Age of Power 1: Legacy (29 page)

I
glanced at her, confused, and she said, “He checked Ryan Tech, and they have
the whole place locked down. The fires to the south have them scared. So far,
it’s still mainly FBI and hired guards out there. But he overheard some guards
talking about the military coming in. He got worried about being caught so Alan
decided to go and check out Kular’s office to see if he can find something
there.”

I
stated the obvious. “Is that a problem? He
can
teleport.”

She
gave me a worried look. “Yes, it’s a problem. Yasmine has some dangerous power,
and she’s already mad at us. 
If she’s nearby…
Damn it!
He’s always doing this.
Going
off half-cocked, because he can just pop out if he’s about to be caught!”

I
looked at her, trying not to smile, but failing miserably. She looked at me,
curious. “What?”

“You
did the same thing at the hospital. And Kular caught you. It must be in the
blood,” I commented.

She
turned pink as she gave me a mock glare. “That’s different. Well, kinda…”

I
just kept looking at her. Finally, she surrendered with a gesture. 
“Fine!
 Yes—are you happy now? And I didn’t even
have problems with Kular back then! That came later, after our problems started
with Yasmine. It’s just that she was being so possessive of you two. I mean,
she acted like you were her personal lab rats!”

That
prompted me to ask, “Yes, well if Kular is a real doctor, wouldn’t she
naturally be protective of her patients?”

Angela
sighed. “She is. She’s good, too. Once she met with Paradoxis and they
disseminated the treatment, we thought things would be good. I mean, she didn’t
get to everyone she was caring for. And I saw how that affected her. I know it
affected me…”

I
caught the pain in her voice. “You knew someone who died from becoming an
Empowered?”

She
looked away for a moment. Then nodding, she said, “His name was Jake. He was in
Toronto with us.
Look, Vaughn, the way Alan talked so
blithely, it seemed like it was all fun and games, right?
But it wasn’t.
We were all slowly getting sick. And nothing helped until Kirksten figured out
about the loss of magnesium in our bodies, and developed his therapy. I mean,
without it, burning up so much magnesium was killing us.”

I
cocked my
head,
skepticism was in my next words.
“Killing us? Okay, sure, the magnesium being absent makes us sick, but—”

Giving
me a troubled look, Angela said, “Vaughn, if you don’t keep up with a regimen
of magnesium, you die. In fact, all of the Empowered would die without regular
doses of magnesium. Some slowly, some quickly—it depends on how fast it’s being
used up by the person. Even the normal wear and tear of simply living would be
fatal, eventually.”

I
hesitated to say something. Angela asked. “And you were never told this
before?”

I
shrugged slightly and said, “No. Kular and Kirksten made it clear we had to
stay on it, but neither of them ever said it was that important. I figured once
we rebalanced, we’d be fine.”

Angela
sighed. “No, you wouldn’t have been. Jake died from magnesium burnout because
he kept using his ability to create sustained energy bursts to power Toronto
after the Day. Something had disrupted the power grid during the chaos on the
Day. He kept pushing himself. We found him at the power plant, unconscious and
exhausted. We took him to an emergency room, claiming that it was delayed
radiation sickness from that burst in the sky. They tried to help, but it was
too late.”

I
said, “I’m sorry.”

I
reached out to hold her hand, and she took it. She told me more about Jake.
From the way she talked, he sounded like a party-loving wild guy; he had liked
his new powers and he knew he was getting sicker from using them. But he kept
going right up until the day he died. And the man sounded like he would have
hated what was going on with Yasmine and Paradoxis.

Giving
me a smile tinged with sadness, Angela said, “I think you would have had fun
with him. Jake loved to be on the building rooftops of the city, and he and
Alan would spend all night talking up there.”

I
grinned, thinking that I would have done the same thing. I was always climbing
things. I told Angela of the night Yama first appeared, when Brand and I had
been on the church roof.

She
chuckled and said, “We’ll have to go up there some time.”

I
said, “Hmm, I think we forgot that we left the beer there. We were somewhat
distracted, after all. I don’t remember bringing it down with us.”

Angela
grinned. “I don’t drink, but Alan would love it. He loves to party—at least,
when he’s not being such a snob. Oh, I’m sorry about his attitude, by the way.
He really can be a prick at times.”

I
said. “Eh, he’s all right. I’ve heard worse. But what were you were saying
about Yasmine and Kular? When did they get involved? I mean, it sounds like
this happened pretty fast.”

Angela,
to my enjoyment, stepped in close, and we continued to hold hands. Looking
thoughtful at my comment, she said, “Not really. I mean, it may sound
organized, but we’ve been running on pure instinct and reflex since the Day.
Parry got on the Internet almost immediately. She found Shield first, and then
they began searching for others. Even as she got sick from the magnesium
imbalance, Paradoxis kept pushing to find an answer. Then Kular showed up, and
things developed rapidly from there.”

To
my surprise, Angela took my arm and put it around her shoulders, moving even
closer. I didn’t argue. I guess she wanted the sense of comfort it gave her. I
just smiled as she talked on.

She
said, “Yasmine appeared in the conclave around that time. But she was busy even
before the conclave came together. She was working with the African Empowered
when Parry found her. And while it was their idea to work together, Yasmine had
been the one to push the Orishai to go back into Africa. Her argument was that
they should deal with the troubles there while all the governments and military
were out of place.”

“The
‘Two Africas’ thing—what’s that about?” I asked.

Angel
gave me a summary of the new Two Africas. Yasmine and the Orishai had gone into
Africa and, over a matter of weeks, had used their powers to create what were
essentially two large countries split on religious sides. The North African
Alliance was primarily Muslim, while the South African Confederacy was
Christian.

