Glimmer

Glossary

Binuit-Namri: A race of energy beings, who are attracted to the energy and vibrancy of life on Earth. Their actions are governed by a strict set of rules that must be followed.

Deva: Energy guardians of every plant.

Eluc: Binuit-Namri slang for King.

Empathist: A human who feels the emotions, pains and energy of humans. Often overwhelmed by these emotions and feelings, they live in social isolation.

Energy: The non physical energy that animates all living things.

Guardian Angels: An angel assigned to guide and protect a particular human. They do not mix with Binuit-Namri.

Humans: Either emit or consume energy. Both are fatal to Binuit-Namri in extreme circumstances.

Joining: The Binuit-Namri ceremony where energy is exchanged with a kiss. The union lasts for all eternity and is virtually impossible to reverse. The unions are pre-arranged by a Matchmaker and are based on complementary energy signatures.

The Realm: A transitional area between The Realm Proper and Earth where Binuit-Namri generate a human form and learn human behaviour before they travel to Earth. It is a simulation of life on Earth.

The Realm Proper: A pure energy dimension, where Binuit-Namri exist only as energy.

*~~~*

Prologue

If my research ever fell into the wrong hands, I would be banished by The Council. I write this, to remind myself of the risks I take with this experiment. This time, I believe, I have dealt with the critical intergenerational challenges that have previously prevented my success.

I overcame previous instability issues, by making subtle energy modifications in the blastocyst stage of reproduction. This ensured embryo stability within the womb. However the single energy infusion, at this early stage was thwarted by the birthing process. The journey through the birth canal triggered an energy overload, resulting in termination of the subject. This was neutralized with the use of Fae energy at the blastocyst stage.

The latest subject is exceedingly difficult. This experiment, I believe, is too important to lose on emotional human behaviour, so I have installed a back up plan. If this subject fails, then there is the chance that any future experiments will be simplified.

*~~~*

Chapter 1

Ambrosia

I stand, facing the King’s grand and imposing throne in the centre of The Council Hall. They will have to make space for my throne. Soon.

Running my hand over the ornate carving, I know this is where I belong, despite finding the symbolism of an Earth throne too human for my taste. However, I must tolerate this until I am in control.

Ever since Binuit-Namri first visited Earth, their preoccupation with humanity has increased. First this castle, then villages and then Last Blood. When will the insanity end?

More and more Binuit-Namri return from Earth and refuse to be cleansed. Instead of rejoining the collective in The Realm Proper, they live a pathetic existence in Last Blood.

All will change when I sit in the throne. They will be forced to cleanse and return to The Realm Proper. This place will no longer exist.

What is it about Earth that is so attractive? Humans are barbarians. The energy of the world may feel unique to an undisciplined mind but how could it hold any fascination to beings such as ourselves, who are capable of so much more than a simple corporeal form existence.

Earth visits have made our once powerful Nation weak. We no longer hold the same high status that we once had. Angels, Faeries, Demons and Banshees used to show reverence to us. Our association with humans has made us into a laughing stock.

I will change everything. First, I need to possess the special Eluc energy that was transferred to our King when he was crowned. Once my energy is strengthened, then I will implement my plan.

My hand’s still on the throne when Regulus’ energy enters the room.

Our King is testing my patience, Regulus. The Realm is too liberal. Chaos is everywhere. There needs to be more control, more rules and less freedom.

Harland has no options left, my lady. Once joined, you will ascend to your rightful place as Queen of the Binuit-Namri Nation. However, Regulus’ brow furrows, I have heard troubling rumours, that he has been seen with a human.

I have heard these stories also. It matters not. She is inconsequential. The Enforcers will take care of her before anything can eventuate.

He nods solemnly. And if something has already happened? If he has joined or breached the agreement in another way?

The last negotiations with the King’s Earth father, the Politician William Woods, allowed Harland to spend the rest of the Gregorian calendar year on Earth before his instantaneous return and our immediate joining. If he failed to meet my terms, then a war would commence. It was the only way I could get our stubborn ruler to commit. I’ve waited long enough for him to explore the energy of Earth. I refuse to wait any longer for him.

