[TJoXV] Guren: January 28- Run
I jump through the broken window to the fanfare of shattering glass and blaring alarms. The clock starts ticking down. I have exactly one minute to reach the mudbrick city in the distance, and no more. All Echoes practice drills to ensure they can neutralize runaways in only a minute. If I can cross the rocky plain in time, I can hide there. I can throw them off my trail. I can keep going, just like I planned.
But until then, the arid expanse still separates me from it. The distance is 50 meters- all Echoes training facilities are located exactly 50 meters from the nearest urban center.
I can already hear soldiers rushing to the window.
Wind and heat. Parched earth beneath my feet. Laser bolts connect with burns and shocks. The whole world is buried in flashes of lightning. My feet stamp on the ground in quick, blunt pulses. Through blurry eyes fighting against darkness, I can see the buildings shaking closer. Closer. Furied shouts fly behind, marred by the grip of rushing wind. My speed tears their seething words past comprehension. Reality is buried in adrenaline and pain. I run.
50 meters becomes 30. Then 10. With less distance, the details of the city become visible. Sprawling, rocky streets are dotted by the occasional passerby. I knew there would be few witnesses at this hour. Rough sand brick buildings create dusty alleyways, just as I’d hoped. That’s where I’ll hide. A worn sign recalls the humble city’s name: Adisi Dire Dawa. I have arrived.
I have no time to celebrate before another bolt unleashes a raging burn on my back. I keep running, darting into an alleyway and then out into a new street. I see what looks like a bunker a couple meters away, with its shutter door wide open and a lean, dark-skinned man inside. That’s my only hope.
I dive into the bunker, much to the surprise of the man. I point an aching finger toward the door and blurt out my panicked questions before he gets the chance to stammer his. “Is this military-grade?” My Amharic is heavily accented, but still intelligible.
“It… is,” he replies, slowly. His voice is light but imbued with purpose. “It’s an M.G.E.D.”
“That’ll hold them,” I mumble, briefly slipping into Greek. He leans in to hear me better, confused. “Close it!” I shout.
“Wait, wait- who are you?!”
“Fugitive. That’s all you need to know.” I dart to the control panel, my eyes wildly scanning across the buttons. “Which one closes it?”
The man puts a hand on my shoulder. “Hold on- This is a storm shelter. You can’t hide from them here.”
I’m still focusing on the buttons as he speaks. Emergency Lockdown, Door Timer, Secure Mode… Close Door! There it is! I break free from his grasp and throw my hand on the button. Immediately, the door crashes onto the ground with a hefty thunk.
I’m safe. I’m finally safe. My hand drops from the control panel as I breathe a heavy sigh of relief. I slide down to the metal floor, slumping my back against the wall. I did it. I’m… safe…
The man turns his head to look at me, shocked and confused. “What… what did you just do?”
I smile, well aware of the achievement. “Escaped boot camp,” I reply. My breath is still heavy and fast, but is gradually slowing.
“Oh- the Echo training facility? The F-”
“Fervorous,” I completed, continuing to recite the Fervorous pledge. Each training facility has a unique pledge, each in English. The Fervorous makes their recruits recite theirs at every meal. The words were burned into my brain. “‘Where the recruited become rec-”
“Recruiters, I know, I know,” he finishes. “We hear it every parade.” He eyes the door, worried. “So they’re coming after you?”
Suddenly, there’s furious banging from the other side of the door. We both turn our heads in surprise. “Yes,” I confirm, meekly.
I put my hand on the floor to support me in an attempt to stand up, but the immediate searing pain makes me lurch back to my spot with a yelp.
The man rushes to my side, concerned and hands ready. “Are you okay? What happened?”
“Burns,” I tell him, showing him my open hand. “I got hit a lot.”
He gently brings my hand closer to inspect it. The flesh is pinkish-red and thin. “Bad burns,” he comments. He uses a local phrase the Echoes didn’t teach us. I can make out “very bad.” He pauses, but eventually looks into my eyes with a conflicted stare. He decides, “Do you want me to help?”
“Please,” I groan through gritted teeth.
He dashes to the wall to fetch a first aid kit from a supply bin, and places it by my side. His hands swim through its contents with practiced speed, returning carrying a roll of bandages. “I’d put your burns in cool water if we had any. Light bandage wrappings will do for now.”
