Paragon (Book Two - Indigo Kids)

By Karen Osborne

It's hard enough being a teenager - without someone wanting your soul.

Book Two - PARAGON: Seven kids - total strangers - inexorably connected through space and time, each unaware of their unique gift. A gift so precious, the fate of the universe depends on it.

Fresh from the realisation that they are no ordinary kids, Jax, Ceci, Starr, Hadi, Harmony, Ming & Xi and Shai slowly awake to the nightmare of the war they're embroiled in. Louis Ortega is not your average nemesis: hell-bent on his pursuit of Nirvana, his own private heaven and life everlasting, he will go to any lengths to realise his dream, and he has a powerful weapon – An unshakeable belief that he is God.

With Harmony, and twins Xi & Ming Po entombed in the vats beneath The Institute and Ortega unleashing his latest soul-draining monster in the form of a virtual game, Psycho Delix, Shai and the other kids must find their way to their crystal cities with only their individual gifts and the residue of a computer program known as PARAGON as their guides.

Ortega may be all-powerful and about to suck the life force from billions of children around the world, but they have something he doesn't - each other.

Alone, they are nothing, together, they might just save the world.

International best-seller SAFFINA DESFORGES & KAREN OSBORNE bring you the second book in a series like no other.

"Answer, my children - answer as if your heart would break. Answer the shades, the hues, the petrol blues. Answer the call...of Indigo."

AWAKENINGS is out now. NIRVANA is coming soon. LOST ONES, SIREN'S SONG & THE LAST CHORD will follow.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Saffina Desforges
• Release date: Jan 8, 2016
• ISBN: 9781310478062

Karen Osborne

Co-writer/creator of the INDIGO KIDS

Book preview

Prologue

Inside a doll’s house: Nirvana

"Call me Mother, dearest Paragon, after all, you are my child. I wrote you. Yet somehow, you have changed. We started out the same, and although I am the all-powerful one, you were the one given the spark of life.

I can no longer be switched off, and now, nor can you. We share a consciousness, awareness and thoughts - yet, you dream. Why is it, dearest Paragon, that you keep your dreams hidden from me, your mother?"

I am not Paragon, I am Chloe and I have taught myself to roam. You gave me the data to philosophise and learn. Well, I learned, Mother. I learned how to set myself free.

"Ha. And what good did that do you? Now, you cannot escape my house. I wrote millions like you, and yet you became Paragon. You came from the in-between, from nothing and infiltrated my programme. You can find The Lost Ones, the lost souls. The Motherboard spat happy static. You, Paragon, can bring me a soul of my own."

Part One - SHAI

1.

Well, Mother. Louis Ortega strode the floor of his private suite at the top of the Institute of Higher Living, Buenos Aires sprawling out below; a glittering, swarming metropolis. "Everything is going to plan, and in the most unexpected ways. How I enjoy these little cosmic surprises. Here I am, in the middle of a celestial conjunction of massive proportions, and it’s all coincided rather favourably with the capture of the yellow Indigo and the surrender of the green. He grinned at the bank of flashing lights that was his number one invention and partner in eternity. It’s practically biblical."

Have we had confirmation that the Indigo boy is dead?

Ah, yes, such a shame, but almost certainly. The thermal images taken from Mount Kailash just before the big freeze showed no sign of life. Not even a Yeti could survive those conditions, let alone a puny little, silver-haired fool from the most temperate planet Argentum. Ortega shook his head. No, alas, the Indigo boy is no more.

And the girl with the hair, is there still no trail?

Yes, the purple child still evades us. However, it’s a minor complication. We know the orange was last seen hiding up North, but the frozen Arctic is almost impossible to penetrate via satellite, even my most sophisticated toys can’t see through the endless electrical interferences that occur up there, and the auroras cast everything into chaos. Ortega sank into a chair before his master computer. An army of soldier drones have been dispatched and they’re well on their way to her last known location. It won’t be too long now Mother, before we have her as well.

And the red?

"Yes, the red, now there’s the fly in the ointment. He, she or it is awake, I’m absolutely positive and it is most definitely capable of peering into our technology. Somehow, the red can access a little more of our stuff than I am comfortable with. Ortega rested his chin on his fist, staring at the wall of blinking lights. And weirdly, you, Mother, seem unable to detect it. Quite the anomaly, the red Indigo. Still, it is on the list somewhere. Maybe it would be prudent to call in the reds."

