CHAPTER 9: NEW RECRUITS

Chapter

Two security officers stood at attention in the briefing room, still fighting off the fog of a century-long sleep. The woman flexed her fingers repeatedly, like she was testing whether they still belonged to her. The man's eyes moved around the room in short, careful sweeps, confirming the walls were solid, the floor was real.

I ran Revelation across both of them, cross-checking what I saw against their personnel files.

Rebecca Samson. Former military. Long-range operations specialist. Former commanders noted adaptability under pressure, the kind that didn't waver when plans fell apart.

Donald Williams. Intelligence background. Tactical experience. An analytical mind that preferred gathering information before acting. And, apparently, a crippling fear of poetry.

I blinked. Metrophobia. Revelation occasionally surfaced details that had no tactical value whatsoever. Still, if I ever needed to weaponize Robert Frost, Donald was finished. The local wildlife wasn't likely to recite a sonnet before trying to eat us, so I filed it away and moved on.

"Eli Falken, Chief of Security." I stepped forward and kept my posture easy, movements unhurried. Newly awakened colonists tended to go stiff around me once they clocked the synthetic frame. Better to let them adjust at their own pace. "Welcome to the worst and best wake-up call of your lives. I know you're still piecing yourselves back together, but we're working against the clock."

"Rebecca's already eyeing your sword," Sage said through our private link, her presence settled and familiar at the back of my thoughts. "Donald's studying your face. Trying to reconcile the youthful features with a command rank. He can't decide if you're synthetic or just genetically modified."

I kept the smile off my face. After a century together, she'd developed a sharper read on people than most trained observers, and she didn't even need magical skills to do it. I'd have to watch myself or she'd start cataloging my own tells next.

I pulled up the holographic display with a thought and let the hunt footage fill the room. Hexaraptors, ravine stalkers, armored serpents, all of them put down fast enough that the line between combat and something else entirely started to blur. The recent ravine hunt played in full, showing the stalkers' ambush and everything that followed.

"This world is full of predators that conventional approaches won't touch," I said. Both officers watched the footage with the flat focus of trained professionals, tracking movement and positioning rather than flinching at the bodies piling up. "And yes. That's me doing the hunting."

Rebecca leaned forward. Athletic, brown hair pulled back tight, the kind of posture that comes from years of maintaining it without thinking. Her eyes followed the combat sequences with particular attention to how I used the terrain.

"I knew a synthetic was leading the expedition," she said. "Nobody mentioned security would be your department." The small crease between her brows wasn't disapproval exactly, but it was a reassessment.

"Problem?"

"Honestly?" The tension in her shoulders dropped. "No. That's incredible. Your capabilities are incredible." And she meant it. Pupil dilation suggesting excitement, not alarm. Facial muscles reading as genuine. She saw a potential ally, not something to be cautious of. Good. Trust problems between security personnel created gaps I couldn't afford.

Donald was quieter about it. Reserved, analytical eyes behind thick-rimmed frames that missed nothing. His fingers tapped a slow, deliberate pattern against his thigh.

"Your tactical approach is unorthodox," he said, studying the frozen image of me mid-teleport above the ravine floor.

"He's nervous," Sage said. "Watch how he's angling toward the exits while keeping eye contact. Classic intelligence habit."

I leaned against the briefing table and let my voice go casual. "Good news is, it gets weirder."

I switched feeds to the crystal footage. The whole sequence laid out plainly: first contact, transformation, and what came after. The forest footage showed me teleporting between trees, there one second and gone the next, nothing left behind but a whisper of displaced air and a faint purple afterglow.

Donald studied the footage with narrowed eyes. "That could be edited," he said carefully. "Or some kind of projection technology."

Healthy skepticism. Exactly what I wanted from someone in this role.

"Fair point," I said, pausing the playback. "Live demonstration?"

I didn't wait for an answer.

One moment I was standing beside the display console.

CRACK.

The next I was across the room, the air rushing in to fill the space I'd left. Both of them flinched at the sound. Rebecca's hand dropped to her hip before she remembered she wasn't armed. Donald froze completely, eyes going wide.

I kept going. Another thought, another instant transition, and I was touching the ceiling twenty feet up, standing inverted on the metal panels like gravity was a suggestion I'd chosen not to follow. Their expressions were worth every second of it. Then one final jump and I was back at my original position, the displaced air catching a tablet on a nearby table and sending it skidding off the edge.

Elapsed time: about three seconds.

"That," I said into the silence, "was not special effects."

There's a specific kind of stillness that follows when someone watches something genuinely impossible happen in front of them. CGI on a screen is one thing. Feeling the air move against your skin is something else.

"Holy shit," Rebecca said, all the military precision in her voice gone at once.

Donald's mouth opened and closed. For a man who specialized in being unreadable, being rendered speechless was quite the achievement. I'd mark it in my calendar.

Five full seconds passed before anyone spoke.

"That was actually real?" Rebecca's voice pitched higher. Both hands gripped the edge of the table, knuckles pale.

