well like it was a machine that he’d taken apart and put together a million times.
His father didn’t disappoint when he added, “You don’t know your limits. ”
“My limits used to be very limited.” Jace kept smiling.
It didn’t hurt to talk about the past now, though he still had moments where he feared that everything he’d gained would be washed away. The migraine pain and tinnitus he’d felt in the Khul ship had terrified him.
Maybe if I have to sleep in a tank of blue goo, I’ll be okay with that.
“You always fought through. Pushed yourself beyond pain and exhaustion,” his father mused, sounding rather sad.
“Are you worried that I’ll do that again?” Jace asked as he naturally checked the ship’s fuel.
He didn’t even have to think about where the gauge was.
In fact, the image of the fuel indicator had come up almost before he’d interacted with the hologram.
He wondered if he needed to touch it at all or if it would have automatically come up.
He had a feeling he was thinking in a limited, human way about this, but giving up completely to the abilities he had…
Well, it was like what he had said to Gehenna in the dream the night before.
He didn’t want to lose himself to just being the Pilot.
He wanted to be Jace still who couldn’t quite believe he was flying a spaceship.
His father snorted. “You’ll do it again. That’s your nature. But I would urge you to figure out what you can do before you blow past that end point when things are dire.”
“Hard to know where that is,” Jace admitted.
“This body seems to be optimized.” He paused and wrestled with his own feelings about this.
“On the one hand, I feel completely normal. Like this has always been my normal, but, obviously, it hasn’t.
Maybe the fact that I’ve adjusted so well should bother me.
Obviously, I've changed. I don’t know all the stuff the Osiris put in me. Yet I feel like myself.”
Until I decide not to and take the next step. But I don’t know if there's a next step. How much of that interaction with Gehenna last night was a dream and how much was real?
He hadn’t really had a chance to dwell on his body since he’d be transformed.
They’d had so much to do. Now, he was curious about it, but also leery.
If he’d started wondering with Gehenna actively in his mind, she would have already been showing him a million things about this new form.
He could feel the bright spot of Gehenna in mind, but her attention was elsewhere unless he reached out for now.
Jace shook his head in amusement. Only his mother could take so much of Gehenna’s attention from him.
The Osiris, of course, said nothing. Jace wondered if it was trying to learn the concept of privacy or was just being cagey.
Being cagey, he thought with a mental huff of laughter.
“What sorts of things did the Osiris put in you? What do you know?” His father’s tone was curious but also worried.
Jace couldn’t blame him. If he’d see his father pumped full of glowing, blue liquid and transformed into Captain America, he’d be worried, too. Or at least very curious!
“I don’t know everything. Scratch that. I know very little,” Jace said and his father grinned, but he had that look in his eyes that told Jace he was listening very carefully to what Jace was and wasn’t saying. “I don’t know if I will get any older.”
His father let out a huff of air and his eyes widened. “Immortality?”
“Well, I guess.” Jace shrugged. “I know that I heal incredibly fast, which might be why I don’t age.”
“There are theories that aging is, in fact, not natural.” His father rubbed his face with both hands though as he took in the possibility that Jace would always look as he did now. “What else? Though I don’t know what can top that.”
“I’m stronger than most humans,” Jace said. “Faster too, obviously.”
“You’ve got the best eye I’ve ever seen with that rahir,” his father added.
“Yeah, I can, ah, see all the possibilities before me. Like, if you’re in a room with a door, window and vent and there’s some danger coming, I’ll know which way to go,” Jace explained, which was hardly an explanation.
“The AI are clearly generating odds that I don’t see or something.
Like when we were on the Hive and it was collapsing, I could see all the paths to escape. ”
His father whistled. “Handy and that makes me feel a little better about that escapade.”
His father did not know half of it. Jace’s shoulder blades twitched at the thought of the vats with the softening humans, the horror for their pain, the hideousness of seeing black shapes squirm under flesh.
Jace pushed the dark thoughts away. He knew he would be thinking about the Khul enough to not do so right at this moment.
Jace continued, “Let’s see, what else? Oh, I know hundreds of languages.”
His father blinked. “Hundreds–”
“Maybe more. And with the AIs I can decipher almost anything,” Jace answered.
He didn’t feel like he was bragging as he hadn’t earned these abilities.
He had been programmed with them. It would be what he did with them that would count.
“I can take this ship apart and put it back together. While I do still need the hardsuits, my body can adapt to far more adverse environments than a normal human body could.”
“God, Jace.” His father looked rather shellshocked.
Jace shrugged. “That’s not all. I probably could get a list of all of it for you. Gehenna likes lists.”
His father was quiet for long moments then said, “I wouldn’t tell General Intoshkin any of this.”
“No, I was pretty much going to skip all of it with him,” Jace let out an uncomfortable chuckle. “Just one of these abilities would make his doctors drool. But all of them? The immortality thing? That would have them cutting me open in a second.”
“I don’t think it would go that far. The General is a good man. But they would be taking pints of your blood and insisting on you being in their labs. They probably will still do that even without knowing everything,” his father said with a grimace.
But Jace shook his head. “I won’t be tested. I am not going to any lab. I have things to do.”
His father’s forehead furrowed. “Is it because of all the testing you went through before? Because I can understand that. Yet, what if your blood could help people?”
“It can’t,” Jace was surprised how certain he was of this. He shook his head. “I don’t know, Dad. I just feel it would be a bad idea to go down this road. The process is more than just pumping me full of chemicals and cooking me. I think it's really particular.”
“The Osiris is telling you this?”
“Maybe. I’m not sure. I just feel it.” Jace shook his head, not sure how to explain it.
“Well, your feelings have always been spot on so I’m not going to gainsay you,” his father said, but there was clearly still some dissatisfaction with his answers.
“I know that what’s happened to me seems like something that can help other people, Dad,” Jace answered the unasked question.
His father smiled and shook his head. “You know me just as well as I know you.”