Amy Foster - The Rift Coda

She nods.

There’s nothing I would love more than to trust the Faida completely, but they are wily and arrogant. Sure, I think they want to be on the same side as the humans in defeating the Roones, but I get the feeling that they want to be in charge—both during and after. If there’s one thing I’ve learned in this whole crazy mess it’s that I’m not giving up my power to anyone, ever again. Still, if things continue going as they are, I won’t be much use to anyone in this condition. I don’t think I have much of a choice.

“I can see how I would have to trust you,” I begin as I fold my hands together on my lap. I want Navaa to see that I’m open, amiable. “I don’t know why you would need to trust me. I can’t transfer this noise into your head.”

“No. But you could open a Rift and I could get drawn into it. That’s why I need to get a gauge on how far this ability of yours goes. What if your trigger is emotion? What if you’re angry while walking down one of our hallways and accidentally open a Rift there? I don’t know what you can do, so I need you to show me, to prove you aren’t a threat.”

“But the sound blockade—” I begin to protest.

“You got through the sound blockade. Maybe it was your enhanced technology, but maybe not.”

“Fine,” I tell her because something has to give, one way or another. “What do I have to do?”

Navaa rises gracefully from the bed and walks across the concrete floor. “Stand.” Navaa has both arms reached out, palms up. I go over to her and put myself in front of her hands. “May I touch you?”

I’m not gay or bi and on this Earth pansexuality could be the norm or it could be unheard of, so it doesn’t really matter, but I joke anyway, “Aren’t you worried about the Blood Lust?”

“‘Blood Lust?’”

“Yeah—you know …”

And then it hits me: she may not know. I think of how easily Arif took me in his arms and carried me up to the level with our rooms. He didn’t even hesitate. Do they all have control over it, or …

“The Roones—they didn’t … change you, did they? Turn your sexuality against you?”

“What? How do you mean?”

So I tell her. About the abuse we’d experienced, and how it manifested. I gloss over some of the parts—no need for her to learn about the soap opera developing between me and Ezra—but for some reason it feels good to tell someone else who would actually understand what it means to be manipulated by the Roones.

After a moment, the look around Navaa’s eyes softens, but the last thing I want is pity. They don’t have the Blood Lust, but then again, neither do I now.

“Do whatever you need to,” I tell her quickly, wanting to be done with this conversation. Still, my instincts are hammering away at my gut like a battering ram. Not because of the Blood Lust, but just at the thought of making myself so vulnerable to such a powerful woman.

“I’m just going to place my hands on your shoulders,” she tells me as she does so. “It is easy to get lost in the noise and it’s important that you have an anchor in these early stages. You may experience vertigo or lose your sense of time and space. The pressure of my fingers will remind you that you are here and you are not falling.”

“Great. Sounds awesome,” I say in English under my breath.

Navaa chooses to ignore me, but I think she gets the tone. “Now, close your eyes and focus on the sounds inside of your mind. The pain is coming from dissonance. The strongest frequency is the one that belongs to you, but the others are fragments of tones that you have pulled along with you from the Rift. You are the boat, the water is the Rift, and the wake is all the different Earths that linger.”

I do as Navaa instructs, or at least I try to. It isn’t just a question of hearing all these different tones. If it was only hearing, I could probably ignore it or tune it out. But the sounds are trapped inside of me and not just in my brain. There isn’t a stretch of my skin or a bone or a joint that isn’t filled with noise. Navaa had been right. Giving in to this is disorienting and I am surprisingly glad of her sure and steady hands on my shoulders. “All you are hearing right now is the disparate tones, but what you can’t yet discern is the rhythm. This is what regulates this ability. We are all creatures of rhythm. Our hearts beat steadily. Our pulse and blood keep the same time. There is a clock inside of every living creature that tells us when to sleep and when to awaken. This is what you must tap into. Start with your own heartbeat. Find it. Concentrate on that.”

Navaa takes my hand and pushes it up to my neck, to my carotid artery, and I am grateful. I’m not sure I would have found it without being able to actually feel it first.

Thump. Thump. Thump. Thump.

Once I lock on to it, I wrap it around me like a blanket knit of heat and sinew. I find my pulse everywhere—inside my chest, in the veins running up and down my arms—and slowly, the noise, which was a constant thrum, begins to echo in the short bursts of my own beating heart.

“I have it,” I tell her.

“Excellent, just keep at it. Hold on to it. Its nature will change. The Kir-Abisat is like an excited animal snarling and leaping, pulling against its leash, but eventually, your focus will make it heel. Tell me when you get to the point that aligning the noise with the rhythm is no longer a struggle.”

Navaa’s analogy is a good one. This ability of mine feels wild and untethered, but after a few long moments, the fight in it subsides. My head doesn’t hurt. The sound is there, pulsing, but it’s like hearing music in another room. “Okay, okay, it’s more controlled now,” I tell my guide.

“That’s good. That was fast. Let’s just see, shall we, if we can get you to sing one of those tones. Perhaps the loudest one, the song from home.”

“Wait, what?” I ask, my eyes flying open. “I’m not ready to do that. I don’t know if I ever want to do that. I’m only listening to you now because I don’t want to walk around with an amplifier in my head all the time.”

“Some people are afraid of weapons,” Navaa’s voice lulls just inches away from my ear. “They find it distasteful to even touch one. A soldier does not have that kind of philosophical leeway. If it’s possible for you to open a Rift, then you must learn how. You cannot waste the tactical advantage.”

Damn—she’s right. Of course she’s right. But there is something about this that terrifies me.

“I wouldn’t even know where to begin,” I tell Navaa honestly.

“It’s a question of multitasking,” she tells me. I look slightly over my shoulder at her tapered fingers and the slight curve of a wing. “It’s like playing an instrument. You must always keep time; your muscles know how to keep the beat going, but then your fingers play the melody. This is no different.”

I did use to play the cello. I would have never made it professionally as a musician, but I had some talent. Maybe that’s why the Roones chose to insert this mutation into my genome. “Fine. All right,” I relent. “You want me to sing?”

“I want you to become the tone. You start with your voice, but you must try to pull it out from every inch of your being. It should feel more like a meditation than singing a simple song.”