Rescue
July 27, 2285
Tethys, Third Moon of Saturn
Terra Firma Dissident Prison Complex
Xavix was on the bridge of his ship. The athletic dark-haired man smiled down with a flicker in his eyes as if he had a secret to share. On his 360 degree panoramic display around the ship, he could see two young adults males were running toward the ship. Alarms were blaring throughout the prison that masqueraded as a university. Even though the parking lot was large, it felt small at the moment. They were being pursued by school security. They didn’t yet know the truth, but that was Xavix’s job. “Open up” he spoke to the Artificial Intelligence built into his ship. A staircase deployed from the side and the two teens clambered aboard. “Lead them here, let’s go”
The ship took off at an unreasonable angle and pulled back the staircase at the same time. The doors to the faculty parking lot on Tethys began to close. Edith, the ship’s AI, knew she wasn’t going to make it. Blasting her fusion drives up to 100% she accelerated to 450 miles (ca. 724 km) per second. She damaged most of the ships in the parking lot with engine blast and accelerated quickly, knocking Xavix and, presumably, the two young adults off their feet. The closing doors scraped Edith’s exterior as she sped out of the lot, but she made it. Slowing down to only 75 miles (ca. 121 km) per second was barely a jog for her. Edith was one of the fastest ships in the solar system, but going that fast took its toll on the people inside, so she didn’t do it commonly, even though she wanted to.
The bridge had no controls, no buttons, just the singular panoramic display which currently showed a panorama of space outside the ship with no gauges or details. Saturn loomed large on the screen as it drifted slowly away. Xavix liked seeing space, and Edith knew that. Xavix got back to his feet and sat down in the one chair directly in the center of the circular room. “Was that really necessary?”
If Edith had an eyebrow, she would raise it to him. “Was getting out necessary?”
Xavix sighed, rubbing the elbow that he knew would have a bruise tomorrow. “Yeah okay.”
In orbit around Saturn
Lead by panels in the floor, two young adults entered the bridge from behind him. Not looking backward, he welcomed them. “Sam, Tim, welcome. Please sit.” two chairs materialized in front of him, facing him.
One of the young men lead the other. The leader had straight brown hair cropped short, brown eyes and an air of confidence. The other had blonde hair cut around his shoulders, green eyes and a more frustrated demeanor. They sat in the chairs facing Xavix.
Tim, the leader of the two, spoke first. “Is this real, are we in space?”
“Yes, and so is she.” Xavix, the person they knew as their history teacher, pointed at the screen. They looked at the screen where a small capsule was highlighted. Dwarfed by the size of Saturn, it shared their orbit. The capsule appeared to be coming ever closer in the view screen, even though they were the ones moving closer to it.
“So it’s not the year 2004?” Tim was the inquisitive sort.
“No. You were placed in a prison. A prison which robs you of the fabric of reality. It is two hundred and eighty-five years later. Your memories were removed, and you were implanted with false ones to keep you complacent.”
Sam spoke up next, “It would have been easier to stay.”
“Tell me that after you have your memories back.”
Tim considered this, “Mr. Mustang. How do we get our memories back?” He paused for just a moment, but then instantly had more questions. “What is reality if we can’t remember it? Who would make a prison that tricks you into thinking you’re just an average student at a university? Who are you really?”
“My name is Jaedon Mustang. That much is true. My actual career is not as a history teacher.” He smirked, pointing back at the screen. “She, Ylena, the woman in that capsule, has your memories on disks. The topic of reality is a complicated question. Everyone’s reality varies slightly. For instance, My ship, Edith, is Artificial Intelligence. She is an empathic type AI, she will sense what you need before you need it. Is reality for her just all of our needs?”
“Oh, hell no,” Edith said.
A table and a cup of tea appeared next to Sam. He pushed it away. Sam denied himself the fact that it would have really helped his emotion at the moment.