He kneels down and begins gently circling the bandages around my hand. They sting against my skin, but he keeps his pressure light to reduce the pain. He works as fast as he can without hurting me. “I’m Donavin,” he announces. “And you- you are very lucky I had volunteered to patrol the storm shelter today.”
“I’m also named Xavier,” I inform him. “What makes me so lucky?”
“I happen to be the only trained paramedic in the area. Besides, well…” He pauses to look at the rattling door, his gaze shaky. “Maybe some of them.”After an uncomfortable silence, he slowly lowers his head and returns to work. He hints at a small smile. “You’re far from the first Echo runaway we’ve had to deal with.”
He chuckles, meek. “Hey, hey, I don’t mean it- we don’t mind you guys. There’s plenty of you, after all- I think for every 10 people who go there, we end up getting 2 of them back after a couple of months. So, I’ll give you the same offer I give to the rest of them: you can hide in my house for a night or two, until you can find somewhere to go. We try to be accommodating, and my wife is only slightly tired of me bringing strangers home. She’ll warm up to you, though- she sympathizes. All you need to do is prepare yourself for two talkative little tikes.” He looks at me, grinning. “Think you can handle that?”
“Of course. I’d like to think they’re a bit easier to handle than escaping armed soldiers…”
Donavin laughs. “You’d think. But, hey- me and Kia thought we could handle them too.” He pauses, smiling. “Kids can be really good at proving you wrong…” A fond memory washes over him, but the tide soon recedes. He returns to his work, finishing the last wrapping. “That’s all I can do for now. I bet you have burns in other places, but we don’t have the supplies or the time to help them.”
He gets up and walks to a screen beside the control panel. After a couple quick inputs, it lights up to show security camera feed from outside. Concern shadows his face as his eyes study the footage. I join him and immediately see familiar faces.
“Oh, look at that- it’s my platoon.” I kick myself. “Was,” I correct.
His eyes widen as his face dawns surprise. “Your old platoon is hunting you down? I didn’t know the Echoes were so eager to betray each other.”
“I wouldn’t call it betrayal- they never liked me very much to begin with,” I explain. “I never gave them much to like. But, hey, I can’t be too mad at them, they did teach me a lot. How to fake a smile, how to escape a chokehold- not that those two usually had any overlap…”
He pragmatically interrupts me. “The door isn’t going to hold them forever- we need a plan for when they find a way in.”
I pause to think. “Are there weapons in here?”
“On the lower levels, yeah- take the elevator. They should be in any of the bins on floors lower than 2. Oh, and the password is Menelik!”
“Menelik? That’s not very hard to guess.”
“Oh, it is- it is for foreigners.” His eyes spark as he grins. “The ones who aren’t well-versed in history, anyway.”
I offer him a shrug in apology. “I’m Greek,” I concede, jokingly. “We have history books burned into our brains.”
He snickers until he regains his sense of urgency. He flaps his hand at me. “Go, go- run.”
I dive into the elevator. He doesn’t need to tell me twice.
With the press of a dim green light, the metal box starts to descend, and the noise it produces reveals it’s seen better days. As it slides down the deep metal shaft, it creates an industrial ambience that cuts away from the outside world, leaving me to my thoughts. What I’m doing now stands in stark contrast to the days before. I’d been planning my escape for months, gathering as much information as I could. Everything up to the moment I jumped out of that window was premeditated, but everything after was unplanned. I never imagined that this is where I’d be all those weeks ago. No one could have ever imagined that studious little Xavier Vandus would be breaking out on the day of his graduation. I was supposed to receive my implants today- two little metal squares placed in my chin to show my rank. I could receive more, greater ones, if I’d continued. If I’d become a pilot, like I aspired to when I joined. This isn’t where I pictured I’d be all those years ago, back when I thought this was my ticket to seeing the world. Back when I thought this was a good idea. But it’s where I am now.
I take a deep breath, closing my eyes and sealing my thoughts. Just keep moving forward, right?
While I don’t dwell on them for long, my mind sees that the events of today will make for an exciting journal entry. Without a moment to spare, my thoughts diverge into the entertaining questions of writing it all down, lifting myself from my surroundings.
There’s no use for me to explain this to myself, but I leave occasional explanations of the Greek journal tradition in the hopes that my journal has fallen into the hands of someone else, as I intend for it to. Besides, even if you’re familiar with the tradition, I should know best of all that our memory will fail us from time to time. So, in the case you fell to that, I’ll help you up the way I do with all the information I find: writing it down.
