Solaria Rising - Chapter 39: The Eye of the Storm
The truth behind the tremors, unleashed in full fury.
Solaria shimmered into view. It was stunning. Organic, and somehow... growing. No longer the simple cave entrances and shelves, it was coming into its own. Becoming a place of solidity, though not yet a cityscape. A communal, alive space.
Solaria was rising.
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Kyle took in another deep, still-unfamiliar breath, one that brought him to the brink of stillness. It was healing, this air-breathing—amazing in the way it filled the core. No deep breath with gills. Only the constant pull. A pull he was preventing in his brethren, even while drawing in more for himself.
Wait! Hold back. Let them breathe.
The words echoed in his head, confusing him. Was that his mind, or hers? Should he comply? He heard others as well. His people, his former clansfolk. His enemies.
The cacophony was overwhelming.
Surely he needed to stop them. They would advance if he did not.
Not like this.
Though loath to let go of his hold, his mind raced to reason out a better end. Hold back, give her more time?
If that was her, in his mind, he couldn’t ignore…
He stretched, envisioning the girl he adored. Seeking to verify.
Her image flashed across his mind’s eye, that same beautiful visage—only now even more fully realized.
Organic. Real.
Her true form.
‘It is you,’ he breathed.
She was alive, and not in danger. Her voice rang out then, as if she were in the room. Like a faulty wire had been fixed, their connection solidified, while all the other voices faded.
“Do as I say, Kyle. This isn’t the way.”
His reluctance vanished. He took a breath, still so strange and alien, a sign that things were changing faster than he could anticipate.
Trusting her judgment, he envisioned the gill slits of his former clansmen, and willed them open as their vestigial lungs shrank away. He felt the desperate gasps, the pull of life’s breath from the water. The intense relief.
They were safe, for now.
And once more a danger to the city—and to Calistya.
‘Now what?’ Kyle asked.
She drew closer, almost as if he could reach out and take her by the hand. The chamber dissolved, and he was with her, body and mind. She opened her thoughts to him, and visions of the Aquasentinels appeared there.
They already mending their gear. They wouldn’t be slowed for long.
Calistya could feel it, and so could Kyle. They could sense everything now. Including the Solarian elders. Their psychic energy surged through her, forcing interference through her unwilling mind. They aimed to channel her powers to go straight for their minds.
She bristled against the assault, resisted and repelled. Kyle did two. With their combined strength, they were at last fatiguing. With a collective psychic push, which pained them both and taxed them to their limits, the assault faltered, wavered. And fell away, screams of frustration trailing off.
They slumped into each other. Kyle, breathing heavily, suddenly realized there was no air there. Nor water. They were in a sort of floaty limbo place.
Sensing his confusion, Calistya gathered what little strength she had left, and placed an image in his head. That of the world itself.
We exist where the tremors emerged from. We, the physical manifestation, are sheltered now.
But not for long, he thought.
No, not for long, she admitted. Her thoughts shifted to the war, leading him to think through the process with her now.
Nothing had changed, in reality, and there was work to be done still. Two powerful forces were about to clash, after all they’d done. All they’d tried to do.
“Your people are tearing this world apart,” came the voice, projected from the collective energy, but clear as a true sound. “You who evoked the shaking earth, tore the energies apart, must stop the tremors yourselves. Only you can undo what has been done.”
Confusion rang like bells in their minds. We’re causing the tremors? How could that be? It wasn’t so. It was *them*.
Wasn’t it?
In a flash, the whole converged. The deepest truth came alive. It was neither her people, nor his. It was aggression itself tearing the seafloor apart. The ground-churning machinery of The Technoquatics, clashing with the psychic response of the Solarians.
Their battling energies were literally destroying the world.
And the world had responded.
It was the universe itself, triggering a healing evolution. Kyle and Calistya. Reborn to stop the madness. It was as if the world itself had come alive, so grave the concern.
Calistya’s eyes settled upon Kyle’s. It was time for them to return.
Find the protectors. Find Albi and the others. We need their help.
And with a final, grief-stricken psychic push, Kyle was removed from the protective bubble, returned to real form. Human form. He breathed heavy once, twice, and wailed.
