Editing Certitude
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''I’m leaving the business'', he’d said.<br> | ''I’m leaving the business'', he’d said.<br> | ||
Leaving the Resistance. <br> | Leaving the Resistance. <br> | ||
| − | The Feds had grabbed him off the street on Beaumonde and taken him prisoner. They had him for 60 days | + | The Feds had grabbed him off the street on Beaumonde and taken him prisoner. They had him for 60 days. 1,440 hours. 86,400 minutes. Over 5 million seconds. I had no knowledge of what the Alliance did to him during all that time—Mike wouldn’t say and I refused to ask—but I knew the end result when we sprang him free. Injected with DNA-altering drugs, Mike had been rendered incapable of withholding a truthful answer to a direct question and unable to resist a direct command. I couldn’t tally the wealth of information they’d wrested from him, but I could measure what it cost him.<br> |
| − | Everything he’d worked for might well be useless to the Resistance now. Over a decade of training, skill, and credibility in the clandestine circles just went up in smoke. No one would hire him and some would gun for him, for fear he was a mole. Mike had been burned, completely and irrevocably, and his life as a spy was | + | Everything he’d worked for might well be useless to the Resistance now. Over a decade of training, skill, and credibility in the clandestine circles just went up in smoke. No one would hire him and some would gun for him, for fear he was a mole. Mike had been burned, completely and irrevocably, and his life as a spy was over.<br> |
And so he’d made his way to Salisbury, the place where he’d been born thrice over. First as a rancher’s son, second as a monk, and third as a spy. Disparate occupations, to be sure, yet in him it only made obvious the logical progression of one to the other. He was that rare genuine article, the true natural, and what he did came as easily as breathing. You could no more remove the instincts that served him so well as a spy than you could rip out my affinity for machines. We’re hard-wired for it. Deny us our talents and any suitable outlet, we’d both wither. Die by inches. Cut us loose and we’d gravitate toward them, like iron filings to a lodestone, without thought and needing no reason but that the Universe spoke to us so. His choice of Salisbury, therefore, was no surprise to me. Of all the places he’d choose to go to ground, it made the most sense it would be there. He had contacts there, who would take him in regardless of his condition, contacts that had made him what he’d once been, and could be again.<br> | And so he’d made his way to Salisbury, the place where he’d been born thrice over. First as a rancher’s son, second as a monk, and third as a spy. Disparate occupations, to be sure, yet in him it only made obvious the logical progression of one to the other. He was that rare genuine article, the true natural, and what he did came as easily as breathing. You could no more remove the instincts that served him so well as a spy than you could rip out my affinity for machines. We’re hard-wired for it. Deny us our talents and any suitable outlet, we’d both wither. Die by inches. Cut us loose and we’d gravitate toward them, like iron filings to a lodestone, without thought and needing no reason but that the Universe spoke to us so. His choice of Salisbury, therefore, was no surprise to me. Of all the places he’d choose to go to ground, it made the most sense it would be there. He had contacts there, who would take him in regardless of his condition, contacts that had made him what he’d once been, and could be again.<br> | ||
Which made what he’d said to me next all the more unexpected.<br> | Which made what he’d said to me next all the more unexpected.<br> | ||
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Dancers say that when the music starts, they lose themselves in it and their bodies become nothing but the medium the music moves through, that movement is the language it speaks. Singers say the same, that air and sound and pitch comes combined from their core, pours forth from their throats, and nowhere and at no time are they more alive than when they sing. Through my ears and my hands and the marrow of my bones, I felt the ship come awake as her engines fired to life and I knew I had made the right choice. And as we left the dirt I knew, as sure as I knew my name, that Mike had already known what I’d say.<br> | Dancers say that when the music starts, they lose themselves in it and their bodies become nothing but the medium the music moves through, that movement is the language it speaks. Singers say the same, that air and sound and pitch comes combined from their core, pours forth from their throats, and nowhere and at no time are they more alive than when they sing. Through my ears and my hands and the marrow of my bones, I felt the ship come awake as her engines fired to life and I knew I had made the right choice. And as we left the dirt I knew, as sure as I knew my name, that Mike had already known what I’d say.<br> | ||
So why did he ask?<br> | So why did he ask?<br> | ||
| − | The engines | + | The engines echoed Nika’s hand on the throttle and they changed their tune, raised their pitch. I could feel them straining to run, like a thoroughbred at the gate, and I gave them a little more rein. Power flowed more sweetly and the dissonance of strain disappeared. All the gauges were well within normal and I let my mind go back to the problem at hand.<br> |
