Chapter 96

A week had gone since Isaac had been rescued. Although there were brief moments in which he regained consciousness, he spent most of his time in a state of profound slumber. The sight of the should-have-been protagonist of this world laying down unconscious on a bed all day long while being fed through an IV drip didn't sit right with me.

Had it not been for Faye asking me to stay put, I would have already set out for the Epsilon to raze it to the ground. She argued that it would be better to wait until the Gamma had better established his forces. In the end, I decided not to retaliate immediately, not necessarily because of her good reasons, but because I didn't want to increase her worries while she was already uneasy. After all, not much time had passed since the recent attack.

Still, at times she seemed to simply be in a bad mood, rather than anxious. The reason for her temper appeared to be one of the two new guests who arrived the previous days, and it wasn't Isaac.

Just two days after her arrival, Chloe had come looking for me.

"Mr Doe!" she called for me, while I was resting on top of a nearby branch.

"Miss Ortiz," I responded, my curiosity piqued.

Although she was scheduled for questioning in order to find out the cause of her and Isaac's misfortunes, our meeting was unofficially planned for further along. According to Hector, arranging it too soon may put too much pressure on a convalescent.

He had explained to me that, after my return, the air around me had changed and apparently it could cause nervousness or stress. A normal arch was able to bear it without too many problems, but a traumatized patient couldn't. Faye's agreement with his judgement had finalised the future course of action.

But judging by her behaviour, she seemed quite stable.

"Please, call me Chloe!"

She shyly gestured for me to come down from the tree and I complied, letting my body fall from the branch and landing on my feet by twisting my body around just before reaching the ground.

"What brings you here?"

"I just wanted to thank you, Mr Doe. I can't find the words to truly express how thankful I am for what you have done for Isaac… and for me," she thanked me with tears dripping down her face and a bashful expression accompanying her last words.

"I understand. Now you should go back to rest, we will talk again at a later moment," I tried to dismiss her. Her words were sincere, but sincerity wasn't the only thing mixed within her voice and demeanour.

She ignored my words and continued speaking.

"No one but you helped us… thank you," she continued in a soft voice, clearly disregarding my words.

She took my hand into hers and approached me close enough to rest her head against my chest. I didn't encourage nor discourage her behaviour, as I found it curious. If one purely listened to her words, it appeared as if I was a comforting presence to her, but if one looked at the faint shivering of her body, the contrary would come to mind. The most curious thing of all was that she herself appeared to be oblivious to her own feelings of apprehension.

But before I could deepen the subject, Faye appeared from the brush, her eyes two thin slits.

"Miss Ortiz, I thought I had been clear about you needing rest," she said with an amiable smile and a sharp gaze as cold as ice.

Chloe, startled by Faye's sudden appearance, inadvertently took a step back and raised her hands as if defending herself.

"Oh, good morning Miss Deveraux, I was just…"

"Now now, let's go back to bed, okay?"

Chloe turned in my direction, her eyes looking for some form of support, which she didn't find.

Defeated, she politely gave me her farewell and followed a member of the staff brought here to take her back, while Faye continued to stare daggers at her.

"I don't like her," she snorted, turning to me once Chloe had disappeared from the area.

A small smile appeared on my face. I always found Faye's annoyed demeanour to be quite amusing, as it was quite different from her usual self.

"Are you really having fun at my expenses?" she cried out incredulously in indignation.

"It may be so," I responded playfully.

"... Sometimes I forget you can have a really bad personality"

"Doesn't it remind you of the old times?"

"Shut up!"

After a little bit of joking back and forth, she sighed and the conversation slipped back on track.

"Anyway, jokes aside, I don't have a good feeling. Even Hector seems to be more stiff than usual, and it's not like he has ever been flexible. There are still too many unknowns regarding what is going on and Miss Ortiz doesn't seem to know much… Albeit I'm still unsure if it's because she genuinely doesn't know or because she is hiding something. She does seem to be constantly on alert though," Faye revealed her suspicions.

"I didn't perceive any hostility in her," I started explaining my observations.

"Of course you didn't," she scoffed while rolling her eyes.

"But it is certainly curious how she herself appeared unaware of her own feelings of dread while in my presence," I continued.

"So you too think she is suspicious?" she said with a beaming smile.

"It would be better to keep her here, where it is possible to keep an eye on her," I closed the topic.

Although she wasn't completely satisfied with my answer, Faye ultimately let it go and turned to the matter we needed to address.

"Sooo… what do we do with him?" she asked, pointing towards the thicket.

Like a puppet moved by nothing else but my will, the androgynous figure which had been concealed behind the bushes emerged from his hiding place. The first time Faye had met him, she had almost burst into tears.