Donald raised both palms, training reasserting itself through the shock. "Let me get this straight. Aliens existed here, left behind functional technology, and you're showing us this because..."

"Here comes the existential recalibration," Sage said privately, amusement clear in her tone. "Watch Williams' hand go for where his sidearm should be. Three, two, one."

Right on schedule, Donald's right hand drifted toward his hip before he caught himself and smoothed the front of his uniform instead.

"The chamber's forty-five minutes north," I said, watching their expressions cycle from disbelief through wonder toward something more careful. "Built by the Evaruun civilization. They left twenty million years ago."

Rebecca sank into a chair. The metal creaked in the quiet.

"Nobody thought to mention potential alien ruins during mission briefing?" A thread of professional indignation ran through the question. "That seems like a fairly significant thing to leave out."

"Planetary surveys detected nothing. The chamber was inside a mountain, covered in vegetation." I spread my hands. "Hard to find something when you don't know you're looking for it. If I'd known touching alien tech would give me superpowers, I'd have added it to my original contract."

That got a short laugh from her. Donald's lips twitched.

"This changes everything," he said, mostly to himself. "The discovery alone requires xenoarchaeologists, linguists, theoretical physicists."

"All being arranged. Dr. Stevenson is coordinating research priorities." I kept my voice level, not letting the conversation drift into anxiety when decisions needed making. "What I need from you right now is a decision. Are you willing to accept these abilities?"

"Alien abilities," Rebecca said, her training clicking back into place. She straightened in the chair like armor settling over her shoulders. "From technology we don't understand, built by extinct beings for reasons we can't verify."

"Exactly why we moved carefully. Alex and I tested first, then senior staff. Our medical director monitors everyone extensively. The evidence so far points to complete safety, but unknowns exist."

"What about the possibility this is a trap?" Donald leaned forward, the interrogator surfacing. "What if the Evaruun designed this to control other species? Absorb them?"

The exact question I'd have asked.

"The documentation describes evaluation and elevation protocols," I said. "They were facing a reproduction crisis they couldn't solve, so they abandoned the galaxy. Before leaving, they built assessment systems for potential inheritors. It could all be a ruse, I won't pretend otherwise. But we only received that documentation after we unlocked the System, which suggests they wanted us to understand their intent."

Rebecca's tactical focus sharpened. "Testing what, specifically?"

"Survival capability, cooperative advancement, societal progress. The system evaluates Candidates, which is currently me, and Initiates, which is everyone else who participates. Every fifty levels triggers an assessment. Pass, and we receive partial data from their accumulated knowledge. Fail, and future sharing stops."

Donald gestured at the frozen display, the image of me thirty feet above the ravine floor. "Those capabilities would completely change colonial defense."

"Conventional weapons against organized monster attacks?" Rebecca shook her head. "Suicide. But with this..."

"Survival becomes viable. Better than viable." I straightened from the table and let them sit with the implications.

Donald was still watching me. "Show me the teleportation again."

I disappeared and reappeared across the room, touched the ceiling, returned in an instant.

"Fuck me," he said, his composure cracking clean through.

"Pure wonder response," Sage observed. "No fear in it at all. Reminds me of when you first showed me Earth shrinking to a point of light."

Rebecca started pacing, her boots clicking a steady rhythm against the floor. She stopped abruptly.

"Adaptation is essential when circumstances change." Her gesture took in the display, the chamber footage, all of it. "And this changes everything."

"How many people know?" Donald asked.

"About twenty-five. Senior leadership, division heads, core administration."

"All upgraded?"

"Unanimously, after reviewing the evidence."

I watched them. Anyone who'd signed up for interstellar colonization already had an unusually high threshold for the unknown. These two were adjusting faster than most.

"Decision time," I said, keeping my voice easy even though Revelation had already read their answer in their posture, their pupils, the set of their mouths. "If you'd rather not have superpowers, I can find you desk work until the population grows enough for conventional law enforcement. Though that won't help much against what's out there."

They looked at each other. An entire conversation passed in two seconds of eye contact.

"Let's see these alien powers," Rebecca said, and was already moving toward the door.

The chamber never lost its effect, no matter how many times I stood inside it. Both officers moved slowly through the entrance, heads tilting back to take in the soaring walls and the intricate carvings that covered every surface. The crystal pulsed with slow, steady light, the purple glow deepening as they approached.

"It's beautiful," Rebecca said. Her voice had gone soft in a way that had nothing to do with military discipline. "Like a cathedral built by gods."

Donald said nothing. His expression was the face of a man wondering whether he'd died in stasis and this was some elaborate construction his dying brain had assembled.

They reached the crystal together, moving in the synchronized way of people who'd trained side by side. As their fingers made contact, the familiar text materialized in the air before them.

Welcome Ascension Initiate.

Their status interfaces bloomed into view.

"Combat Analysis," Rebecca read, eyebrows rising. "It says I'll be able to identify weaknesses in anything I fight, instantly."

"Truth Perception," Donald said, eyes narrowing at the floating text. "Built-in lie detection. Picks up when people leave things out deliberately."