If Mike had already known my answer, why had he asked me the question?<br> | If Mike had already known my answer, why had he asked me the question?<br> | ||
We’d disembarked and crossed the meadow and stopped short of the tree line at clearing’s edge. He’d scanned the forest hemming us in and he’d muttered something the rustling breeze couldn’t quite mask from my ears:<br> | We’d disembarked and crossed the meadow and stopped short of the tree line at clearing’s edge. He’d scanned the forest hemming us in and he’d muttered something the rustling breeze couldn’t quite mask from my ears:<br> | ||
''Might be a while before anyone’s here…''<br> | ''Might be a while before anyone’s here…''<br> | ||
He’d stood at the comms on the bridge, calling the ground below:<br> | He’d stood at the comms on the bridge, calling the ground below:<br> | ||
| − | ''Weather | + | ''Weather report….Mission coordinates….''<br> |
Not the language of a man getting out of the spy business. It sounded more like a man getting in. A man who could not afford the liability of a lover or a wife.<br> | Not the language of a man getting out of the spy business. It sounded more like a man getting in. A man who could not afford the liability of a lover or a wife.<br> | ||
''Make no hostages to fate'', I’d said to him once, back when he’d first asked me to marry him. At the time he’d seen the necessity of it. Now I have to wonder if he’d been relieved I’d been practical instead of sentimental, on both that day and when he’d asked me again, nearly ten years later.<br> | ''Make no hostages to fate'', I’d said to him once, back when he’d first asked me to marry him. At the time he’d seen the necessity of it. Now I have to wonder if he’d been relieved I’d been practical instead of sentimental, on both that day and when he’d asked me again, nearly ten years later.<br> | ||
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''You knew this was comin’, Irina'', he’d said that day, with Angel fast approaching. His duffel sat packed on the bunk we’d shared and at the time I’d thought I’d known what he’d meant. <br> | ''You knew this was comin’, Irina'', he’d said that day, with Angel fast approaching. His duffel sat packed on the bunk we’d shared and at the time I’d thought I’d known what he’d meant. <br> | ||
I’d once told Nika that I had no faith, and by extension, no belief in God. That I believed only in tangibles that I could see and touch and measure. Concrete proof, I’d said, and that I accepted no substitutes. One could argue that the proof of His existence is how He sent Mike’s path across mine when I needed him most. Perhaps. What is inarguable, no matter what agency you subscribe to, is how Mike and I always manage to cross paths again. And again. And again. Across nearly a decade and with the entire ’Verse to get lost in, we would always meet up sooner or later.<br> | I’d once told Nika that I had no faith, and by extension, no belief in God. That I believed only in tangibles that I could see and touch and measure. Concrete proof, I’d said, and that I accepted no substitutes. One could argue that the proof of His existence is how He sent Mike’s path across mine when I needed him most. Perhaps. What is inarguable, no matter what agency you subscribe to, is how Mike and I always manage to cross paths again. And again. And again. Across nearly a decade and with the entire ’Verse to get lost in, we would always meet up sooner or later.<br> | ||
| − | It | + | It was never be a matter of ''if'', only ''when''. All I had to do was outlast the Universe and inevitably, she’d relent. Our divergent paths would meet and we’d be together again. All past evidence supports it. Hard evidence, as hard as concrete.<br> |
''You’ll find me'', he’d said, as the air of Salisbury wafted through his hair, and the sunlight picked out the gold in it. ''Somehow we always do''.<br> | ''You’ll find me'', he’d said, as the air of Salisbury wafted through his hair, and the sunlight picked out the gold in it. ''Somehow we always do''.<br> | ||
Well enough.<br> | Well enough.<br> | ||
| − | So I went about my duties, finding solace in the ship and the song she sang. When Nika touched down at Salisbury’s main northern spaceport, I was able to face the crew with my head up and my eyes dry, and though I wasn’t entirely at peace with the situation, I was accustomed to it. After all, I’d done it before and I’d do it again. As often as it takes. Because while the Universe might sometimes throw you a bone, she never stops spinning and the trick to surviving is to keep up or get ground up in her gears.<br> | + | So I went about my duties, finding joy and solace in the ship and the song she sang. When Nika touched down at Salisbury’s main northern spaceport, I was able to face the crew with my head up and my eyes dry, and though I wasn’t entirely at peace with the situation, I was accustomed to it. After all, I’d done it before and I’d do it again. As often as it takes. Because while the Universe might sometimes throw you a bone, she never stops spinning and the trick to surviving is to keep up with her or get ground up in her gears.<br> |
Damned if I’d let her win. | Damned if I’d let her win. | ||
<br><br><br> | <br><br><br> | ||
| − | '''Go back to [[Valediction| ''Valediction'']]''' | '''Go to | + | '''Go back to [[Valediction| ''Valediction'']]''' | '''Go to next Entry''' |
| − | + | <br> | |
| − | + | '''Go to''' [[Marina Kseniya Sebastien | '''Rina's Crew Page''']] | |
| − | '''Go to''' [[Marina Kseniya Sebastien | '''Rina's Crew Page''']] | ||
| − | |||
