Free Assault or Attrition by Blake Northcott Page B

unimaginable castle the size of a
small city, was the key.

Chapter Eight
     
     
    The
following months dragged by. November turned to December, and
two weeks prior to Christmas I could feel depression setting in. At
first I thought it was seasonal affective disorder, which wasn’t
uncommon during the winter months in regions with cold climates.
I’d spend time in the dome, sun tanning under the glow of an
artificial sun each day, but my symptoms only worsened. It wasn’t
the cold nights and grey Canadian skies that were bumming me out –
it was loneliness.
    Peyton was
ignoring my messages and Gavin was nowhere to be found. Taking time
for myself was one thing, because I always had the option to make
contact with others when the mood struck. Being isolated with the
knowledge that I couldn’t contact my best friends, even if I
wanted to, was completely foreign, and it was taking its toll.
    A weekly
holo-session with Gary, Elizabeth and the kids was my only real
connection to the outside world. It was nice to hear their voices
and chat about their days. I’d ask the most mundane questions, like
if they’d had a chance to put up their Christmas tree yet, and
they’d always respond with amazing enthusiasm and an alarming
amount of detail. And during every session, I felt like I needed to
thank Gary for saving my life back in Toronto. Without the lunging
tackle that slowed down the Russian (buying Valentina enough time
to launch him out the window) I might not be alive. “You are the
most bad-ass computer programmer in Canada,” I once told him. He
smiled, and said that he credits his fast reaction time to my
sister: years of practice dodging dishes she launched at him during
their all-out brawls. His response sent them both into fits of
laughter; I don’t think they’d ever had an argument in nearly ten
years of marriage, let alone a fight.
    Although
virtual chats staved off my depression, I needed real human
interaction to brighten the days when I felt truly alone. The time
I spent with Brynja helped a lot. We played games, watched movies,
and she was the only person who seemed interested in chatting with
me about comics. She didn’t know Stan Lee from Bruce Wayne before
she arrived at the fortress, but she was a quick learner. In just a
few short weeks of reading sessions and movie marathons Brynja was
becoming an expert in geek culture, and before long she was making
Star Wars references like a pro. One particularly cold evening I
caught her referring to Alberta as ‘Hoth’, and I wanted to embrace
her like a proud father.
    It wasn’t long
before she was taking her fandom to the next level without any
further prompting or instruction on my part. Brynja began using the
3D printer to make cosplay outfits, dressing as her favorite Marvel
and DC superheroes. On any given morning I could have breakfast
with a blue-haired Harley Quinn or Wonder Woman, which always
elicited a smile from passing staff. One evening we planned a
session of Dungeons & Dragons, to which she turned up dressed
like a warrior princess, complete with a sword, studded bra and
leather loincloth. Her dedication grew to an obsession, rivaled
only by my own.
    When we weren’t
pursuing our hobbies we researched. We scoured records of
superhuman sightings and phenomena from across the globe, trying to
find an instance – even something remotely comparable – to what had
happened when she appeared out of thin air that day in the
hospital. Hour after hour, day after day we came up blank.
    Brynja’s powers
had also faded since she had reappeared. She read Kenneth’s mind
just moments after she manifested, but explained that since then
she hadn’t been able to do it again. She used to read surface
thoughts with ease: Brynja could pass by someone and ‘see’ what
they were thinking, or hear their voice in her head as clear as her
own. And now, nothing. Her other ability (the one she considered a
curse) was being able to pass through objects like a