While watching Elias' face hum on the Unabox, Sanchez realized what his new intuition had been telling him. Onscreen, Elias’ likeness said, “Sorry, Emilio. There's one thing I've realized: You and I are not the same. You are weakened by doubt and caution. I, on the other hand, don't have time to think about this and that. I want to get off this rock, go home, and screw something." he said with a sickening grin. "I won't be picky, but I will certainly not degrade myself like Artemis and take my urges out on a Noman. I'm better than that." Elias said. "So, as I was saying, I've alerted Captain Raemus to your situation and while he is correcting you-and your blubbering-I will be on my way to freedom. I would send you a message while I'm relaxing in the Recreational Grid, but you won't be here to receive it. Thanks for everything, Emilio.” finished Elias. The Unabox showed Gellar Elias reach toward the screen to deactivate the Unabox connection from his side. Emilio's Unabox blipped to a white line running the diameter of the black screen. The cold, stilerium halls reverberated with Elias’s last words and the whirring sound of the Unabox as it ended its transmission. Emilio sat there staring into nothing and listening to the echoes bounce around him. They ricocheted through the hallways, the Arches, and throughout the octagonal sector back to Sanchez. Sanchez stared into nothing for a few moments and became lost in his thoughts. Sanchez had been staring into space a lot during the past few weeks. Thinking was something that tantalized and terrified him. It had only been a few weeks since they arrived back at Calimbus Dome, a slave outpost on Titan, after their accident beneath the empty bed of Ligeia Mare. Gellar Elias and Emilio Sanchez, while surveying for subterranean methane, had fallen through the ancient bed and were exposed to something. Neither of them knew what exactly had happened to them in that cave but both were quite aware of what had been happening since. They were lucky to still be alive, but from their discussion on the way back to Calimbus, they realized that they were changing. He suddenly, and violently, jerked out of his daze. That son of a bitch. “That son of a bitch!” cried Emilio. He couldn't believe that Elias would betray him. To make matters worse, Elias’s image had seemed...different. It was as if he had somehow become twisted in the brain. Since when did he care about freedom? What was freedom, anyway? Emilio digested this summary of events and felt a wave of prickly gooseflesh awaken across his shoulders and arms. He was convinced that Raemus would hunt him down, bring him to Central Core to face the Council, and then he would be corrected. Emilio Sanchez’s brain snapped focus back to his current situation. He looked both ways down the slick, silvery halls and wondered what to do. If someone was going to come, they’d have to be an Elite Officer or Driver. Only the Officers and Drivers had access to the Driver sectors. The Genetian Elite Officers, or simply Elites, were created to coordinate operations on slave, or Driver, Outposts, as well as ensure no genetic deviations went unchecked. The Drivers performed regular maintenance, surveying, and ensured the health and maintenance of the Noman slave population. Nomans were the workforce and subjugated class of the Genetian population. They were created for menial and manual tasks that, under most circumstances, could be handled by robots. However, The Council discovered hundreds of years prior that it was cheaper to mass-produce organics rather than robotic churls. The Nomans were made for specific duties and, aside from the needs of the body, thought and did nothing but those duties. Their genetic programming allowed for nothing more. Sanchez groped at his utility belt for his OptiKey. He plucked it from the cinch-latch at his waist and looked at it as it lay in his hand. This key was similar to Elite Optikeys, only the security level was lower. Optikeys had been invented by the Council years ago. There were three Genetian Officers for each Noman Driver Outpost and each Elite owned an Elite Optikey that became inert when separated from the electric field of its owner. When it ceased operation, its stored power system would initiate a distress signal that would alert the other Elites via their OptiKeys. Optikeys had a small ring that was tethered to the OptiKey itself by an elastic wire. The wire was pulled out, which allowed the user to swing the key in circles. The centripetal force of the swinging generated power for the energy cells inside. Sanchez got up and ran to the sector Arch, activated it and passed it under the scan device. He wasn't sure how he was going to get out of this mess but sitting around would accomplish nothing. Sanchez hummed a brief tune while the OptiKey was verified. It was something he started doing after returning from the accident. He was doing a lot of things that he had never done before. He felt pangs in the center of his forehead and he rubbed it methodically. Since returning, he'd also been having headaches for the first time in his life. He did his best to keep those a secret, as well as everything else. After today, secrets would be a lot harder to keep.