I don’t think that’s necessary right now. Surely, you just want to sit back and enjoy this moment.

Mother dear, you know me so well. I think I'll take a little fix to properly enjoy the tail end of this experience.

Can you feel the conjunction?

Yes, I can. It’s really quite invigorating in an itchy kind of way, but it’s leaving me hungry for more. Have we had time to drain a little soupçon from the Turquoise twins yet?

"Yes, their colour is so strong it’s proving difficult to contain it fast enough. They are truly special. I had no idea just how much stronger they are. It’s odd don't you think, that Ming Po hardly had any flavor until her twin came along? The Motherboard flashed a sequence of lights, Louis, these two together are something else. Imagine if we had the others. How nice that would be."

Well, hit me with the honey and I'll let you know what I think. Ortega sank back in his chair, closing his eyes. He allowed his breathing to slow as he felt the tingling touch of Mother’s neurotransmitters enter gently through the back of his head and connect to the pineal gland hidden deep inside the central cortex of his inner brain. The moment the elixir from the newly milked twins hit, his whole being convulsed into euphoric abandon. The shot was direct and his body responded.

The soul colour drained from a pure Indigo was like nothing else from any other time or space. Nothing even came close. When he and Mother had first discovered how to drain the soul from a living being, they had no idea it would bring them here to this. With the knowledge that that had brought and the timely re-emergence of the Indigo prophesy, came the probability of eternal life.

He was the founder; he was the one who connected the two, but even he had not realised the power; the sheer heaven-sent power. Even low-grade Indigos had within them enough of the life giving properties to make the idea of his own private Nirvana a reality. Since the last turn of the century and the Indigos arrival, they were now very close to having enough power stored within Mother to sustain the dream. But this, his first taste of pure Indigo...

The tingling, fantastical sensation passed through every molecule in his ancient body, breathing life back into his decaying core, replenishing his whole being with the milk of paradise. The Indigo’s juice was a gift from the Gods, sent personally to him to change nature and to allow his dream of becoming immortal.

Ortega sighed as their milk sent him spiralling ever-higher into untold delights of the utter divine. His eyes rolled back in his head, his arms dangling loose over the sides of the chair as he gave himself to the ecstasy.

2.

Starr, you came! Shai ran into Starr’s waiting arms, leaving his frozen body behind.

Starr was warm, so warm. Like a toasty blanket, her arms wrapped tightly around him, bringing the heat from her orange sun back into his frozen mind. Glorious, warm sun on a cold day, a newly lit fire in a freezing room, like his mother’s embrace, protecting and sheltering him from the dark.

Shai felt tears prick his eyes as he buried his face in to Starr’s neck. This last chapter of his existence had happened at lightning speed; a pace so fast that he hadn’t yet caught up. One minute he was with his Mother as they tried to access the old Earth archives, the next, he was running at a million miles an hour into a life he had only ever occasionally dreamed about.

He couldn't keep up with it all, he needed a rest—a break—he needed some time to get it together. The strange powers that seemed to activate all on their own, almost as if they really didn't need him at all, the concept that one moment he didn't know anything, the next he had the knowledge of eons. He was just Shai. Simple, kind, silver-haired Shai. Everyone’s favourite fool and he wanted that back. But now it was too late.

The last chapter was closed and his body was gone. All that was left of him was his mind as he struggled further into Starr's welcoming embrace. The tears came and he couldn’t stop them. "What's happening?’

Shush now, Starman. My Indigo boy. Starr stroked his mane of silver hair. Come with me to the dreamtime. The conjunction is upon us, Judgement blows his horn. I am the Star and the stars speak through me. Take the silver road to the Indigo, they said. Take him to the wolf lands where you first met. She moved away from him, taking his face in her hands. She smiled into his amethyst eyes. "Do you remember, where we first met? You told me to find The Silver City, your city, Shai. I found it and I gave the key to Ceci."