There will be war.

Regulus starts to speak, but closes his mouth and looks at his feet. Does he doubt my resolve to rule the Binuit-Namri Nation? He is as soft and as foolish as Harland if that is the case. Earth is meaningless.

That is my only plan. I am the chosen one to led our people into a new era.

What consequence is it to The Nation if Earth is destroyed? It is little more than a holiday destination, one which we do not need. Latest reports indicate that humans are already well on their way to destroying the environment that sustains their life. I doubt a few decades here or there will matter.

You are willing to destroy an entire planet for your ambitions?

"Regulus, you should ask if Harland’s procrastination is worth an entire planet. The fundamental question is that visitations to Earth have achieved an increase in the number of our people who foolishly believe that they have lost their hearts to humans. The latest predictions indicate that the population of Last Blood with triple in three human years. Ninety percent of all of Binuit-Namri outside of The Realm Proper will be in that disgraceful place.

The time has come to take control. If it continues, there will be no Binuit-Namri left in The Realm Proper. It is preposterous to think that a simple ball of dust is the cause of our problems. One way or another visitations will cease.

I turn on my heels and walk out of the Council Hall. I only want what is best for our people.

Now all I need is to kiss Harland - with or without his permission.

*~~~*

Chapter 2

Nyssa

Bang!

A flash of light?

Was that a gun shot?

Voices? Talking?

Is that Harland?

My chest burns. Has someone jabbed me with a hot iron?

Harland is here. Was here? What the? Has he been hurt?

My knees buckle.

My lips are intensely warm and the feeling spreads everywhere. The sun has taken up residence in my soul.

The pain vanishes. I’m delirious with joy, excitement and love. The world is full of light and peace. It’s mind-blowing and totally awesome.

A second bang?

A third?

Nothing.

Silence and calm.

At last.

I’m floating near the ceiling. My father and Aunt Mel are lying in pools of red. Blood. Oh, wow - so is my body. But as still as their bodies are, mine is thrashing, fighting. A dark haired person is bending over it. They scramble to their feet and vanish in a flash of light.

I’m sucked out of my childhood home and into a long, dark tunnel.

All too soon, its pitch black.

I hate the dark.

I open my mouth to scream but freeze.

Something is approaching.

Lots of somethings.

*~~~*

Chapter 3

Ianto

Man, Harland is going to kick my ass if he finds out I’ve tailed him continuously since I caught him making out with that girl at the cottage. For someone who is ruler of a Nation, he sure spends a lot of time doing dumbass shit.

Not that I can talk. I’m at the dumbass end of the spectrum right now, squatting behind a row of rubbish bins, like some lowlife peeping tom, two houses down from Nyssa’s, waiting for the idiot to make his next move.

Sometimes, I wish I wasn’t a Protector, then his glimmer wouldn’t have registered on my idiot radar, and I wouldn’t be here, tracking him, while he does whatever it is he’s doing. I don’t want to know the details, I just hope he doesn’t land himself in a shit-load of trouble.

While I’m waiting, I may as well let Aphra know what he’s done. Lowering my barriers, I link with Aphra. Idiot glimmered to Nyssa’s house.

She sends something unintelligible back. The only word I can pick out is effin before the connection is abruptly terminated.

Maybe she glimmered. I don’t know. To be honest, I’m tired of all this crap. I want to go back to Last Blood and to my friends. Sure, Last Blood is a cop-out but it’s easier than living will all the bull crap rules of the Binuit-Namri Nation. At least there, there is some freedom.

Hail stones the size of peas start to fall. I raise an energy shield around me. I’m hypnotized watching them bounce off, falling in a white blanket on the ground. Ping. Ping. Ping. Earth weather is amazing. It’s the only thing I’ll miss.

I feel the surge of Harland’s energy before I see him and his half-assed attempt at climbing over the back fence. Shit! Could he make any more noise? How is it even possible he can glimmer? This night is going to Hell in a hand basket, and all on my watch.