There are tales from before that speak of the old Greeks as legendary figures of humanity’s past. But, since those details have since been lost to time with all the histories of the rest of the peoples, one of those old Greek’s descendants in the new galaxy decided to prevent such a thing from happening again. They began to write down every event of every day into a journal, a journal they kept and filled with information until it was a comprehensive history. And when that journal was full, they started another. They wrote three journals in their lifetime, each of which we call a Chronoepistimi- time knowledge (our names are quite broad, no?)- coming together to form the Chronoepistimia. Inspired, their descendants began to write journals of their own, a tradition they then passed on to their descendants. And so it continued, until all the followers of that tradition- those who had claimed the name of “Greek” in memory of those forgotten ancestors- were a people of their own. A people my brother and I were born into.
In the Vandus family, you receive your journal on the day of your thirteenth birthday. That was a very happy day for me. But for my brother Phineus… Phineus never made it that far.
Right, the present. It helps to stay in the present.
The doors open, releasing the dusty air that rushes into the elevator, shocking my unprepared senses. On the other end of the room, I can see another elevator entrance. Strewn throughout the metal box are storage containers, one with its lid open, revealing weapons and Slearic batteries. I grab two pistols and a generous handful of batteries- enough to have some to last me after the incursion. Standard-quality Slearic batteries can overheat roughly 15 times before being depleted. As long as I stay out of trouble, that should last me a good while.
With our armaments in hand, I begin walking toward the elevator I came from, but stop when I hear noises from behind. The other elevator door opens to reveal Donavin, panic burning in his eyes. His jaw is quaking, as I realize it had been doing since the moment I arrived, though much softer.
“They’re firing grenades now,” he mutters, brow furrowed. “They’re going to break through.”
He says, “I see you found the weapons. Were you trained with these?”
I step away from the elevator, looking at the pistol in my hand. “Are these P-Shots?” I assume the shelter would opt for the budget brand.
“Psi Models, thanks to a generous donation.”
“We trained with Omegas every day.” Omega Models were the least powerful, and the cheapest. The Fervorous had lots of them. I smirk. “Will I have to worry about this one falling apart, too?”
He tries to laugh, but he lacks a lying heart. “Hopefully not…”
I walk over to him and hand him a Psi, as well as a couple of batteries. “Have you used one of these before?”
“Once, to test if they worked.” His fingers fumble around the handle. “But only once.” His eyes rest on the pistol uneasily. “We bought these for a worst case scenario. We never thought… that…”
“I understand,” I finish, relinquishing the burden. I look at a dusty metal door a few feet away. “Are those fire escape stairs?”
“Yeah. They connect to every floor.”
“They don’t know the elevator password. They’ll be coming from there,” I realize.
A booming thud reverberates down the floors, startling us. There’s the unmistakable, grinding screech of metal falling on metal. “Coming soon,” Donavin observes.
“You said they had grenades?” I ask.
“That’s what it sounded like. Is that… plausible?”
“The only Echoes who are allowed to use grenades are people with the grenadier rank, which I don’t remember any of them having. I guess there were some promotions I missed at the graduation ceremony.” There’s another thud. “Although… they could just be throwing out their Slearic batteries. Low-quality ones explode on impact.”
Donavin stares at the batteries in his hand. “Noted.”
“It isn’t recommended,” I tell him. “With good aim, we shouldn’t even need them. Right?”
The door bursts open before he can answer. Startled, we both jump back, and Donavin aims his Psi. His grip is controlled but his trigger finger is wild, and he quickly overheats his battery and misses most of his shots. As the searing heat reaches his hands, he yelps and drops the pistol. In a panic, I grab however many Slearic batteries fit through my fingers and chuck them at the charging soldiers. Blinding blue flashes of light freeze time. Then the heat reaches me. I shield my eyes, and back away, just as the sound begins. Frantic, unrestrained energy thrashes around, zipping and fizzing while humming loudly. And of course, they scream. With a crackle and a boom, the blue thorns dissipate, revealing a platoon of dazed, burned, men. Some cough and groan in pain. Some don’t move. I killed them.
My eyes well up. I didn’t mean to. Donavin carefully tiptoes closer. I fall to my knees, my hands wavering over them. I never liked my platoon, and I still don’t. But I didn’t want them to die. I don’t want anyone to die. I didn’t mean to.