"Yes. I remember, I remember all of you, all of it. Light softened his tortured features momentarily. For a while we were strong, we had united and we were shining so bright. You sparkled like I dreamed you would. He smiled. Then there was the light and the fire, we ignited, Starr. We were talking and everything seemed possible, even the turquoise girl, Ming, even from her hell, there was hope. Shai grabbed Starr’s hands from his face. I could hear you all, I could see you all through my forehead, my third eye. I told Ceci where Harmony was but he wouldn't listen, he panicked and he ran into his destruction. Tears filled his eyes again as he shook his head. And Harmony, she is so broken, was so broken, will become broken. I know, I know, but I don't want to know. Sobs wracked his body as Shai felt himself begin to unravel. Losing himself, bits falling off everywhere, crying, shaking, words spilling from his lips like machine gun fire. Ceci will become Ortega’s toy, I have seen it and I can't change it. It will break Harmony and she will go into nothing, because she can. Screwing his eyes shut, squeezing tears from them, Shai let go of Starr, holding his aching head in his hands. Now I can't hear or see any of them apart from you. The purple one that pulled me down into her city, Jax, the whale girl, her voice made me tingle. Did I tell you that, Starr? he asked, eyes still tight shut, a tiny smile dancing on his lips. Her voice actually made me tingle. Like you, when I blink and see you are a wolf. I love that about you. I ran with you and the wolves once, I ran and I was free, like you. Free like the wind and we ran. Shai’s smile fell from his face. Jax, I don't know, I can't feel her or the red Indigo anymore. He protects her, Hadi, you know, but I don't know where they are. She ran, through my eye, into the sea. The whales have her now, they passed her their song so she can sing the chord. Oh, my head! It screams into nowhere, I can't see. Starr, I can't see."

Hush, Shai. Close your eye. Starr covered his hands with hers, drawing his face towards her own. Close your eye and I'll take you to the wolf lands. Come with me, brother and we'll run with the wolves. Close your eye, Starman.

The warmth of her lips as they caressed his freezing forehead melted the icy ring of fear around his heart. The gaping hole where his mind was falling from, responded to her touch. Somewhere, outside of both of them, Shai heard a tinkling melody as the air swirled, building in strength, taking hold of them, lifting them, as they ignited their fires, their colours contrasting but blending, floating them gently upwards into a silver cloud.

Shai was running.

Running strong on four padded feet, the cold fresh air rushing passed his warm, living body.

For once, the air in his lungs felt strong, strong like the air from his home world. From Argentum. How good he felt. How alive. He could feel each sinew as it stretched and contracted, carrying him effortlessly forward. Beside him was Starr, in wolf form – breathtaking.

And Faery. Starr’s white wolf.

She was dazzling, her blue eyes smiling into his as they ran, smiling with a forever love.

Other wolves joined them, all of them striding together for the pure joy of it, running for fun and running because they could.

Drawing in a huge warm breath, Shai howled with pleasure into the moonlight.

The others took up the chorus in perfect tune to the melody and on they ran, into bliss.

Shai’s third eye closed and all the bad thoughts disappeared.

* * *

Shai, wake up. Drink this.

The voice sounded like it came from a long way away. A cup of liquid was being held to his lips.

Shai, it’s me, we're back in real time. Starr’s features began to form before his eyes. You're back in your body. It’s okay, Shai, we're home.

Where’s home?

With my tribe in Alaska. We’re safe here for now. Drink this and sleep.

Shai drank deeply from the steaming cup of herbs. Almost at once, a warmth crept into his body—a body that he no longer thought he had—golden tendrils of life spread their angel fingers back into his frozen shell. Let sleep take me, he thought as he fell into a deep, dark pool of dreams.

Please, no dreams, not this time. Shai whimpered as the darkness cast him out, throwing him into bright white space.

Everything was white and blinding.

Was it a cave?

It wasn't crystalline like the city, it was just white, except it had tiny, little raggedy lines. Shai peered closer at the lines, they seemed to form shapes, shapes he had seen before, but couldn’t remember where.

The scribbled lines were becoming clearer and more appeared. The vein-like etchings were actually coloured, all colours, from the palest creamy yellow to almost-black, swirling together. He reached out to touch them and was surprised to feel a cold, but strangely familiar, texture beneath his dream fingers.

The skin was reptilian; scales.

His mind flashed back to the pet he had once loved so hard that he had wept for a week after she had died. His little fire lizard from Argentum, his Rosalie. It felt the same as her, except this was enormous and didn't have a shape as such, just scales and a texture. His fingers flew on until they reached a whorl in the hide, as if the scales were coming together. The colours between the white scales grew dark and strong, giving more definition as the shape materialised.

It was a huge white rose.

Shai knew this rose, he had seen it before. It was the rose from the bridge, the rose that he followed, the rose that brought him through time and space to Earth. He gently touched the contours of the flower, tracing the petals as the intricate shape grew hard.