Shit!

He’s glowing, and doing nothing about hiding the fact he’s not human.

Double shit with a cherry on top!

I send a large energy bolt into the clouds. Thunder shakes the area. Ah, heck, I may as well book us adjoining rooms in prison for meddling with Earth’s weather system. But I had to do something, to get humans to cower inside their homes and not witness this spectacle.

Harland staggers past. He’s in real bad shape, bumping into fences and cars, trying to make his way down the road. I’m not even sure he has any idea where he’s going.

I should help him, but something holds me back. A thousand excuses and reasons flood my mind and while they all seem plausible, none of them feel solid enough to take the risk to interfere in the choice he’s made. If Aphra or Malyna were here, neither would hesitate, but this isn’t my battle. I warned him to stay away from that girl but he didn’t listen. There’s nothing more that I can do, except watch him make his mistakes. Hopefully, he’ll learn from what he’s doing.

Oh, who am I kidding? I start to follow. ’Fark!" I’m doomed if I leave him and I’m doomed if I help. Last time I interfered, he pulled one of his King commanding crap moments, threatening to send me back to The Realm Proper, where I’d have no choice but to share all of my feelings and experiences of Cybele with the rest of the Binuit-Namri. As if he could...well maybe he can, which is why I’ve backed right off.

What happened between me and my girl stays between me and my girl, even though she’s been dead a very long time.

Despite his threats and bullshit, I have a duty to perform. I made a promise that I would care for his royal pain in the ass during his time on Earth and I always stand by my promises. So I follow the stumbling fool, along the streets, down to the beach and into a cave.

Aphra? Aphra, you have to come and get me, I’ve done something really dumb. I hear him say as I step into the darkened cave.

At least he has the sense to hide.

I take a deep breath. It could very well be my last breath on Earth. Oh well, it was fun while it lasted. I light a small energy globe and throw it ahead of me. It makes a beeline for him, attracted by his Binuit-Namri energy signature and hovers above.

He’s slumped at the very back of the cave. Covered in blood that is not his, pulsing like a dying neon light.

What a huge f-ing mess. Do I squat? Or stand? Try to help him? Figure out what’s wrong? I’m no healer. I opt to kick his foot to see if he’s still conscious. He moans and twitches.

You’re an idiot. This is really not good. You look like something the cat threw up man. I wring my hands together. Not good. Not good at all.

I kneel. His face is white. Blood is everywhere. He looks like death, but that’s impossible. Binuit-Namri cannot die. Our human forms are reorganised energy that cannot be destroyed. It can change form, like water to ice but that’s it.

I lay my hand on his forehead. Cold and empty. Where did you get all this blood?

It’s not his, Aphra states, making me jump. She moves fast to his other side, immediately commencing first aid on his energy. Shit, that’s what I should have done.

For the first time ever, Aphra looks terrified. He’s empty! No energy. At all! She shrieks.

Impossible, I mutter, dismissing Aphra’s panic. It can’t be. Every Binuit-Namri has emergency energy for one last trip to The Realm. If he was that low it should have triggered well before he got to this stage.

We have to get him back Ianto, but how? He’s got nothing. If he stays here, his energy may dissipate...then he would cease to exist, maybe? He’ll just... well I’m not sure what will happen. I’ve never seen or heard of this before. It’s impossible.

She glows slightly as she starts to channel energy into Harland. It’s like a faucet turned wide open. He sucks the energy right out of her, as soon as her barriers are dropped.

Shit.

It’s not going to take long for her emergency energy to be triggered and her to glimmer. I can’t let that happen – not two emergencies on one Protector shift. And what the heck would I do to Harland if Aphra wasn’t here.

I grab his ankle and start transferring energy. I’m no Healer but know the basics. I bet my crude transfer is causing him a world of hurt. A slight smile creeps onto my face. Dumb, stupid idiot, deserves the pain.