According to her words, she could not believe that her old dream was finally becoming reality. But her joy had soon converted to puzzlement once the genai's condition had become clearer. She had looked for an explanation, which I had been unable to give her. It was clear to me that the event was related to my true nature, but I didn't still feel comfortable divulging that kind of information.

I had diverted the conversation noticing how she had referred to the genai as being male. Although she knew perfectly well I was just trying to change the subject, she didn't pry and explained that this particular genai seemed to tend towards the masculine, although such a distinction wasn't particularly reliable. Geogenais were not humans, nor animals, so concepts such as sex or gender were usually ill-suited to describe them. "My mother was quite the curious exception. It's almost like she was made ad hoc," she had laughed reminiscing about it.

Regarding her question about how to proceed with the genai, I had been unable to respond, as I was yet to understand how I could break off the connection. And so a few days passed, with us trying to investigate the issue and find a possible solution. Nothing had worked: not mana nor aura had been capable of severing the link.

But on the sixth day, I discovered something. While observing from a distance Chloe using her abilities to quicken Isaac's recovery, I couldn't help but notice how her cosy orange aura had elements which loosely resembled the false-aura employed by Isaac's abductors. That sight also brought to mind an old memory, of Chloe trying to heal me and instead causing me to experience terrible pain.

And that finally brought us to the present, a week after Isaac's rescue, with me, Faye and Chloe standing in a remote area of the forest where I had brought the genai the previous day. When I called for her, Chloe immediately came, not to the amusement of Faye.

"Good afternoon, Mr Doe!" she exclaimed cheerfully.

"You should help resolve his issues," Faye interjected, getting straight to the point.

Chloe stopped midway with a puzzled look.

"Miss Deveraux, I'm sorry to say this, but it isn't nice to talk about Mr Doe in this way," she reproached Faye.

"What?! I'm not talking about John! I'm talking about him!" she raised her irked voice while gesturing towards the genai. He was partly hidden between the bushes, so Chloe appeared to not have noticed him.

When she finally laid her eyes on him, she flinched and took a step back.

"Is… is he what I think he is?" she asked, astonished. After all, it was quite rare to see a living and breathing geogenai, as the few of them who were found each year were routinely hunted by special teams of executioners from the Alpha.

"He is a geogenai," I confirmed.

Chloe approached the figure with an amazed expression.

"I cannot bel…"

"Let's just do what we are here to do. Miss Ortiz, our guest is currently in unexplained conditions. You should use your abilities on him to try and resolve his current state," Faye interjected once again, explaining the situation.

Chloe appeared dazed at the sudden revelation.

"I don't know how…"

"Just give it your best," Faye interrupted her again with an insincere smile.

Chloe complied with the request, all the while trying to mask her dissatisfied expression at the treatment she seemed to find unfair. She approached the genai and stretched her hands towards him.

She closed her eyes and started to chant a litany designed to help concentration through a soft voice. Her amber aura raised from her body and gently wrapped itself around the genai body.

I immediately felt a slight sense of discomfort, as if a limb was suddenly being torn from my body. Chloe began to sweat profusely as her aura dug its way into the genai's body and enacted its influence on him.

Slowly but surely, the thread connecting me to the genai was being worn away. Chloe's gentle restorative power was incompatible with my lymph, as the two were quite clearly of similar but distinct natures.

Before the link snapped completely, I tried to exercise the last bit of authority I could on the genai. His species was different from that of living beings, as its members continued existence was dependent on a purpose justifying it. Without one, their body would unravel and they would cease to be.

And so I gave him a new purpose, rewriting the most fundamental and profound constituent of his being. A new commandment was branded on his soul, superseding that with which he had been given form, the one made by his King.

The thread finally broke and the connection disappeared. I couldn't exert my control anymore on the freed genai.

Chloe collapsed exhausted on the four and gasped for air. The previously vitreous eyes of the genai regained colour and he blinked in rapid succession. He looked around and set his eyes on me.

"I'm free. The shackles on my body, broken. The shackles on my mind, lifted. The shackles on my soul, dissipated," he spoke incredulous.

After a period of silence, he continued speaking.

"How can I repay you?"

"Repay your debt to her. She is the reason why you live," I answered referring to Faye.

I didn't pay much attention to the genai. I didn't care about him, I had brought him along only because of the promise. At that moment, there was something else which had caused my lips to lift into a small smile.

The existence of Chloe Ortiz was quite a curious one. She was not one of mine and she carried within herself a power juxtaposed to my own. I was certain she would have a unique role to play in the future and I couldn't deny my curiosity.