Knowing only a vague impression from the merboy that he could find Calistya in the deep—though he didn’t know why that impression lingered, nor why he felt so strongly that he could trust it—Oliver raced to the gates.
What he found there stopped him cold. The equipment, or lack thereof—not a helmet, not a fin. The place had been—
“Excuse me,” Oliver said, striding to the nearest aquasentinel, who looked at him with vague irritation, but he seemed understaffed.
“I need to dive. I mean, I need to stretch a bit. I’m really in a space right now.” He searched for words that would sound urgent, yet casual at the same time.
“I’m sorry, sir. Aquasentinel priority. All equipment has been appropriated for the time being.”
“I’m sorry, excuse me? What?”
“There’s something going on. A mission. I can’t talk about it. I’m sorry. All civilian equipment is off-limits at this point.”
“Look, I really need to—”
“Thank you for watching.”
“Off-limits, sir. I’m sorry.”
Thinking fast. “I’ll overlook to the guard shack. Look, you guys have your own, don’t you? If you could contact Martha, she could confirm. This is rather urgent. I’m not trying to be difficult, but...”
The Aquasentinel looked ready to say something more forcefully when Oliver felt a heavy hand on his back. Spinning around in surprise, he saw Albi out of breath. Unable to speak.
“Nero,” Albi said, using Headmaster Oliver’s familiar name, perhaps for the first time. This lack of formality alone caught Oliver off guard.
“Relax, Albi, breathe. I need to get out there anyway.” He glanced towards the water.
“No. No, everything’s changed. The tremors. The preparations. It’s all a mistake. You need to...” He stopped, unable to speak. The heavy breathing caused him to clutch his chest.
Oliver became concerned for his colleague’s health.
The Aquasentinel, meanwhile, had moved off. Glad to be extricated from this. He looked like he had heavier concerns. He moved back to the shack... and took a call on his radio.
Albi finally caught his breath enough to stammer out a few words.
“Listen. Nero. Things are changing faster than you know. Calistya... she can take care of herself. You have to come back with me.”
“No. You don’t understand. Kyle sent me.”
“Nero, he sent me as well. Or Calistya did. Both of them…”
He shook off Oliver’s look of confusion and repeated, “Things have changed.”
Suddenly, the Aquasentinel was back. Two colleagues flanking him.
“Both of you need to leave now. This area is off-limits.”
“Off-limits?” Oliver shouted. “That’s impossible. We have the right to access.”
“Off-limits, sir. You need to leave.”
Suddenly, the emergency lighting system of the city, practically tuned out by all from the constant reaction to the tremors, changed to a color none had seen before. That in itself was shocking, but the sound of an alpha emergency alarm began to wind its way through the system, sending chills up all their spines.
“Get out now,” the Aquasentinel on the left said, “before it’s too late.”
As if to obey his commands, thick steel doors began to close behind them, about to seal off the city from the ocean.
“Run!” Albi screamed. “We have to get back.”
He grabbed the headmaster by the hand and pulled him towards the doors. They rolled under just as the immense object hit the deck with a resounding and final clang, causing a shaking nearly as violent as the tremors themselves.
Author bio: David Deane Haskell is a fusion writer who’s impossible to pin down. Want new age future-vision with a deep dive into the human psyche? Nominally fictional (nom-fiction) tales that resonate somewhere between fact and fantasy? With that undeniable kind of truth we can still find, even in this messed up, post-truth world?
David’s stories drill into the lives of introspective characters (real ones, and ones who feel almost real) and illuminate the thought-provoking themes that keep us up at night. His settings range from ultra-modern A.I. life with fantastical future backdrops, to dark places in real life where he hesitated to return—but had to. David weaves personal reflections into his stories, creating a reading experience that blends relatably human reflections with deeply personal truths. Truths that you may well share.
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Parts of The Technoquatics were originally serialized on Royal Road under the title “Solaria Rising – Book I of the Technoquatics Series”. This Substack version may or may not contain revisions. The final chapters have never been published anywhere, and will debut on Substack exclusively.