The Shadow of Eudaimonia

Chapter 18: Away from Home

Calvin slowly gained consciousness. The first thing he noticed was the rough and scratchy feeling that grated his exposed skin. Then he heard the silent murmurs of salt water rolling against the sand he was laying on.

"Calvin..."

He jerked his head to look for where the voice came from. But he only saw a dark figure sitting beside him. He waited for his eyes to adjust to the darkness and let the scant light from the full moon across the sky illuminate the face of Lazzi full of worry.

"Lazzi, it's you! Where are we?"

"I don't know either. Where's Ophelia?"

Calvin felt a lump on his throat. "I...she...." his facial muscles tensed up and his eyes began to burn. All the information now had clicked on him. His dad, skin worn by Ortus like a coat and Ophelia stuck there with Ortus, sacrificing herself.

"I see." Lazzi filled in the silence. "She bridged with Ortus, didn't she? To transport us here."

"It's all my fucking fault!" his voice quivered. "I shouldn't have...I sort of knew that Ortus would be there but I... I still insisted! Fuck!"

Calvin's words came to Lazzi like an echo from a distant cry of remorse. Lazzi lowered his shoulders and dug his fingers in the sand. "Hey, calm down. it's not your fault, okay? It's Ortus. I'm sure Ophelia's okay. She's strong. Maybe stronger than any of us. She could handle Ortus easily."

Calvin bit his lips, struggling to contain the surge of emotions. "He got my dad...I think he's dead" When he uttered those words, he felt like all the air in his lungs was punched away.

"What happened to him?"

"Ortus..." he tried to gather his thoughts. "He was using his body. I don't know if he possessed him or..."

Lazzi placed his hand on Calvin's shoulder and patted it with firmness. "Don't worry. I think he's alive. Ortus can assimilate other bodies or copy their physical structures... but it doesn't necessarily mean that they're dead."

"Really? Is that true? Please tell me that's true!"

"Y-yeah, I believe so," was all Lazzi mustered to say. He avoided looking at Calvin's hopeful eyes and smiled of relief. Instead, he fixed his gaze at the billions of stars laid out on the ink dark sky like glitters accidentally spilled by a graceless child. His planet Kepler can be located along the Milky Way galaxy as well but he never saw the stars arranged like this. There were no constellations that he knew, a reminder that he was far from where he should be. "I know how you feel. Before Ophelia and I got here, I lost someone back at home" he mumbled, his words diluted by the gentle waves of the ocean crashing into shore.

Calvin's head turned and studied Lazzi. "Are your parents waiting back at home? At your planet?"

He frowned. "Yeah I wish. I don't have any parents," his voice deepened and turned sullen. "I was part of a batch of embryos grown within a laboratory environment."

"Wait," he blinked at him "that's so messed up."

"Well, the thing is, our planet desperately needed a representative Obelisk to save it from the same thing that has happened here on Earth. So, our leaders decided to use gene-editing tools to create a batch of designer babies—one with enhanced traits such as being lean and athletic, smart, resistant to most diseases and charismatic. I'm one of those babies. "

Calvin nodded, accepted it easily. So that's why he looked like that, he thought at the back of his head. "If you don't have parents, who did you leave behind?"

"My mentor, captain Creo."

"Your mentor?"

"Yeah, he's like a father to me. Each of us had a mentor since we were trained from birth to become the best possible version of ourselves. Captain Creo escorted me in every lesson that I have to attend. But Creo went beyond his job. He often tells me stories not written in the history books that I was forced to read. Stories about amazing skills the Obelisks have or ancient love stories or tragedies written on the old Earth." Lazzi smiled remembering all the things Creo did for him. He was so good to him even though he was sometimes, admittedly a pain in the ass.

"You were trained since birth to...become an Obelisk?"

"Yeah. And when we were 10 years old, we competed with each other to determine who will become the next Obelisk."

Calvin's face turned stiff. "That must've been rough."

"No, it's not. Why would it be?" he asked as if he doesn't already know the feeling of being forced to run, train, and study for years. He asked because "rough", he thought, was a funny word to describe it.

"I mean, you didn't get to be a child? Have you ever played in your life?"

"Like a game? Sure, we played competitive games a lot. Once we were left in a maze full of traps and the first one out wins. The winner gets points while the losers don't get to eat for a day."

"What the fuck? That's not a game! That's a competition."

"You're not making sense. What's the difference?"

"A game should be fun!"

Lazzi tilted his head at Calvin. "It was fun to win."

Calvin shook his head. "It's more fun if you're all gonna enjoy the game. Especially when you're playing with your friends."

Lazzi hovered on the word friends. He tried to recall if he ever had called anyone his friend. He simply frowned. "You must have a good childhood huh?"

Calvin opened his mouth but no words came out. The glint of joy in his eyes had disappeared. "Yeah...kinda." he muttered. "I'm sure your captain Creo is worried about you though."

"He's dead. Ortus killed him. And it's all my fault, because I was weak."

"Oh," Calvin uttered. He gritted his teeth, angry at himself because for a moment, he forgot the safety of Ophelia and his dad, for a moment he thought it was just a nightmare and he had woken up from it. "It's unfair if we blame ourselves isn't it?"

Lazzi laid on his back and let the gritty sand cushion his head. "Maybe." he answered so meekly that the ocean breeze might have been able to steal it. At this point Lazzi was trying so hard to keep his eyes open.

"Can't we go back in time and prevent all of this from happening?"

"I wish I could answer yes Calvin but it's a lot more complicated than that."

"Why not? I mean you control time, right? We could...I mean...tell me Lazzi, tell me we can all fix this."

But Calvin wasn't aware that Lazzi had sunken into a dreamless sleep.