“Edith, the capsule.” The ship flipped over and moved closer to the capsule, then slowly matched trajectory and opened a bay on the bottom side of the ship, as all of this was happening, Jaedon continued speaking. “I am an agent of the Government of Venus. I was sent to free you, along with our princess, who you already know. Gwen.”
This time, Sam’s shock caused him to speak up. “Gwen is a princess?”
“Yes, like you, she was arrested and imprisoned, her memories removed. Unlike the two of you, we were able to arrange an official release, she is already back home on Venus. Her memories were restored, but we had to steal yours for you to watch — we can’t restore them properly. However, hopefully, we will gain that ability soon.”
“How do I know this isn’t a dream?” Sam asked.
“You don’t.” Jaedon said calmly.
“Well, that’s not helpful.”
“But wouldn’t a dream me give you an explanation to follow up on and a nice conclusion?”
Tim broke in, “Who imprisoned us, and why?”
“Only your memories can tell us that.”
A new voice entered the room, “Well that was an uncomfortable ride.” the voice was accompanied by a tall woman in a long black dress and high heels sporting long blonde braided hair.
Jaedon apologized as all the boys stood, and the chairs vanished, “Ylena, we had no other way to get you across the solar system in two months. We had to do that.”
“Next time, warn me when you’re going to hibernate me and shoot me out of a cannon at over 500,000 miles (ca. 804,672 km) an hour.”
“Uh, yeah, it’s not the most comfortable ride. We didn’t tell you until we did it because we thought you would back out.”
“Excuse me.” Sam interjected. “Who, now, are you?”
“I’m the woman who apparently is worth shooting across the solar system with your memories.” She tossed the disks to Jaedon.
“I get that much. But Why? And why not just leave me there?” Sam was furious and slammed his hand down on the table, tea spilling all over; which Edith quickly made vanish.
“All will become clear when you watch these. Sam, you go with Ylena.” He tossed each person their disk, “Tim, we’ll go to a different room to watch yours. Edith, let’s go to the King. 63%” The ship accelerated away from Saturn toward Venus at 63% of its maximum speed. Edith, just for fun, dove into Saturn as she sped up to 283 miles (ca. 455 km) per second.
Sam looked at the disk in his hand. “But this isn’t my name. My name is Samuel, not Samantha.”
“I’m sure that’s part of what’s in there…” Jaedon said, looking at Alestra. Alestra nodded back.
As Edith pulled away from Saturn toward Venus, she caused a trail of Saturn’s yellow brown and red clouds to shoot out into space, leaving a sparkling trail behind her.
Edith
Conference Room One
“How is this going to work? I just can’t watch my memories, can I?” Tim’s confusion was reasonable as he sat down.
“We honestly don’t know. That is part of why Alestra and I are here. We have no idea what effect watching them is going to have. With the official process, they restored the original memories and removed the fakes.
“Ever since it was determined that memories could be stored as data like this, there have been theories about how to remove and implant them. The government of Venus never approved any kind of experimentation. It appears Terra Firma has no qualms about experimentation on this topic.”
“That fills me with confidence.” Tim said sarcastically.
“That’s odd, it wasn’t meant to.” Jaedon smirked back at Tim.
Tim just stared at the person he knew as his history teacher with a blank face.
“Okay, maybe not the best time for jokes. My point is that it’s my job to be honest with you, even when it’s not pretty.”
“Well, I do appreciate that.” Tim slid the disk into a slot. The desks and chairs sank into the floor as Tim and Jaedon stood. The room darkened to black as it shifted into a holographic mode.
The first thing that appeared was floating text of a date and a location.
December 10, 2274
Terra Firma Empire
Tokyo
Taito City
A Small Home
Despite being relatively new, the building and units were poorly constructed. It was abnormal for Japan to build a building like this. However, since the takeover of the Terra Firma Empire and the dismantling of Japan as a nation, buildings like this were becoming more and more prevalent. Cheaply designed buildings, cheaply constructed, for the working poor.