What
didn’t make sense, though, was why Yasmine was going to places like Dubai to
get terrorists when the Orishai were backing her ideas. I put the thought to
the back of my mind as Angela told me about them practically redrawing the
borders in Africa. There was even a neutral line of Switzerland-like countries
between the two nations to help prevent border clashes. While Angela talked
about the Orishai’s actions, it clicked in my head where I had heard that word
before—‘
Orisha
.’ I had learned it from a book on African history.
The 
Orisha
 were spiritual forms of the greater god. They were
‘avatars,’ in a sense. Oh, how hilarious was that?

After
Angela finished, I said, “Don’t take this the wrong way, but it sounds as
though Yasmine was once a decent person. Okay, she got edgy about Ryan Tech, but
it also sounds as though she and the Orishai did good things.”

Angela
sighed. “That's true, they did. Honestly, I think Yasmine just wanted to help
them. But it started her down a dark path, Vaughn. Parry said Yasmine had
seemed fine when they went into Kenya and Libya. But by the time they dealt
with the Sudan and Rwanda, they were essentially hitting hard and fast with
their powers. They basically acted like they were at war in those countries.”

I
nodded and said, “While Yama was on its final approach, I remember hearing
stories about mass migrations into the central African nations like Chad, the
Central African Republic, and the Congolese states. People were trying to get
away from the tsunamis.”

Angela
sighed. “The problem was more than that. After Yama was stopped,
a lot
of the governments in Africa had collapse and military
dictatorships were starting up. People were being terrorized…”

She
stopped. It prompted me to look at her. She had a haunted look in her eyes.
“What happened?”

She
didn’t answer for a while, and we just walked around the neighborhoods. We got
closer together, and it was nice. But if I wanted to know what I was dealing
with where Yasmine was concerned, I knew I’d finally have to ask.

“I
don’t want to know this, do I?” I asked.

“No,
you don’t want to know. I wish I hadn’t seen what happened. But Parry stopped
trusting Yasmine after she showed us what she had done in Africa. Especially
when we discovered she had manipulated the thoughts of human beings so brutally
that the Orishai could became instant power brokers. By March, they were
already pulling together nations and territories for this big conference. And
that started the ball rolling towards becoming the Two Africas,” Angela said.

Speculating,
I said, “So that’s where she came to like the idea of having that kind of
power. She basically ambushed all the African leadership and forced their ideas
of the two political powers on them.”

Angela
nodded and said, “Now, don’t get me wrong. Since the whole mess
was sorted out,
the African nations have begun developing
into a peaceful coexistence, at least that’s how they’re being shown. We aren’t
sure what goes on behind the news broadcasts out of the continent. And so far,
the UN hasn’t had much to say. They’re still arguing over whether or not to
recognize their nation-status. Parry tried looking to see how the people are
being treated in general, but the Orishai told her to stay away—very forcefully
at that.”

I
tensed slightly, looking at her. “That doesn’t sound like peaceful coexistence…but…when
did Yasmine change? Was it from the actions she took with fighting the
military?”

Angela
nodded. “It started when Yasmine just took over the minds of old leaders, the
presidents, the warlords, the prime-ministers. She did that, it worked. Then she
began pushing for the idea of just taking over other places while things were
still chaotic.”

I
gave a snort and said, “Well, she kinda missed her chance. Things are settling
down now. If you guys had moved in around March or so, I can understand something
like that happening. But the U.S. has been doing pretty well in terms of
recovery since then.”

Angela
stopped and pulled back from me with a hurt look on her face. Her eyes narrowed
in sudden anger. “We don’t do that kind of crap! Most of us in the conclave
just wanted to understand ourselves. And when it comes to Africa think about
how easy Yasmine had it with every one of those nations.
Droughts,
AIDS, religious and tribal warfare, political corruption, all of that weakened
the people of almost every nation in Africa for decades.
Vaughn, half of
them weren’t even run by governments—they were run by warlords!”

I
winced. I remembered talking about Africa and its history with Alex. He had
talked about it as being one of humanity’s greatest humanitarian failures. He
was never clear as to why that was. Ah well.

“Okay,
but that won’t happen here. We’re recovering from the Day and the Exodus. Yes,
it's true that Yama hit us bad. Hell, the Day nearly collapsed civilization.
But things are coming back. Yasmine can’t just come in and take over. Besides,
if the Orishai are busy, who is working with her?” I said.

Angela
turned away, but this time, I caught a distinctive look of guilt on her face.
“What? What is it?”

She
said, “Vaughn, she didn’t suggest that we just invade the U.S. or Europe, or
even that we should pull in all the leaders and begin mind controlling them.”

A
chill ran down my spine. I asked, “If she wasn’t going for invasion, then what
was she up to?”

Angela
gave me a slight snort and then said, “It was stupid. And none of us followed
her idea. Besides, when she got back, she started going after Ryan Tech again.”

I
looked at her. What was it about Ryan Tech that someone could block a telepath?
I mean, if Angela and Alan were right about how strong Yasmine was, then no one
there could have stopped her. From the sound of it, taking over Africa was so
easy for them that it had taken them only a month and a half! Talk about having
one dictator over all, while she was there. Wait a second…

I
said, “Did you say that she all but created the Two Africas with that big
conference?”

Angela
nodded and said, “Basically, yes. The Orishai grabbed up the surviving leaders
of the nations of Africa, dragged them all to Kenya, and, in a few days, the
new regional governments were created.”

I
shook my head. Something wasn’t making sense here. “Okay, but why go to Dubai
to try to get religious terrorists? If they weren’t necessary for her African
campaign, why talk to terrorists in the Middle East?”

Angela
stopped and pulled away from me. She stared and said, “What?”