Cor'et

Cor’et
“What?” …click….click….tap…”Three….”…Schhhhhh….”Magnet…..”…..Crack….tap….”Broken, fractured…”….Slam….click….”Cathenz!?”…..Schhhhhhhh……tap……snap….”Die?”
Lilien pulled away from the cold door, she didn’t want to hear anymore of this.

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A dull green light filled the room, occasionally flecked white. This light came from the many, many computers, each with a person watching the binary scroll on endlessly, making sure that no data came in, or left, that wasn’t cleared. This was what the Inner Shard’s espionage department did on their down time. Really, this was all the espionage department ever really did.

Lilien’s eyes had a distant glaze over them, and looked over the monitor in front of her as if it wasn’t there. Her mind was on the conversation she had overheard the previous night between her espionage partner and her supervisor. A set of red digits scrolled over the screen, and Lilien was completely oblivious to it. 11, 1111, 10101, 10010, 101, 10100.

“CATHENZ!” bellowed Drin from the door of the monitor room. He was a short, plump man with penetrating, brown-black eyes. “Report to my office immediately!” he said, not as loud this time, but his voice was still low and booming. On that pleasant note, he left.

“Supervisor Drin, my favorite staff worker,” muttered Lilien. The entire room was alive with whispers. “I hear Drin’s going to send Lilien out on a suicide mission…” “You hear what happened to her partner?” “I hear Lilien’s too much of a liability, they’re turning her over…” “Ressiel, I heard her talking to Drin about getting Lilien removed.”

Lilien left the room, she didn’t want to hear anymore of this, their lies, their rumors, but worst yet, their truths. She jogged down the cold, sterilized wrought iron hallway, suppressed by the heavy scents of sterilization cleaners and metal. She read the signs above the doors, until she finally arrived at Drin’s office.

“You’re late, Cathenz, I told you to be here immediately, five minutes ago.”

“My apologies, Supervisor Drin, I have a tendency for tardiness.”

“Well lose it, you’re going out tonight.”

“Tonight?!”

“Yes, tonight. Outer Shards. To their Offensize Base, you’re working sabotage for us. No questions.”

“Understood.”

Drin haphazardly threw a thick packet of papers at her. “That’s your mission statistics and facts. Love them, hate them, burn them, I don’t care, just learn them backwards and forwards. By tonight.”

“Yes, sir.”

“Get to it, Cathenz.”

Pale gray light filtered through the laced, dark red curtains of Lilien’s office. A faint mix of chords and vocals played in the background of her office, mostly drowned out by her breathing and thoughts. The room was otherwise deathly quiet; one could drop a feather on the dark tiled floor, and it would’ve been loud.

Lilien sighed as she heard footsteps outside her door. Most likely Drin. He tended to avoid her office if at all possible- he hated the dark, warm color scheme. Lilien, on the other hand, liked it greatly; it reminded her of the pictures she had seen of sunsets before the Shattering. There weren’t any sunsets anymore. Just night and day, darkness and light.

“Cathenz, you’re out in an hour, get ready,” said Drin from the threshold of her office.

Her eyes darted over the paper one last time. “Yes, sir.”

“You better be on time, this is crucial, understood?”

“Understood.”

“Good. Start getting ready.” With that, Drin left, taking the packet with him, explaining over his shoulder, “It’s classified information. I want any notes you took burned before you’re out of this room.”

Lilien picked up her notes, looking over them. “Sabotage. Outer Shard Attack Base. Shard #17, Evelium. Coordinate: -11, -16. Pass code, 100, 101, 1, 10100.” She said to herself before throwing the paper into the fire and quickly changed, putting in contacts to mute her eyes color, and some dark grease in her fiery hair. Lilien then put on her torquet, a half necklace starting at the base of her spin, and curving around, ending in a small ball with a single, shaped piece of metal, which was located in-between her collarbones, on it running her fingers over the black feather which hung from it fondly. “Cor’et,” She whispered softly. She then grabbed her Electron gun, strapping it to her side, just in case, and her data stick, which the Technological Espionage Assistance Department had thrown together. Hopefully, with enough data to crack their systems in five seconds flat. “Finally, back on the field,” she said, heading down to the launching grounds, and looking around for Xal’s ship.

The landscape darkened immensely as they trekked into space, not deep into space though, the planetary shards were too close, and had too much gravitational pull, to allow that.

“I’m going to drop you off a little ways away from the Attack Base, and exit the gravitational pull of this shard. I’ll stay close for eight hours, and then presume you’re dead and head back to base. Call me when you get back to where I left you, and I’ll be back in roughly fifteen minutes.”

“Got it, Xal.”

“Good.”

The rest of the flight was completely silent, but still rather pleasant. They came to a landing, and Lilien walked to the door. “If I die…” she started seriously. “Get Drin to wear a dress to my funeral.”

“Will do. I’ll wear one, too.”

Lilien left wordlessly, smiling to herself as she took in her surroundings. “Night, good. Couple miles east of the Attack Base.” Lilien quickly worked her way to the outer layer of security in the ‘Offensive Maneuvers Facility’ As the Outer Sharders called it, and easily scaled the electrical chain-link fence, not completely sure what parts were safe to step on. “My favorite part of this job, the ever-looming factor of instant, crispy death,” she said to herself with a chuckle, one hundred percent serious.

The front door was unlocked, but Lilien doubted she’d be able to just stride in without being seen. So she went around the building several times, before selecting a side door and walking through it. It led to a dark, small corridor which lead directly to the Main Control Booth for the lowers levels security system.

“Hello,” She greeted the security guard in the control booth from behind.
“Goodnight,” Said Lilien sweetly, dealing a sharp blow to back of his head. It didn’t kill him, but it left him unconscious and bruised. She plugged the data stick into the computer, and smiled grimly as three words scrolled across the screen: Security system disabled.

Lilien then jogged quickly through the corridors. They’d catch on soon enough to what she’d done, and she needed to get her job done before then. She eventually ended up in the basement of the sterilized, polished building, and quickly found the Weaponry room. It was oddly empty, almost too empty. Except for the large, circular bomb in the center. Lilien walked up to it, almost too cockily. And jumped slightly as she heard the sound of metal slamming. The doors closed. All of them, and probably locked.

“Hello, Lili dearest, does anyone still call you that?” said a voice absentmindedly from behind her, making her spin around. It was a girl, with hair the same color as Lilien’s, but bright, lively green eyes. She was slightly shorter, but only slightly. She hit several keys on the keypad. ‘Weapon armed’

“Hello, Astri.”

Astri smiled. “You remember me.”

“You’re rather hard to forget,” said Lilien, motioning at her sister’s torquet, which had a white feather rather than a black one. “That helps.”

“Cor’et,” Astri started. “Did Mom ever tell you what it meant?”

“Center.”

“Heart,” Corrected Astri, hitting several more keys on the keypad. ‘Weapon disabled.’
With that, she turned to leave, remarking over her shoulder. “If anyone asks, I don’t exist anymore; I’ve long since been blown to a million little pieces of ash floating around the atmosphere.”

“Wait!” called Lilien after her. “Why? Why do you side with them and not us?”

“Because there’s one big, murderous dog pile starting. And I plan on staying at the top.” This time, Astri really did leave.

“Understood,” whispered Lilien, leaving.
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The next day, she gave her follow-up report to Drin. “No casualties, no encounters with Outer Shard civilians, and still no trace of Astrelli Cathenz. Overall success.”