I’m worried about Aphra. She won’t think twice about giving up her existence for idiot. Always thought she had a perverse sense of honour, loyalty and all things noble. Nobility and loyalty, well that doesn’t get you anywhere but heartache and I should know. She’s always thought that Harland should come first, but how can you give your entire life to looking after someone who is bent on self-destruction?

Oh man! I pull my hand away. I know what they are expecting of me. I bet she’s hoping that I can carry them both back to The Realm. That’s gonna take one of us to be full strength.

Whose blood? Malyna snaps, glimmering into the cave, less than a metre away. Man, you have to give it to her, for knowing where her charges are. I’m lucky to get within ten. Hell, if I glimmered here, I’d be on top of the cliff.

Malyna’s white designer trousers soak up the blood and mud on the bottom of the cave as she kneels beside him. Her meticulous appearance disappears seconds later, as she too, starts to pump energy into Harland.

It’s impressive, I’ll give ‘em that. Seeing a Senior Earth Healer and Field Medic in action. Never seen that before, not even in Earth training, but then I never thought I’d ever see miss immaculate Malyna, kneeling in mud and who knows what else, with her energy barriers down and allowing another man, who ain’t her husband, drawing down her energy. I’d be wild if I were William.

You got blood on ya Aph. I point to her sleeve.

She doesn’t bother to look. It’s Nyssa’s.

Boundaries getting blurred hey ?

What! She growls. I went to check on her, because he will wanna know what happened. The human paramedics are trying to bring her back. She was shot in the chest. I patched what I could in the instant I had before the SWAT team broke down the door. He caused this-

What happened? Malyna interjects.

The energy residue indicates Nyssa’s father shot her, then his sister and finally himself. Our illustrious leader tried to keep Nyssa alive by forcing her energy to remain in her body. I think he may have... Anyway that’s not important now... Nyssa has a huge hole in her chest. I don’t think she’ll make it. It’s impossible for a human to survive such a catastrophic wound.

I wipe my face with my hands to hide my surprise. I knew Aphra was good with energy signatures, but I never realised she’s that good. No wonder the Elite Guard look at her in awe. I wouldn’t have been able to pick up that much detail.

But what a friggin’ mess man. How will I ever explain this to The Council? Shit, it’s going to take them months to work up all the breaches of The Rules. Shit man, there has to be a way out of this. Think Ianto think!

The three glow, like a candle, as the girls synchronize their energies, blending them to become one big energy blob so we can glimmer to The Realm.

I force myself to turn away. As their Protector, it was my job to protect and I failed. I could have stopped it if I weren’t stupidly keeping my distance. I should have barged into Nyssa’s house and stopped this before it started. But that would have been going against The Rules. I was damned if I did, and more damned because I didn’t.

In the mud, I see the soft glow of a phone. After wiping the screen clean, I check the model. It’s the new phone he said he didn’t buy. The wallpaper is a picture of Harland and Nyssa together. I recognise the look on both their faces.

No wonder he gave Nyssa everything he had. He has feelings for her.

What an idiot, but I can’t talk. I would have done exactly the same to save my love, Cybele. Instead an Enforcer made me watch her starve to death. I’d joined with her and everything. I thought I was being clever, but I wasn’t clever enough. Centuries have passed since then and it still hurts like it was yesterday. Never got over the grief, but somehow just manage to struggle on and not think on it too much. All I wanted was a few decades of happiness, but all I got was a few months.

I stare at the screen for a few more seconds before I flip it over and pull out the battery. I hide the phone in one of the crevices in the wall. Harland’s got enough trouble, he doesn’t need any more.

Harland starts convulsing. His body is rejecting their energy. Must be due to all the centuries he’s been trading with Devas. His Binuit-Namri energy is well and truly toast. The only ones who can save him now are The Healers.

As for the girls, well they don’t look that much better. Aphra’s slumped on the floor. Down to her reserve, she’s not transferring energy anymore, instead she’s realigning the jumble of energy inside of idiot, so he’ll be as energy neutral as possible for the trip home.

