Chapter 11
Freak
“You knew you were never going to get away with that,” Alara hisses at me.
“Was I trying to get away with it?”
She narrows her eyes and I know I have said the wrong thing. There isn’t really a right thing to say. The world is full of wrong things in this moment, and I’m at peace with that.
I have been caught, obviously.
It’s very hard to dissolve an entire reality and not be caught. I wasn’t really even trying not to be caught. Well, not for everything, anyway. I’ve done a lot of work in a way designed not to be noticed, and then finally topped it with the thing she could not help but notice.
Alara is fuming. Steam is rising from her head and shoulders as she smolders at me. If she could kill me, she would. But Psyons are functionally immortal and we do not have the death penalty. So she’s going to have to get creative.
I don’t think she has the mental capacity to be particularly artistic about these events. One moment she was about to form an evil alliance with the DC; the next, none of that had ever happened.
I did not expect every Psyon in existence to be here, but I suppose it’s hard to make an example if it doesn’t happen publicly. Also, their simultaneous appearance might be my fault, now that I think about it.
When a timeline collapses, a Psyon standing on the brink of it has no choice but to return to the place from whence he came.
Alara and I appeared at the temple at the same time. That makes sense.
The fact that everyone else was also in the same position, that is interesting.
That tells me I was perhaps the only Psyon not in on this plan.
And that explains why I languished in a DC torture facility for years.
I’ve been assuming the goodwill of my kind for years, but my agenda has clearly not been meshing well with theirs for a long time.
“Why were you all so keen to merge with the Datari Composite?”
“Fresh blood, new power. Joining forces would have made us beings to reckon with,” Alara says.
“But we are already…”
I trail off. For some beings, a taste of power is both too much and not enough. I thought we were better than this. But we’re not. And perhaps even I am not truly any more advanced than the others. It’s just that what I wanted—or rather, who I wanted—had a different face.
Alara and I are not all that different. For a long time, we were both on the verge of power. It is clear that she tried to get rid of me once. I am sure she is going to get rid of me again now.
Though they cannot kill me, it feels like a good day for an execution. The sun is warm, like it always is. The dunes are mathematically perfect, as they always are. The wind has a hint of jasmine and a little pine, and some daisy. All the fundamental plants of the universe.
I have a feeling of satisfaction that will not be dulled by the gathering of our kind.
“Was it worth it, Tasin? Doing all of that, knowing that the penalty for erasing as much as you did is to be erased yourself? Have we taught you nothing all these years? Do you not understand what is at stake here? What has been lost? All the bounty of a civilization gone before it started because of a decision you made.”
“That egg could have been eaten by any predator,” I argue.
“The fact that I ate it is not here or there. Yes, I disrupted the seminal event, but having done so, it is the same as if it never happened at all. You are prosecuting a crime that, by definition, cannot be a crime because nothing happened.”
“That circular logic will get you nowhere, and I have no notion of why you have bothered to form those words,” she says. “Something was, and now is not, and the difference is you.”
“True,” I agree. “And every day, trillions of creatures eat billions of eggs, and none of them are charged with wiping out what has yet to be.”
“Again, not an argument we accept, and you know it.”
“You accept no arguments,” I say. “But I will tell you this: the time in which I now stand, is a time in which I did not spend three years trapped and experimented on. It is a time in which our offenses have not been rendered neutral. They were on the verge of an invasion of the home realm, you can be sure of that.”
“There are other evils in their place, and you can be sure of that,” Alara replies. “I am tired of arguing with you. There is nothing to say. Sentence must be passed.”
“Then pass your judgment,” I say calmly.
“I am ready to forego my existence, for I know what matters most to me is safe. The home realm is not going to be invaded, and my pet is not going to be captive to those monsters. She will live her life in the place she belongs, and I will have the satisfaction of…”
“I could just kill her,” Alara says.
“That would be illegal. She is no threat to you. Human lives are sacred, as well you know.”
“All lives are sacred,” she says.
I give a shrug. “Perhaps some are more sacred than others.”
“A human life, is that what you want?” Alara smirks as the idea comes to her. “You are so very concerned about this single animal creature who can barely moderate the volume of her thoughts, let alone control them. Maybe it is time you gave up more than your life, Tasin.”
“Just kill me,” I say. “Take your vengeance on me.”
“I’m not going to kill you,” she laughs.
“I am going to send you into the exile you deserve. You are going to live a short, brutal life. And at the end of it, you are going to die the way animals do. I am going to sever you from the home realm. You will wander this universe lost, unable to return home until eventually your body winds down and you pass from the world forever. I sentence you to the one thing a Psyon is never supposed to know. I sentence you to death.”