Date: Sat, 13 Oct 2018 19:14:03 -0400 From: Thanatos Talimenios Subject: Shadows Calling 1 Volus III I turned the corner of the market to see the two story library building, my home. As an orphan at a mining colony planet, I don't do much but dodge the slave syndicate mafia. I'm eight years old and learning to develop powers that help me fight against them. At first I thought it psionics, however, it turns out it is something more arcane and esoteric. The slavers want me to fight in the pits they have further out in the colonies. The star armada of the Republic of Worlds doesn't come here much. I slip to the transdimensional subspace side of the world and walk towards the library. On the shadow world side, I see people and can walk through them. They don't see me. I hide and sleep here a lot of the time on this side. I typically call them layers of the the planet. While walking past a few poor people, I see a shadow imp (I call them anyways). It looks at me with a sidelong look. "Hi," I say to the imp. The imp starts walking away. I really don't know where they come from but they live on the layer side and talk to me sometimes. I teleport past the door to the library foyer. Inside is the shadowy image of the librarian at her desk. I move past the desk and start walking towards the basement door entrance. At the door, I hesitate then teleport again; my awareness sight seeing what is on the other side to teleport to as always. I walk down the stairs to my mattress and plop down on the makeshift bedding. Soon thereafter, I fall asleep. Waking up to the beep of a communication, I slip over to the real side of the layer of the planet. I get off the bed and walk to the communication computer. Hitting the blinking accept button the display, I see a face I recognize. Admiral Tapella. She is a Betor admiral in the Armada that I like. "Greetings Laven, I have distressing news. The slave organization is planning a slaver assault on your world. You need to get to a life pod and head to Earth with me," she says. She looks angry now and is looking around her office. "I don't know where the life pods are," I say. "I will direct you, I will hack into your com headset and guide you to a location with a ship. I will also teach you to plot a course," the admiral replies. She looks back at me, " Another thing, you may need to kill to get this ship. I will tell you if it is okay to use your powers to kill a specific person. Wear the visor and I will see through it." "Okies," I say to her. Then I put on the visor and headset and wait. "I'm linking to the headset, just stay put for now. It doesn't transfer to the transdimensional layer you speaking of, I know that much, but when you come back to our side I will be able to talk to you once more." Admiral Tapella begins typing on her computer, presumably to link to my communication headset; I programmed it myself. I hear a voice over the earpiece saying to me, " Now make haste to the warehouse district with teleporting and I will further direct you. I also see through you." "Okies," I reply through the mouthpiece. "I'm at the warehouses now Tapella," I announce after arriving back to the volus III layer near some buildings. There are people nearby walking fast away towards the loading zone for freighters. I don't see any freighters or tankers, but I do see a few ships with people getting on. "That is the Primus of Volus III; he is in with the mafia deep. Kill him and get on his ship; close the door, lock it, and prep the ship for takeoff," I hear over the earpiece, it's a new voice. "Who was that," I ask while teleporting a fair distance towards the Primus. I easily recognize him from news channel messages. Always telling others he is the voice of the people. Always sending orphans off to sexual slavery. "That was Vice Admiral Forrester, he's from the academy helping me with you. Helping getting you to safety," I hear. Approaching the ships, I notice the plasma weapons held by a few, only pistols. I slip to the other shadow layer and quickly teleport aboard the ship the primus is approaching. It looks nicer than the other ships. The ships are small. The vessels could only hold about 50 people with the Primus' vessel only holding about ten. "I slipped back over but the Primus is coming on board soon," I say over the headset. "Kill him as soon as you see him, don't give him time to shoot you," I hear from a male voice. I wait, and quickly see the Primus coming up the stairs to the bridge. I announce, "Vox Populi speaks!" Throwing a bolt of black and purple energy at his face, I see him gurgle blood spewing out of his cratered face. "He's dying! I'll close the door to the ship," I say hurriedly. Looking back at the now blind and dying Primus, I say to him," That's for all the slave children and always trying to take me, father." "He never wanted a half Betor kid Laven," says Tapella over the com set. Now truly orphaned by my own hand, I contemplate my future on Earth and quickly redirect the ship towards Higal. The Higalians were always nice to me, and conviently outside the Republic that I grew to hate with a dad as a corrupt official of it. There were corrupt admirals too; Tapella would talk of them. I knew they wanted to study me to see if they could reproduce through genetic tinkering my powers. I cut off communication to earth by turning off the headset with a tap on the side to the power button. Having set a course I walk back to the couches in the luxury cabin. I sit down and think about the pictures I had seen of my mother. I'm alone now. At least I'm not part of the Republic anymore.