2.11.1

Railroad Crossing

Astrid blinked at a young girl that played at the end of a scuffed corridor, just outside one of the residential quarters. No more than five or six, and half obscured under a curtain of chestnut hair. The little girl prattled to herself pleasantly while she flipped through pages of a picture book.

Astrid abruptly halted. Her lips parted, to see a child outside the Sanctuaries. Her heart leapt into her throat to hear such a small, playful voice chatter away with her own imagined stories. She seemed to speak to no one, but the images displayed in print on the page.

Astrid didn’t recognize her. But just as she felt her, the child did the same. The girl looked up, and her eyes widened under Astrid’s regard.

The young one knew what she was.

The girl waved shyly. And Astrid, on instinct, waved back.

A terrifying thought then occurred to her that maybe they’d inadvertently stumbled upon one of the taken. But before she could calculate how to best approach the situation, a Static woman nearby, whom Astrid entirely dismissed, caught the ‘intruder’ staring.

Long arms swept the girl up in a hug, and a protective glare burned back at the Channeler. The child wound her arms around the woman with a gleeful babble.

It explained the odd power fluctuations reported, Astrid noted. Had this child gone her whole life undetected? She wondered. Or did she reside here for another reason?

The specialist made to reach for her crystal, to show the woman, and the girl in her arms, she meant no harm.

But while she stood, distracted by the display in front of her, another well of a recycling pulse approached.

Yet another Channeler set upon her, so quiet in comparison to the girl, that they caught Astrid off guard. And alarmed, she instinctively jumped from the presence.

Anders and Romo immediately flanked her, attuned the dramatic shift in her body language.

But Astrid found she recognized the young man that stood before her.

Somewhere between adolescence and adulthood, a beating flow of energy she’d met once before greeted her, even before she recalled his name.

His grey eyes looked to her with less coldness and suspicion than the Static woman. Astrid sought the child and her caregiver again, but they’d disappeared.

Left with the Channeler before her, she refocused and tried to place him.

And he waited.

She knew he, too, would feel her energy as well as she could his. But why he didn’t seem as surprised to see her bewildered her.

Familiarity pricked at her senses. Something about him, her mind told her, she encountered before. But he looked… different. Healthier. Fitter. Less haunted. Less gaunt.

And then she remembered. Her eyes flashed wider. And as though he felt her recognition, a weak smile crested his lips.

“Gavin,” she named, though she scarcely believed it herself. “You’re Gavin.”

“It’s good to see you again, Miss Hale,” he finally spoke.

~~~

Finding one Channeler outside the Sanctuaries would be an anomaly. Two could be no accident.

A piece of the puzzle fell into place for Astrid. Her eyes swept the hall, aware now that any onlookers stood witness to burning questions she could only ask in privacy.

Instead, at the series of conclusions that passed Astrid’s expression, Gavin gestured that she and her companions should follow him.

They did, past small common lounges and domicile doors. But Gavin eventually drew them to one of the residential units. Upon palming it open, he motioned they should file in.

Astrid stepped through to a modestly adorned apartment, no larger than two rooms. Grey colored the walls, with one painted marigold in accent. A potted fern sat in the corner, and the petite bar that separated the kitchenette from the living space lay under a scattering of food stores, still in their packages.

But most notably, the woman and child Astrid spotted in the hall now huddled in the corner, perched in a plush chair.

The Static clutched the girl tighter, with her eyes alight with fright to be discovered. But when Gavin followed the strangers into the room, the woman visibly relaxed.

The Aldebaran team looked about the apartment while Gavin stalked to the woman. He knelt before her and spoke gently under his breath, so that not even the others could hear what he said.

Nonetheless, Astrid caught the tiniest flash of a parcel that exchanged hands. A folded collection of papers and what looked like documentation, though she couldn’t make out the details. Too soon, the Static drew the documents into the folds of her clothing and into a pocket.

Astrid met Romo’s eyes, to confirm they just witnessed the same thing.

The lady rose, with the child in her arms, and Gavin made his way to the bar. With purpose, he selected a few cartons and collected them into a cloth bag, which he then also delivered to the pair.

The nameless woman nodded, passed a quiet word to the man, and then, with one last fervent glance to his visitors, she left, the with young girl pitched to her hip.

The small child kept her eyes instead on Astrid. And a soft little “bye” sounded over the woman’s shoulder when they exited.

The Channeler’s heart squeezed.

Only after the pair were well gone did Gavin fully turn his attention to his guests.

But the first of her questions, Astrid no longer needed to ask.

“It’s true, then. There is a Channeler Underground Railroad.” She could hardly believe the sentence that left her mouth.

Still, Gavin tensed.

“It’s best you don’t use those words. I remember you, Astrid Hale, and the day we met. And if you were anyone else, I would have turned you away already. I am obligated to more than myself.”

“It’s true though, yes? That’s what just happened here.”

The young man looked from Astrid to her company, who seemed his main concern. But upon Anders, his eyes also registered recollection.

“You were on Thedes, too?” He asked.

“We all were,” Anders told him. Though Romo never saw the atrocities left in the cells of the prison.

“I have so many questions,” Astrid began. She came closer, to speak quietly, if hurried. “How long has this been going on? Who set this up, how many of you are there?”

“Secrecy is our greatest security,” Gavin replied, guardedly. “First you must tell me why you’re here.”

The specialist soured to recount the ill events that delivered them to Morda in the first place.

“We’re exploring options for getting our people out of danger,” she tried. “Have you heard of the attacks on the Sanctuaries?”

Gavin scowled. “Aside from Argos, you mean?”

His words stung, as if he thought she could forget his own traumatized past, and those lost. The event that, to her mind, started everything.

“Yes,” she told him. “Aside from Argos.”

Gavin’s face darkened. “No. It doesn’t seem to have concerned anyone here enough to make the news.”

The calm of his nature turned a little embittered by that. “That’s why you’re here?”

“Only confirmation the Un—Mmph.” Astrid caught herself. “Only to confirm that the incidents aren’t a masked exodus.”

“No.” Gavin said the word with finality. “If such a thing happened, we had nothing to do with it. I don’t need to check with the others to know that.”

“There’s more of you?” Romo cut in. Astrid tilted aside for the agent.

“No single person can control all the pieces. Or should know all the pieces,” Gavin replied. “Like I said… secrecy is our greatest security.”