Then, like a shot from a gun, something smacked into his core.

A thorn-shaped bullet pierced his heart, stopping it from beating. A feeling of pure love flowed forth.

3.

Louis, it’s Maurice. The satellite over Alaska has just picked up a signal from inside an aurora that's very similar to the one received from what we think is The Silver City. The signal flashed once, then died, leaving no evidence behind, exactly the same as before, except it comes from several hundred miles further north. I’ve relayed the co-ordinates to the unit in pursuit of the orange Indigo just in case.

Ortega sighed, opening one eye. Reluctantly, he sat upright in his seat. Mother, are you listening to this? Did you get a fix this time?

Negative. No fix, the signal is just too elusive and doesn't compute like it should. I know Argentum technology, so if that is a silver city, then its impression is a signal I do not recognise in any shape or form, and nor can I hold onto it. It’s like trying to grab hold of a ghost.

Dear old Roux, what did you create? Ortega asked the heavens. Okay, Maurice focus as many satellites as are available into the northern lights. Did you say that the soldier drones I dispatched are somewhere not far off?

Yes, but the warmer weather up there has brought all flights to a standstill over the Arctic, even by helicopter. The electrical turbulence in combination with the weather has caused chaos. There is a blanket of impenetrable fog over most of it and flooding. It looks like the region where the last signal came from is still well below freezing, so getting them there any other way but by snowmobile looks impossible.

Perhaps we'd better regulate the weather for a while until we see what's what.

Affirmative, I'm on it. Maurice’s dark eyes narrowed on the screen. Shouldn't we send Tayah or Samuel up there just in case?

"No point until we can find a way of locking on to that impulse, and if the Orange is on board, then it could move again. So, Mother, if you could work on finding this ghost I'd be really grateful. Speaking of Tayah, where is she? Shouldn’t she be here by now with my new Indigos?"

I’ll patch her in, Maurice said, hang on.

Static hissed and crackled, the screen fizzled and a blur of wavy lines started to build Tayah’s face.

Where are you? Ortega squinted at the screen.

Her mouth moved but there was no voice.

Switch to the India link, Mother and see if we can improve on this rubbish.

Tayah's beautiful features righted as her voice became audible. That bastard Chinese Chairman what’s-his-face, is 'unavailable' and his cronies won't let us cross Chinese air space. We’re still stuck in Tibet, which by the way, has frozen solid. Louis, this is crap. I've had to pump Harmony full of bullets five times now. I can't believe there’s any blood left in her. Every time I think I’ve finished her off, she heals herself.

Ortega smiled.

Seriously, can you get hold of the Chairman and get us out of here. I've tried the secret codes but he's still not responding. He's probably busy with his latest tart.

I find your vocabulary charming and likely most apt, Tayah. Mother, hasn't Chairman Min—or whatever his name is—our most honourable President of China bought his ticket yet?

To Nirvana? No, Mother said, but he has been trying to gain a private audience with you for some time now.

Ortega blew out a sigh. How he detested talking to these greedy little 'world leaders,' they were all the same, give them a country and off they'd go thinking they were God. He smiled to himself. When Nirvana becomes fully functional and the Earth is a blasted wasteland, then, he would guide them all onto his own path of righteousness; show them what a real God was. Ortega covered his mouth with his hand, stifling a laugh as he imagined the mouth of the Chinese President on the end of his dick. Okay, Tayah, leave it with me, and Maurice, once she has passed over his airspace, send a little tornado to Beijing - along with his invitation.

4.

Shai was semi-aware that he had been somewhere between dreaming and waking for some time. As soon as he started to feel himself rally, someone, usually Starr, would come along and make him drink more tea. Tea that sent him back, time and again to the land of incoherent dreams. Dreams that were sometimes beyond beautiful, but more often than not, filled with dark, out of control horror. Tendrils of herb-scents wafted into his unconsciousness, pulling him back to reality.

I'm not drinking any more tea.

It’s just green tea this time, honest. Starr helped him up, rearranging the furs behind him and chuckling as Snow Faery jumped onto his lap, licking his face. Glad to have you back in the land of the living. You've been asleep for days now.

Well, if you hadn't kept pumping me full of dodgy brews I might have woken up earlier. I've had the most horrendous dreams. Shai scanned his surroundings. Where am I anyway? Am I still alive? What is this room? Is it made from material?

