Page 21 of Spark Transform

Soleil glanced at Josh and realized he’d already seen Tuzan’s transformation. She didn’t bother to complain because it wouldn’t have occurred to Josh to mention it. In his Kameleon days, the CPS had given him hundreds of makeovers, from minor to radical.

“I like the new look,” said Josh. “It suits you.”

“Stunning and classic,” agreed Soleil. “Why now?”

“It felt like the right time.” Tuzan gave an exaggerated sigh. “I blame the missing Ayorinn’s Legacy quatrains I found two months ago, and the new one from last night.”

Soleil raised an eyebrow at Josh and Tuzan. “Care to share?”

Tuzan tracked the quatrains like they held the secret to the meaning of life. Academia and the government dismissed the jumbled lines of poetry as doggerel. She didn’t know what to think.

Josh looked abashed. “Sorry, I forgot.” He quickly used the percomp on his wrist to send a command to the big wallcomp display.

Delicate time spins dark into prismatic spectra.

Ancient paths spill

Redshift drops to fill voids.

Spirits return fire to the restless.

Harsh mirrors render infinite paths and none.

Resurrected gods stir,

Touchpoints spin,

Galaxies twist apart…

The helical dance begins.

Fail not the red spark.

A footnote said it was translated from Mandarin. No way of telling if this was the first translation or the twentieth. According to Tuzan, it didn’t matter. The Legacy’s purpose was to free all of human civilization from the unnamed shackles of some dire fate only the greatest forecaster that ever lived could see coming.

Soleil read it twice, but the quatrains had never made any sense to her simple Jumper brain, no matter what language they appeared in. “Is it the ‘harsh mirrors’ bit?”

“No, that’s the Legacy itself.” Tuzan pointed to the line above it. “This means returning to who we were meant to be. All of us spirits. Ghosts.” His eyes drifted. “I think we’re going to get more passengers soon. We need to scale up.”

Soleil shook her head to clear it. “You sound like a forecaster.”

Tuzan barked a laugh. “No. I think I’d know if I was.”

“Hmph.” Soleil pulled plates and utensils from the antique floating cart that had once belonged to Tuzan’s sister. “Maybe they cleaned your memory. Like they did to Josh’s knowledge of being a sifter so he’d be more useful to the CPS as a Kameleon.”

“Doubtful.” Tuzan began pulling containers out of the bags. “It’d take a higher-level cleaner than me to do it, and there aren’t that many. They’d need a twister, too. The CPS’s top telepaths are all impaired by the control drugs, or they might take the notion to assault their handlers and escape.” He winked. “Not that I have any personal experience with that.”

Tuzan insisted the Minder Corps enhancement drugs were the exact opposite, and Soleil had come to believe he was right. Yet another truth that needed surfacing from whichever subterranean digital vault the CPS had hidden it in. One thing she’d give the CPS: They documented everything.

Josh opened the bottle of wine. “Neirra Varemba could have done it.”

Tuzan’s expression froze in astonishment for a long moment. Finally, he shook his head. “She was a top-tier healer, but she wasn’t that good a twister. Convincing any adult that they didn’t have a minder talent that they had used for years would take finding and twisting an enormous number of memories.”

Soleil set out the wine glasses. “Maybe there’s another unlock phrase in your head, waiting for the right person to deliver it.”

“No, thank you,” said Tuzan firmly as he opened the last container. “That recoverable memory technique she invented is excruciating. Scrambles your brain for days. Lunar months. Galactic years.”

“Chaos, yes.” Soleil’s head still hurt occasionally from the experience. “Try carrying around a telepathic hypercube of someone else’s memories in your head when you’re not a telepath.” She handed out napkins, then sat. “Neirra worked miracles when she was alive, especially for me, but the price is high.” She smiled at Tuzan. “But it’s worth it for the mental shields you arranged for me, or Davidro would have made me fish food in the Shoruz Swamps.”