The skill selection interface appeared next, listing options and point costs. I moved closer.

"You'll want a movement skill," I said. "The local wildlife doesn't give you time to think. I went with Teleportation, fast and reliable, but Flight might suit your roles better. Patrols are easier in the air, and if something the size of a hovercar comes out of the tree line, having altitude has obvious advantages."

"Flying," Rebecca said immediately. The professional distance dropped out of her voice entirely. "Actual flying."

Donald nodded. "Aerial superiority changes the entire defensive picture."

Both of them put fifty thousand points into Flight without hesitating.

"What about your remaining points?" I asked.

Rebecca scrolled through the cascading options. "Truth Assessment. Thirty thousand. Basic deception detection."

"Mine's better," Donald said, with an unexpected flash of dry humor. "Primary skill reads actual truth, not just what's being hidden."

"Competitive already," Sage noted. "Healthy. They'll push each other. Good for unit cohesion."

"What else looks useful?" Rebecca asked, fingers moving through the invisible interface.

Donald took his time, working through the options with the same methodical care he'd applied to everything else. "Evidence Analysis and Crime Scene Reconstruction. Perfect combination for investigative work."

Once their selections were confirmed, I stepped back toward the entrance.

"First practice session today. Tomorrow at dawn, meet by the ship. Look for two lawn chairs. Possibly four if I remember to bring extras."

Their conversation followed me out, picked up clearly by my enhanced hearing even as I moved through the chamber's long corridor:

"No way that's actually our boss." Rebecca's voice carried easily through the acoustics. "Did you see how handsome he is? I was expecting a grizzled old sergeant."

Donald's reply was dry. "Of course he looks good. He designed his own body."

"You heard every word of that," Sage said.

I kept walking, suppressing the laugh. Humans were remarkable. A transformation that had taken me weeks to process, they seemed to absorb in hours. Maybe it was easier when someone had already gone first, already mapped the impossible and made it ordinary. Or maybe it was just that the people who volunteered for interstellar colonization were already built to bend without breaking.

Either way, for the first time since we'd landed, I wouldn't be working alone.

I spent the next few hours clearing a training area near the settlement's edge. Nothing elaborate, just enough open space for takeoff and landing, a few obstacles for aerial navigation, some targets for testing range and precision. The sun was setting by the time I finished, the light going that deep red that made every shadow stretch long across the alien soil.

Sage materialized beside me, her hologram crisp against the fading sky. "Quite a bit of effort for a basic training ground."

"They showed promise," I said, straightening a target that had tilted.

"Better than you hoped, you mean." She knew the difference. "You've been worrying about finding competent security since we landed."

I gave her a sidelong look. "When did you get so good at reading me?"

"Year forty-seven," she said without hesitation. "When you spent three months learning the zither and refused to admit it was because you were bored."

"That was legitimate entertainment."

"Of course it was." She didn't bother sounding sincere. "Just like this training area is only the bare minimum and not at all designed to make a good impression on your new recruits."

I was saved from answering by Alex's approach. Her steps were steady in the dimming light, her enhanced perception probably making the shadows as clear as noon.

"New security team settling in?" She looked over the setup with obvious appreciation.

"Both took Flight, plus complementary skills. They should be functional within a few days if the adaptation rate holds."

She nodded, picking up one of the target markers and turning it over in her hand. "Your read on them?"

"Solid. Williams is analytical, cautious, prefers information before action. Samson is faster, instinctive, combat-oriented." I leaned against one of the boundary posts. "Good balance."

"Concerns?"

I thought about it. "They accepted everything quickly. Maybe too quickly. Worth watching."

"Dr. Patel already has a post-enhancement evaluation protocol in place," Alex said. She set the marker down exactly where she'd found it.

A comfortable silence settled between us. We'd developed the shorthand of people who'd been working through the same problems long enough to stop explaining themselves.

"They asked about you," I said. "Wanted to know if you'd been enhanced."

Her eyebrow lifted slightly.

"I told them senior staff had unlocked the System, and for specifics they should ask you directly." I shrugged. "Not my place."

She relaxed slightly, approval in the ease of her posture. "Good. Sets the right tone early." She turned to go, then paused. "Rodriguez wants your help tomorrow morning. Something to do with a plant with unusual properties. Try not to keep her waiting."

I grimaced. "I impress her once and suddenly I'm her research assistant."

Walking back toward the settlement, I felt something I hadn't expected. Something close to relief. Above the ridge, I could just make out two figures moving through the air in unsteady arcs, testing the edges of what they'd become.

"Your stride length has increased by 4.2 percent," Sage said. "Improved mood indicator."

"You're tracking my walking patterns."

"Among other things," she said, not even slightly apologetic. "Your synthetic physiology makes it straightforward. Someone has to monitor your mental state."

"That's deeply unsettling."

"Especially now that you're running an enhanced security unit," she continued, as if I hadn't spoken. "The responsibility suits you, for what it's worth."

I looked out toward the ridge again. "Let's just hope nobody flies into a mountain before lunch."