Divided Read online

  “Hello, my dear.” He smiled at her. “I hope you’ll forgive my intrusion but I have limited time and resources. I cannot wait forever for you to get over your anger with me.”

  “I…what do you want?” Becca pulled her robe even closer together. “Why did you bring us here and make us do…what we did?”

  “I did not make you do anything. You came up with the idea to merge your bodies all on your own,” Vashtar reminded her gravely. “In fact, I believe it was you, my dear Becca, who first submitted the idea.”

  “I…you…” Becca felt her whole face getting hot. “I wouldn’t have if you hadn’t threatened us with being dissolved in the slime! How else were we supposed to pull together and get out of there?”

  “There was no other way—you did exactly what you were meant to do,” the little man said. “A sexual merger was the only way to heal your triumvirate and initiate the three-way unity that my people call the OneMind.”

  “But why?” Becca persisted. “Why trick us by promising a solution to our problem just to get us out here and play Interstellar Cupid? It doesn’t make sense.”

  “It makes perfect sense if you look at it from my point of view,” Vashtar said mildly. “What I told you about my society being based on threes was true. And what I showed you of the holding tanks and the nutrient slime…”

  “Also true?” Truth raised an eyebrow at him.

  The little man nodded. “Even the Mindscape was based in reality. Though you never actually entered it, it was the way that most of my people chose to survive when Orthanx was flung out of orbit.”

  “You said was,” Far said quietly. “Is it no more?”

  “It is…significantly less populated now than it was when we first entered our tanks. In fact…I am the last.” A single tear slipped from Vashtar’s ruby red third eye. “I get lonely, my dear,” he said earnestly to Becca. “And since the eye gives me the ability to project my consciousness, the only pleasure I have left is in bringing people together.”

  “Seriously?” Becca said blankly. “So you really did bring us out here to play matchmaker?”

  Vashtar nodded proudly. “And I succeeded. Your case was incredibly complicated but I knew that if I could allow you to share your memories, I could draw the three of you together.”

  “Well, it certainly worked,” Truth said dryly. “Although what you put us through was so real we had doubts as to whether they were memories or if we had somehow stepped back in time.”

  “Back in time? Oh, my no. That would be quite beyond my power!” Vashtar protested, but Becca couldn’t help noticing that his third eye was blinking very slowly, almost like someone nodding up and down. The dichotomy gave her a headache somehow and she tried not to look at it.

  “Well either way, you really put us through some awful things,” she said sharply. “Things none of us wanted to relive.”

  “You had to see those things, my dear,” the little man said gently. “You had to empathize with each other. Feeling the pain of the others brought you closer.”

  “It did,” Far said, nodding. “Though Becca is right—it was agonizing to go through the worst experiences of our lives all over again.”

  “I would pay the price again if there was no other way—for myself, I mean,” Truth said. “I wouldn’t wish it on Far or Becca. But to me, the cost was cheap considering what I gained.”

  “I’m glad you feel that way, Truth.” Vashtar nodded gravely. “It was you I worried about the most. But I knew if you could be brought into harmony with your brother you would not retreat.” He looked at Becca. “And I knew that you were the only one who could bring these two into harmony, my dear.”

  Becca didn’t know what to say. “I wanted to bring them together I just…I never thought…” She cleared her throat. “I guess I imagined doing it some…some other way.”

  “You brought them together in the only way possible,” Vashtar assured her. “Nothing short of giving yourself to both of them at once would have healed their bond.”

  “I am grateful for your healing, Becca” Far said quietly. “You did what I thought was impossible—you brought my brother back to me.” He looked at Vashtar. “I should be angry that you manipulated us but…I can’t be. Not with this result.”

  “Yes, well Vashtar might have gotten the two of you back where you belong, but he still didn’t do was what he promised.” Becca was still irritated by how neatly they’d all been maneuvered and it was even more aggravating that neither Far nor Truth seemed very upset about it.

  “How so, my dear?” Vashtar asked, raising an eyebrow—the one above his third eye—at her.

  “You swore you’d give us a cure for the warriors that are possessed by the demons of the Black Planet if we came out to Orthanx to see you,” she said, frowning. “Instead, you’ve been playing mind games with us and probably watching while we…” Her cheeks began to get hot. “While we all…connected.”

  “As for your joining, I would never presume to view such private things,” Vashtar said gravely.

  “You didn’t?” Becca really hoped he was telling the truth. The idea that the rotund little man might have been hovering, invisible but watching somewhere in the room while she and her men went to town made her feel ill and vaguely violated.

  “I didn’t,” Vashtar promised. “As soon as it became apparent you were going to, eh-hem, merge, I ‘tuned out’ and did not return until I was certain you were finished. And as for my other promise, I am more than prepared to keep it.”

  “You are? How?” Becca asked.

  “Is the cure for the possessed warriors somewhere on Orthanx after all?” Truth rumbled.

  “Oh, no, my dear Truth—it left our planet long ago. Along with those few of my people who chose to leave the slime tanks and try life outside the Mindscape.”

  “Well what is it?” Far asked

  “And where in the Seven Hells can we find it?” Truth growled.

  “Why, right on your own home planet, Truth—on Pax.” Vashtar smiled widely. “Remember I said that some of my people chose to leave the slime tanks? Well, that was after Orthanx had settled into orbit around your sun. And Pax, being the closest habitable planet, was where they went.”

  The dark twin frowned. “But…there are no other people than the Rai’ku and a few Kindred on Pax.”

  “And who do you think are the ancestors of the Rai’ku?” Vashtar said.

  “No, that can’t be,” Truth said firmly. “There is evidence of primitive civilizations that date before the time before your planet came to rest in orbit around our sun.”

  “Primitive being the key word,” Vashtar emphasized. “Primitive but with the potential to be more—much more than what they were. My people interbred with them in an attempt to civilize and tame them—but not to change them. The Rai’ku still retain their ability to shift to a second, animal self when they so desire.”

  “A deeply important ability to my people,” Truth said, nodding. “Though I do not possess it myself, my half-blood Rai’ku brothers do.”

  “Check your records—you will see that true civilization began when my people arrived,” Vashtar said proudly. “Before that the Rai’ku were living in trees, spending more time in their animal forms than as thinking, conscious individuals.”

  “Why are they not a society of three as your own society on Orthanx was, then?” Far asked.

  “It has to do with their second or animal nature,” Vashtar explained. “The Rai’ku mate for life and they are extremely territorial about their mates. A third party cannot be introduced, no matter how hard we tried.” He smiled sadly. “Did I mention that it was mainly the unmated among my people that chose to make the move to Pax?”

  “I am not surprised,” Truth muttered. “None among my people would share a female.” He cleared his throat. “Unlike…”

  “The Twin Kindred,” Far finished for him. “Unlike us, Brother.”

  “Yes.” Truth nodded. “Unlike us.”

  “Ok