Malyna’s slumped on the other side. Her eyes are closed, digging deep, giving everything she can to Harland, leaving her dangerously close to the condition that Harland was in when I found him. Didn’t realise that a Senior Healer could delve so deep into her reserve energy. I bet William will go all Rambo on my ass, if anything happens to Malyna. Hell, he’ll probably go Rambo on my ass just because Malyna shared energy with Harland. I know I would if I were him.

Oh man! I walk to the cave entrance and look out into the rain. I’d take walking on broken glass over being here right now. This is all kinds of messed up. The girls are expecting me to be able to take them back to The Realm and I’m not sure I can.

The last time I glimmered to The Realm with someone, Enforcer Julius was holding onto me. He laughed as he tried to make me watch Cybele in her last few minutes of life on Earth. I couldn’t take it. Anger boiled in my veins and before I knew it, we were back in The Realm. No one had transported an Enforcer. I became a hero in Last Blood for it. But man, it hurt, like a thousand bee stings on your privates.

Still, Julius was fully charged, so it wasn’t like trying to push a car with flat tyres uphill, which I’m expecting this is gonna be like.

A Deva sprints past. William. Hospital, it sings. I stare after it. What’s William doing at the hospital, when he should be here? This family gets stranger by the minute.

The cave filling with light distracts me. The girls are finishing synching their energy with Harland. Even the energy globe is being drawn into Harland’s energy field. I’m not sure, but I reckon they are going to try and get us all on the same energy pattern. Maybe that will make transporting easier.

Harland is writhing and groaning. Every now and then his body seizes, as if all his muscles lock and the writhing starts all over again. If he survives, he’s going to be fried.

Maybe I should be helping. I mean, my energy is always great, because I look after myself. Shit, I should at least try. I go over to them and put my hand on his leg.

No! Don’t you dare! You are the only hope we have of getting home Ianto. You have to be full. Malyna touches my arm. I yank it away from her. She’s trying to give me what’s left of her energy.

Save it for idiot boy, I grumble and step away before she can try it again. Getting energy from my Earth mother is too freaky and wrong.

We’re as good as it’s going to get. Malyna slurs. The last of her human energy gives out and she rests her head against Harland’s. The three of them look like they have partied all night and collapsed exhausted.

It’s up to you, Ianto. You need to carry all of us. We have distributed our energy reserves evenly over the three of us. Hopefully it will be like the time you glimmered with Julius. Ianto, we don’t have any options. You can do this. You have to, Aphra whispers.

Fuggin’ crab trees, I growl under my breath.

Don’t get lost, Aphra adds.

I look at each of them in turn. Who knows where Binuit-Namri go when they fail to make it all the way back to The Realm. Course there are rumours of a void place, full of dark nothingness, where you remain, lost forever, but I bet it’s just rumours to make us keep in line. I wouldn’t wish eternal darkness on my worst enemy... okay, maybe I’d wish it on Julius.

Focus Ianto. Focus. You can do this. You are tough. Think of Cybele and how The Enforcers killed her. Get mad. Do it man. Do it for love.

Did Aphra know idiot was in love? When was she going to tell the rest of us? I close my eyes and stretch my back muscles. This will be the last time I feel anything this intense. Once Harland is back in The Realm, I won’t be invited back to Earth, not after this screw up.

The least I can do is get them back safely. I will make this happen. I shake my arms and legs, creak my neck from side to side and bounce on the spot a dozen times before I squat next to the trio.

Placing one hand on Harland and the other on Malyna, Aphra grabs idiot’s hand and puts a hand on my arm. Malyna closes the circle with one hand on idiot and one on Aphra.

Hold tight girls and idiot, we’re going home, I growl, starting to build energy to glimmer.

We go past my usual glimmer point, and my body starts to complain. The aches and pains are replaced by stinging. Yeah, I remember the stinging. I really don’t want to go any further, because I know it’s going to hurt plenty but I ain’t got a choice.

Everything goes hazy. Oh man! Don’t panic. The girls can’t get back without me and what will happen if they don’t get back in time? Will they simply no longer exist?

I have to build more energy. If I don’t glimmer, I’ll go off like