“I’m sorry,” I mutter through quivering lips.
Donavin inspects the soldiers. Those who are alive have a dazed look on their face. Their eyes aren’t staring at anything they can see. He grabs a first aid kit from a cabinet and opens it, taking out the materials needed for treating burns. He takes out a pen and paper and writes a note. I get up and kneel down beside him to see. It instructs them on how to treat their burns and tells them to get cool water when they can. Once he’s done writing, he moves his hand to put the pen away, but I reach for it. I want to add something. He hands it to me. On the note, I write:
I place the pen in his open hand, but instead of putting it back, he adds something too.
There are burial dunes a kilometer east.
Finally, he puts the pen away. He looks at me, reading my eyes. “It hurts,” he says, knowingly. “I hope they’ll come to forgive you.”
I sniffle. “In time, I bet.”
He puts a welcome hand on my shoulder. “If anything, in time.”
A small smile sprouts as a tear drips off my face. “Well… they’ll have to forgive me for all the other stupid things I’ve done first.”
“Jumping out a window, first of all,” I chuckle. “And if you had the misfortune of being around me for that long, the list would go on and on.”
“Hardly misfortune,” he argues. “From what I’ve seen, at least. You remind me of a local saying: a worrisome butterfly sees itself a moth.”
“People with good qualities often worry they’re less than they are. I think that fits you well.”
The smile becomes a little more confident. “Thank you.” I take a deep breath and look at the platoon again. “Forgive me,” I whisper. “Forgive me someday.”
A buzz came from one of the soldiers. It was from one of his facial implants, this one on his ear. It functions like a headset. The higher in rank an Echo is, the more implants they receive. Softly, I can hear a voice coming from it. “Platoon 237, please respond. Have you found the runaway?”
Donavin stands up. “We’d best go someplace else; I don’t think you’ll be safe here forever.” He runs fingers through his hair. “This is not where I imagined I’d be the day before Huletineti…”
“A festival, yeah. We celebrate every year when Guren’s two moons align. The name itself is Amharic for duality. It starts tomorrow.”
“Is harboring fugitives part of the festivities?”
He laughs. “No, but that doesn’t stop our family from making it a tradition.”
The Eshe home is much like the others in Adise Dire Dawa: quaint, cramped, and colorful. As Donavin explained, one of the traditions for the Huletineti Festival is gathering daisies and decorating your home with them. As I’d later see, there were many bouquets of daisies gathered inside, and as we arrive, we find his wife Kia building a banner of daisies above their doorway.
“Yene nefse, my soul, we’re home,” he calls.
“Yene nefse!” She puts down the basket of flowers and rushes to embrace him. She kisses him on the cheek and smiles. “You’ve come just in time to help.”
He places a hand on her face. “We’d best introduce our guest first.” He uses more local words as he speaks with her.
Her eyes widen in confusion. “Guest?” She pulls away from his arms to look for me.
Donavin moves to try and block me from view. “My soul, it’s just one this time,” he assures. “We won’t keep him for lo-”
Despite his efforts, she finds me. “Who is this?” Kia asks, pointing. She knows the red uniform.
“I’m Xavier,” I interrupt. “I’m an Echo runaway.”
She sighs, familiar. “Yes, and there are two moons in the sky…”
“This one’s unique, though,” Donavin promises. “I didn’t ask to save this one. He just kinda…”
“Dove into the storm shelter,” I finish.
“Yeah,” he nods. “That.” He bears a moment of nervous silence before adding, “His Amharic is quite good for an Echo.”
Kia stands there, arms folded, looking back and forth at us. “With rain or not, the farmer still reaps…” she mutters. Her chin jolts upward. “You! Xavier!” she calls, her voice strong and sharp. She waves her hand. “Come, come.”
Her posture loosens, and her lips curl into a warm smile. “Really, come. You don’t have to be afraid of me. Respect me, yes. But only my children-” she pauses to look at her husband, “-and my very tall child have any reason to be afraid of me.”
“You’re really letting me inside?” I ask, unsure.
She nods. “If my husband is going to keep bringing strangers into our house, the least I can do is make them dinner.” Her gaze turns to Donavin. “Speaking of, you’ll be finishing the banner.” She grins. “Yene nefse.”