Gellar Elias chuckled to himself as he turned off the Unabox. Gellar’s laugh was distinct. It was a disarmingly high-pitched chuckle, more like a giggle. He looked at his reflection in the stilerium walls that formed his floor of the sector. He leaned back in his chesk, closed his eyes, and inhaled deeply. It was too bad about Sanchez. They had worked well together until they found that ancient cave on Titan. It sparked something inside them - deep inside them. Soon after Emilio would stop talking about his "feelings". Elias soon realized that feelings weren’t supposed to happen. They were a deviation in genetic programming and were meant to be corrected. But despite behavioral protocol, he had had such a pleasant sensation from watching a another person experience fear for the first time. It pleased him that he knew a secret. He felt that this made him different and it emboldened him. He remembered his initial reaction when Sanchez started to talk about how he felt like he was changing. Elias was changing too, but wasn’t about to jeopardize his life over it. He had decided that the only thing to do was to convince Sanchez that he needed to be corrected. Sanchez had disagreed and tried to hide it from Raemus and the other Officers, but he was unable to keep it together. It was a good thing, though. Emilio Sanchez' emotional awakening had not only assured Elias a perfect diversion but it would give him the chance to get to Genetia unscathed. He would be the first Driver to deviate from genetic programming and escape his servitude. He liked that. It gave him a sense of individuality. Until recently, Elias had never even thought about individuality. Gellar Elias was an excellent specimen of the Genetian race. He was tall, stout, intelligent, and good looking - just like the rest of the Genetians. His hair was gray and closely cropped. His eyes were parallelograms of gray and his face was sharp and angular. His shoulders were wide and solid, which matched his other anatomically perfect proportions. The only part of Elias that one might consider odd was his skin. During his gestation period, his skin had been created using multiple concentrations of melanin, so the pigmentation of his skin was many different shades of flesh. It was as if he was spotted with different colors of fleshtone acryl paint. However, when compared to the average Driver, Elias was quite normal looking. This skin mottling was the same in every Genetian and performed well as a means if visual identification. He reclined and planned his ride home on a Windsol Airship. There was no need for a disguise since no one on the ship would notice who he was. It couldn't be any easier! Elias remembered Raemus commenting on the air chairs on the Windsol - that the seats would conform to one's body, even the wrinkles in the clothing. It was said to be like reclining on air. Though Drivers normally didn't ride on Windsols, none of the crew would be paying attention to him. They wouldn't be paying attention to anything but what they were supposed to. “I am one lucky bastard,” Elias sighed to himself. “I’ve managed to fool Kadrin, Anderson, Captain Raemus, and I’ll slip by the Council on Genetia.” He grinned and thought about how significant he would be in the annals of Genetian history. Unlike Emilio Sanchez - the weakling deviation. For decades, The Council of Genetia had required any deviation from genetic mapping to be reported so that the defect could be corrected. Though this was a protocol not meant for Drivers, Elias assumed that his initiative would grant him an absolution from his recent genetic defect. Gellar chuckled his squeak-laugh again. Raemus would be notified through an elaborate alert system that Elias had programmed and that would buy him some time. He thought that Sanchez was probably either panicking or lost in thought, like a fool. Now, Elias' mind was focused on preparing for the future. First, he would have to get take a shuttle to Septin, then board the next transport for Genetia - no - a Windsol. Either way, Gellar had to get off this slave outpost. Captain Raemus watched his Unabox intently. Eavesdropping on Driver channels was a daily duty of the Elite Officers in charge. Each Captain had to ensure that his crew never mutated. Mutations happened every once in a while and, since the DNA deliquescing 1200 years earlier, all Elites were ordered to monitor intranet transmissions. Raemus still had a few OneGen Drivers on his Outpost, so he knew that a breakdown was coming - it was only a matter of time. His theory and opinion were shared by many of his brothers and, most especially, his superiors. Captain Anthony Raemus instructed the Unabox to mute with a subtle hand gesture, like a twitch. He slumped back in his chesk and trembled slightly. Fortunately, there were no cameras to observe his inner conflict. He bit his lip and squeezed his eyes shut. He swallowed and regained his composure. Then he straightened in his chesk, his muscles became rigid. This was a bad week for Raemus. He would have to correct two Drivers and then he has would have to report to The Council to accept responsibility. And punishment. “I don't need this shit.” He cursed. "There should be some kind of safety protocol in place that will allow us to just terminate them chemically. Why go through all this trouble when we could inactivate them and render them for fuel on the outpost?!” he ranted. He sat in his chesk with his head in his hands and struggled to figure out how to fix this mess.