Nine-year-old Tim was sitting on the floor of a small kitchen in a small apartment in the large multi unit building. His mom was cooking their lunch, and a pie. His dad was in the other room. Tim Li (Adult version) and Jaedon were in the tiny hallway between rooms.
“This is your first static memory. And you were young, which implies it was traumatic.”
Their focus shifted to nine-year-old Tim. The child was focused on something floating in his hand. As the two visitors looked over his shoulder, they could see it was a small ball of fire. It looked like a miniature sun. “Look, mom, I did it.”
“Concentrate Tim.” She said to him in the most calming tone she could, but she was in the middle of putting a pie in the oven.
Young Tim started to get up. He was getting up to come closer and show his mom. Then many things happened at once.
Tim’s mom dropped the pie onto the open door of the oven, the pie spilled, putting out the oven but allowing gas to begin filling the room.
That startled Tim and lost focus on the ball of fire. It touched his hand, burning it.
He reacted by pushing it away from him toward his mother.
Tim screamed and began crying.
His dad rushed from the living room into the kitchen.
The ball of fire contacted his mother’s chest. Knocking her out and bouncing off her.
Tim’s dad grabbed Tim and pulled him back into the living room behind the fireproof wall.
The ball kept moving and contacted the oven, igniting the gas line.
There was a large explosion.
The room around Tim and Jaedon faded back to black. Tim stood in the middle of the room, head down. “I remember now. I killed my mother.”
Jaedon walked up to the traumatized young man and held him close.
Crying softly into Jaedon’s shoulder, Tim said “I was arrested, for magic-assisted murder, as soon as I got out of the hospital. They even arrested a nine-year-old.”
July 24, 2272
Terra Firma
Colorado
Denver
The funeral home was full of loved ones. Sam’s grandfather had just passed and was lying in state at the head of the room. A young ten-year-old who was assigned female at birth was in a long black dress kneeling at the casket lightly crying softly. Behind him stood adult Samuel and Alestra. Adult Sam spoke first, “This can’t be me.”
“He is. This is your first static memory. And you were young, which implies it was traumatic.”
“I’m beginning to remember now. I cried, but I thought boys shouldn’t cry, so I was trying to hold it in, and I was embarrassed.”
Young Sam jumped up from the altar and ran across the room though the open glass door and into the grassy area. Despite what he was wearing, he expertly climbed the single tree in the yard.
Sam’s mom came out to get the child out of the tree. Adult Sam and Alestra followed, and watched.
“Samantha, come down, you’ll ruin your dress. Let me hold you while you cry, it’ll help!
“No! I’m not crying! That isn’t my name anyway! I hate this dress! I’m a boy!”
“Oh, Samantha, we’ve been through this. Let’s talk about it when we get home.”
“No. I’m not going home!”
Young Sam jumped out of the tree, as high and as fast as he could. The room faded back to black as the sounds of ambulance sirens filled the room.
Edith
Conference Room Two
Sam looked up at Alestra, the two of them were alone in the dark, silent room. “I remember everything now. That was my first suicide attempt. I was forced to live six more years as Samantha without my parents’ support. In those six years, I tried to kill myself sixteen more times. Subsequently, my parents came around and supported me, but transitioning is illegal in the Empire. We had to move to what was formerly Europe. It was still the Empire, but we could find accepting cities where we could live while being chased. We ran from city to city, but I was myself transitioning along the way. It was four more years like this before I could find a surgeon. I had surgery recently, and was arrested in the recovery room. I was arrested for,” Sam scoffed loudly, “mutilation of the natural child bearing process.”
Alestra hugged him close. “You’re safe now. Venus accepts us with open arms. My name was Orlen before I transitioned. I would have been arrested, too; if they could have caught me. But they themselves taught me how to evade them first.”
“After everything; I wish I had never remembered all that.”
“Our past is part of what makes us who we are, and our past helps us define what we fight for. It should never be erased.”
“I guess I should just be happy to finally be me, and free.”
“Samuel, that’s the thing that matters.”
Sam leaned into Alestra. “Thanks for being here.”
“Always.”