She leads me through the front door, dodging her children and averting her eyes to the waves of dust that trail behind their lively feet. She kicks off her sandals to match her barefoot children. She waves an open hand towards the dinner table, instructing, “Take a seat.” Her hands find bronze pots, plates decorated with intricate floral patterns, but no utensils. All food is eaten with spongy and fermented injera. “Careful, little ones!” she calls. “Your house is made of sturdy brick- don’t learn the hard way.” She shakes her head lovingly. “Dinner won’t be long for you, Xavier. You won’t be disappointed.”
I smile, knowing that’s true. Good food tastes best from good people. “Does Donaivn cook?”
“He does. Better than me, truly.” She eyes the doorway and raises her voice to make sure he hears. “But not faster than me!” She giggles cheerfully. “I make sure to stoke the flames of friendly competition every now and again. It helps us both- we cook best when we’re trying to prove ourselves best.” She looks me up and down. “Take off those boots. They won’t do you any good out here where the dust is. And keep your head up. Keeps it out of your eyes.”
She doesn’t need to watch me to see if I listened.
She was right about her cooking. The evening was spent merrily, with much talk of me and the children. After learning about their son Negasi’s day at school and their daughter Mariam’s favorite color, someone eventually asks of my homeworld.
“Thalassa,” I say, preparing to explain the distance. Donavin interjects before I do.
“Hardly,” I snort. “No matter where you live there, you grow up beside it. I’m no different. There’s so much of it it’s impossible not to.” I refill my spoon with another mouthful of cold stew, combatting my sweat.
Kia placed her spoon down beside her empty bowl. “Its name even means ‘sea,’ yes?”
“Correct. The air is so humid there- nothing like Guren.”
Donavin nodded understandingly, before a playful smile arose. “And here, you can go five steps without your toes getting wet.”
“Far more than five,” Kia adds. “Too many.”
I roll my eyes. “The islands aren’t as small as everyone says.” I break apart a piece of injera. “To us, anyway.”
Donavin asks, “So I take it you wanted to get as far away from the water as possible? If so, you chose a good place.”
I stop. My smile wavers. “Not… exactly.” There’s an explanation that leaves out the details: “Some people just want to see the galaxy.”
Donavin “ahs” in understanding. “I can see the appeal. I only ask because some do enjoy- or would enjoy- getting as far away from their homeworld as possible.” He smiles, guiltily and jokingly.
If there was one thing that any person could agree on, regardless of homeworld, it’s that their own planet was the worst one.
Kia had finished her meal by now and was already up collecting the dishes. Donavin wolfed down his last few bites and then came to help. The kids had ran off. They say this happens often.
I am told where the guest room is and that there were several cots to accommodate me. In the corner is a vase full of large linen cloths, one of which remained on a cot. These were my blankets. It was clear people had been here before me. How many, I wonder? How long did they stay? As I felt my hands on the cot, I tried to imagine myself as someone else: the person before me. What were they like? Their homeworld, their reason for leaving. I pulled the mental image one person back; the person before that one. How far did it go? I scan the room. Each of the cots was set up in a different way. Some were clearly only used for one night. Others had boxes put beside them for use as nightstands, or bags underneath them. I can even make out two little metal squares- now crushed and crumpled- hiding under a cot in the corner, just big enough to fit in someone’s chin.
I am not alone, but I don’t know by how much. The Echoes are too responsible to tell you, but the recruits know stories. Stories like mine. They were never told in broad daylight- almost always the opposite. Stories like that were best heard underneath the unpainted roof of your dorm when your lights were off. That was the picture of many nights.
Underneath the rocky roof, with the last glimpses of daylight being swallowed by that of two very close, almost united moons, I try to hear those stories again. It helps to think of the people in them being with me. Any history is easier as a familiar one. I think of them, gearing up to go where all of the runaways go: Stoya, a city on Hintite. They say there’s enough crime there that you’re the least priority. I’ll follow.
Even if the cots around me are empty, I like to imagine them full. Not full of the people who used to fill my dorm bunks, but full of the people whose bunkmates were also no longer their friends. People whose bunkmates were also on their first mission. First kill mission.
I recognized that face on the one I killed, even if I didn’t recognize it when they were charging at me and firing their weapon. I clench the bandages on my wrist. I didn’t recognize the person but I did recognize the face.
I hold onto the thought of my fellow runaways as I close my eyes. I need as much company as I can get. Because even if this is a path often tread, it is a path tread almost entirely alone.