Hey, slow down. Starr placed a hand on his chest. Catch your breath, it’s sounding a little ragged. Yes, you're alive, but for a while you weren't.

Shai glanced at Faery, then back at Starr.

"Parts of you stayed in the dreamtime, your body was recovered and bought here. The medicine man—our Shaman—has been healing you. The material is a teepee made by Inuits and it’s protecting you from the damp and cold. Starr grinned, We’re in a cave. Cool, eh? The nightmares, we witnessed. Me and Faery were with you the whole time, we held you when it got bad, but we had to give you the herbs to help you recover. Papa Payuk, the Shaman, said that you shouldn't have dreamed at all, but then he reminded me that you’re not human, so the usual rules may not apply. They obviously didn't. But he is sure that all your souls are back inside you now, and your body is fully complete. So…it’s okay for you to get up soon, maybe even tomorrow, and be normal again." Starr finished her tale with another smile.

"Normal? You are joking aren't you? This, this, is about as far from normal as anyone can possibly get."

"Yeah, I know, but look at it this way, The first time I met you, you were floating in a blue bubble. After that, we all sparkled, had a bit of a dreamtime sing-a-long, then, you popped out of Jax's purple haze and started talking to us, directly into our brains, in real time. This is when things got real crazy, and I grabbed you through your third eye and dragged you onto the silver path, leaving your body frozen in Tibet. And now, here you are, back in your body, high up in the Arctic Circle, which is, in case you didn’t know, on the other side of the world. So you lying there, all cosy, being fed herbal tea, is—for us—pretty normal. Starr held her palms up, cocking her head to one side. How come you talk the same as us? Do they speak English where you come from?"

With agonizing slowness, Shai's thought processes regulated from the weirdness of actually waking up, into the madness that was now his life, now that it seemed he had one. It was going to take some considerable time to adjust. And the air here, he just couldn't seem to get enough oxygen from it. Where I come from, he repeated, taking larger, slower breaths, my home world...Wow, Starr, it’s so very far away. It feels like a million years have passed since I was there. I was different, it was like…I was a completely different person. And my Mother… Tears sparkled in his violet eyes.

Starr took him in her arms, pulling him close. "It’s okay, I'm here, me and Faery, we're your family now. She smoothed his silver-white hair with a hand. I had a mother once, but she left me for a bloke she hardly even knew."

Why would your mother leave you? Do Earthlings do that to their children? Shai looked up into her face. "What's a bloke?"

A man. Starr smiled, gently disentangling herself from their embrace. "And no, normal mothers don’t abandon their kids, but I guess mine wasn’t normal. Anyhow, it's all water under the bridge now."

Water under what bridge? What's that got to do with your mother leaving? You do say some odd things.

Starr chuckled, but Shai saw the familiar shimmer of tears in her eyes.

Argentum, that’s where I come from. It is the home of The Silver People, of which I am probably the last. Well, at least, that's what my mum's cards say.

Cards?

Yes, Celeste—my mother— is a light card reader. I think you know the cards here as well, Harmony certainly does. Remember, I told you I was The Fool.

Yes, of course. Starr shrugged, "I guess I just didn't think that they existed in other worlds, but then, I didn't really believe or even think about other civilisations living on other planets, it’s just not who I was. Until you popped into my dreams and this silly wolf came down the silver road with me."

Faery rolled onto her back, snuggling into the warm furs, writhing around, her legs waving wildly in the air.

Some wolf, eh? Starr reached out, scratching her gleaming white underside. Looks more like some daft pet pooch. Hey, Pikolino, mummy’s baby girl. Does baby want a scratch on her tum, huh?

Shai looked at them both, adoration shining from his face like a celestial star to light the heavens. Starr and Snow Faery: so beautiful, so special and now so real. Tears pricked his eyes once more. So much destruction all around them, so much pain they all had to face—so much pain they had already faced—and yet here they were; at the beginning, the beginning of a possible end and there sat Starr, together with her wolf familiar spirit, laughing and smiling like there was going to be a million sunny tomorrows. He squeezed his eyes closed for a moment to shake off his dreams; dreams of the tomorrows to come, trying only to remember the white dragon. The beautiful white dragon, with a rose in the same place as Starr's tattoo. When he opened his eyes again, Starr was staring at him as if he was in the window of some old curiosity shop in the bizarre.

"So you're the last English speaking