this impossible thousand years

She looks through no eyes this time. She is a ghost. There is a powerful feeling to this future; like the universe pulled her more strongly than ever before to this moment.

Zeillese recognized this base. She had never been here, but in the black documents of the cyborg underbelly, it was perhaps one of the most critical bases, because it stored the aether. And shadowy figures - Riwohrs - were floating inside like ghosts. She followed them.

These ancestors of hers destroyed the supplies, quickly and efficiently. Some kind of poison that ate away at the source of the aether itself, leaving the mountains and mountains of tubes of aether dry and empty within minutes.

The air itself seemed to shake and shiver, and one of the Riwohrs turned and looked, seemingly, straight at her.

Unlike the rest, its eyes were a beady orange.

The image broke. Zeillese returned.

~*~

Zeillese rushed down the corridors of the CAPS HQ. There was no time for the Veil here. Mr. Burrison was right. The security for aether wasn’t sufficient at all.

Knocking urgently at the Head Coordinator’s door, Zeillese rolls her shoulders in preparation for the words that she didn’t know how to say. The door opened.

“Veil?” the man asked, regarding her under her military name.

“Head Coordinator,” she replied, waiting for him to invite her into his office. He nodded and led her to a seat. “Permission to speak granted?”

“Of course,” he replied, smiling in regard to her manners.

“Thank you. I have a urgent report to make-” luckily, Zeillese had come up with a quick lie for him “-I have been given reports from anonymous sources that the Riwohr plan to break into Critical Storage Base One to neutralize our supplies of aether.”

“That is very worrying. And what do you suggest?”

“I suggest that the best course of action would be divert extra security and technology to the base in favor of our current military push forward. To strengthen defense.”

The Head Coordinator frowned at her. “That is asking a lot. Are you aware that such a suggested course of action would mean that the Riwohrs could very well punch through our front-line defenses straight to our outpost bases, in that case? Like that instance at Trading Post Five?”

Zeillese hesitated. “Yes.” The man narrowed his eyes, then.

“Then why do you suggest this? And what proof is there of your claims? For all we know, the Riwohr could have planted that source to get us to do just this. Or maybe… you are working with them?”

Zeillese gaped at him. “Working with them? Ho-”

“I’m sorry for the accusation, but we all know it’s a possibility, as your father was a Riwohr. We have given you the benefit of the doubt. But you have been very cold as of late, to other cyborgs and in your work. We worry that you might be straying.”

At this, Zeillese ground her teeth and set her glare, hard, on the Head Coordinator. “I’ve been working hard towards defeating those aliens, not helping them. How dare you suggest that? I hate my father! I bare this military crest on me everywhere I go; I can walk thanks to you. Do you not think I have been grateful - helping you for the past seven hundred years?”

“Aah… Well -”

“You interrupt me, I’ll interrupt you,” Zeillese interjected, harshly. She was vicious now; an angry beast at this subtle discrimination she had endured for years. For a moment, she calmed; smoothing her expression, and the frizzed strands of her hair. “Equal exchange,” she muttered, remembering a man.

~*~

Year 533

Zeillese was at a bar. It had been a long day, and her hood was down, for the moment.

A kalon with rainbow hair, mussed, and fur plain, gray and utilitarian, settled into the seat next to her. “What’s your story?” he asked. She looked at him from the corner of her eye, blue whiskers hanging low, brushing against the table.

Zeillese sighed. “At least ask my name, first. Manners.”

“Oh, well then,” he said, incredulously, as if no-one could care for manners out here. “My name is Prism. And yours, ma’am?” His voice was exaggerating, mocking; in no way polite. Zeillese breathed out steadily, irritated at the man.

“My name is Zeillese.” Prism grimaced delightfully at her.

“I would think you’d be insulted. Not going to berate me, hmm? Where are you from?”

She shot him a look. “CAPS HQ.”

“Wow. Amazing. Talk about fancy and scientific, you must be one chick! I’m from some planet. You wouldn’t know about it anymore. But it was colorful - the most colorful planet in the universe.”

Zeillese didn’t reply, just cleaned her nails.

“I’ve met a lot of people out here, ever since my home planet was destroyed. If it wasn’t for your ears, I wouldn’t say you were a CAPS member. In fact, I’d say you’re a bit more like me than them. Hopeless, maybe. Lost, too.” Zeillese gave Prism a barely veiled harsh look at that. It was such an insulting thing to say. “I’m a whole lot younger than you, but I feel like your long life has left you a bit stagnant in the emotional aspect. Maybe I just met you! But look at you. Taking my insults to your - what - century old name like you don’t care. You do care, don’t you? You should retaliate. You should also -”

“Shut up,” Zeillese muttered, a kind of word she hadn’t said for years. Not since she was a child.

Prism smiled, wide and fake. “There we go. Equal exchange.” He paused, as if he didn’t know where to go from there. “Live a little, maybe. But I know that won’t be as easy to get out of you. For people as old as you, change takes eons. But you have freedom, and that’s pretty beautiful.”

“What do you know of beauty, anyway?” Zeillese paused, hesitant to say her next words. She felt like she was going backwards. But Prism’s words echoed in her head, and she was annoyed that he called her ‘old’. So rude. “You seem to be quite a scoundrel.”

“Scoundrel? Have you not heard of Planet Variegation? Its real name was lost, but…”

“Variegation…? Of course. It was supposed to truly be beautiful, but an errant colonizing race destroyed their planet.”

“It’s my home. Tell me now I know nothing of beauty.”

Zeillese looked down at her nails again. “Riwohrs,” she muttered, as if to herself. Louder. “I wonder how it feels.”

Prism looked confused. “What?”

“How it feels to have your birth planet destroyed. Gone. Forever.”

Prism’s voice went quiet at that. “It feels terrible.” A long pause, and yellow, probing eyes. “I hope no one ever has to go through it.”

“No one?”

“No one. Not even those who never lived there, because there is always that thought at the back of everyone’s mind. This was where I was born. There is where my family is from. Maybe I love or hate them, or they love or hate me. It’s still where you began. And nothing can change that.”

“I see…” Zeillese said, into the dark silence, in the middle of the vibrant bar.

~*~

“Well?” The Head Coordinator questioned.

“I want -” she broke off, “No, I need you to do something. Anything. Extra security for the aether base. Don’t ever leave it unguarded. You have to trust me. I care for these people here. Is - Is this not emotion, is this not care I am showing, in these moments?” Zeillese said those last words loud, saturated with feeling.

The Head Coordinator looked right back into her eyes, burning a vibrant orange fire. Regret seemed to spark in his own plain, brown eyes. “I… I will heed your warning. But there is only so much attention I can give.”

“Whatever,” Zeillese says, finally remembering that perhaps she should be kind, “Thank you. I’ll go now.”

Zeillese excused herself, and closed the door, with just the slight bearings of a slam.