For the First Time, Again, page 3
Then I went to Sears. Well, first, I found an old newspaper lying on a bench. I went to the Sears entrance and I threw the newspaper in the trash. I said some cuss words out loud and I dove into the bin looking for receipts. I found a butt load of them. Cheap stuff, mostly. A lipstick here, a bra there. And boom! Next to a McDonald’s cup, jackpot. I walked in, went straight to the sporting goods section, and asked for the Fila Jr. golf set. They were all out. They did have the Pierre Cardin 4 Piece Luggage Set at $99.99—that thing is humongous!—and the Sixteen Minute Digital Voice Recorder for $49.99. I stopped to look at the telescopes for a minute—I want one so bad—but you can’t really look at anything in the store. I ripped off the suitcase tags in the bathroom, dragged my butt straight to Customer Service, and asked for a refund. I was so nervous I liketa peed myself. The lady asked if my mother was with me. I told her she was buying me something for my birthday and I couldn’t be there because it was a surprise so I was taking care of this for her. I wasn’t sure if I made any sense. Must have; she said it was sweet of me to help my mother out, how she wished her daughter did things like that, but she doesn’t even call ’cause she’s too busy taking care of that lazy no-good boyfriend of hers. “Here’s your money, dear. Have yourself a nice day.”
I did! I had a great day. I went to the movies. Galaxy Quest just came out. I got butter on my popcorn, the real deal. It was awesome. I love Sigourney Weaver, and the guy who only plays villains was in it, but he wasn’t a villain. He was supposed to be supersmart but wasn’t, but then he was. And I thought: me too!
I’m a genius. I’m a brand-new-jeans-and-STP-T-shirt-wearing genius. I threw my Sailor Moon costume in the trash. I liked it a lot, but it smelled funny. I have forty-six dollars and thirty-three cents in my shiny new bag. Also, I ate. The best part is I have a plan, sort of. I can go from Sears to Sears all the way to California. I never seen the ocean. I lived by the ocean, but it was called gulf, not ocean. This’ll be my first ocean ocean. Everyone on TV says they moved to L.A. when they were superyoung, so maybe I can find work there, if I lie about my age. If not, at least it’ll be warmer. I can sleep outside like I did at home when the house got too hot. It’s all because of that waitress and that chicken-fried steak. I think she was right. If I ever see her again, I’ll be going places. I got this.
6
Interstate Love Song
Where am I? Right. I’m in a car, with … young lady gripping the wheel like someone’s trying to take it from her. We’re not moving. Wait, why aren’t we moving? She’s talking to herself, but I can’t make out most of it. I think she mumbled “roadblock.” I guess that’s what it is. I can’t see a thing; it’s raining cats and dogs outside. It’s pretty, though. Water streaks breaking the blinding light ahead. I wonder what state we’re in. Texas, probably. We’re always in Texas. There’s a silhouette approaching. Blue raincoat. Headlights behind us light up the three yellow letters on his chest. He knocks at my window. Smile, Aster. He’s talking to someone. Did he just say: “It’s her”? Crud! Crud! Crud! Lock the doo—Too late. Two big men dragging me out of the car.
—Let me … GO!
I’m kicking, screaming. I’m squirming, facedown, federal agents gripping my every end. This ain’t about Sears, not for a Pierre Cardin luggage set. This is Bruce Willis, has to be. How could they find me? I don’t even know where I am. And why? Peculiar blood test. It’s got to be more than that if they’re putting up roadblocks all over. Do they think I killed those people at the Christmas party? Do they think I killed Pa? Crud, I’m burning up again. I’m so hot it feels like the rain is steaming off my skin. Bad thoughts going through my mind. Grab a gun. Shoot from behind that truck’s headlights. There are dead people everywhere. I did that. There’s a horror movie playing in my head. Wake up, Aster. It ain’t real. This is, though: four grown men holding me in midair. I can’t fight them off. There’s too many of them, and nowhere to go even if I broke free. This is it. Game over.
I stop fighting them. They stop fighting me. Tit for tat. We can get out of the rain, now. I don’t know where they’ll take me. Jail, maybe, if they think I killed Pa and Mrs. Sparks. If they don’t then I’ll end up in Washington. He said they’ll take good care of me. Plenty of folks want to join the Army; living with them can’t be that bad. And there’s things to do in D.C., I think. I might not be there long. I mean, how “peculiar” can my blood test be? Low blood sugar? Anemia? It’ll take them a week tops to figure it out; then I’ll be boring again. They’ll grow tired of me and send me back to Child Services. Whatever, there’s no point thinking about it now, not while I’m flying a couple feet aboveground. Why won’t they put me down? They’re not paying attention to me at all. What are they— I can’t see what they’re looking at. My eyes hurt too much from all the rain and tears.
—YOU THERE! GET BACK IN YOUR CAR!
Whoa. Vertigo. I hit the ground chin first. The feds dropped me like a sack of spuds. I’m dizzy now. The road tastes metallic; I must have bit my tongue. I feel the cold water spreading through my shirt, my jeans clinging tighter to my legs. It doesn’t matter. I ain’t getting up. There’s nothing for me up there, except a jail cell or a hospital room. I’d rather lie here and watch raindrops hit the ground. Life’s simpler when you stare at something small. A ladybug, a penny, a bit of oil making rainbow swirls on the pavement in front of me.
Bang. The pavement goes bright all around my shadow. I recognize the sound, like I knew it was Pa from hearing his footsteps. More flashes, more bangs. A mob of paparazzi heckling a movie star. A box of fireworks going off all at once. This can’t be real. It’s make-believe, has to be. I want it to stop. If I want it hard enough, maybe someone’ll yell, “Cut!” and it’ll go back to normal. This normal, I don’t care. I’ll go to jail. I’ll go happily if they make it stop. My heart’s pounding against the sidewalk like a jackhammer. Please, anyone.
UGH. Something fell on my back, something heavy enough to knock the wind out of me. I turn to look. It’s a person. Blue raincoat. “FBI” on the shoulder. There’s this blank look on his face. It’s Mrs. Sparks all over again. He doesn’t know he’s dead any more than she did. Another head hits the ground. Another. They’re dropping like the rain now. I can’t watch. I won’t close my eyes either; that just means a different nightmare. I cover my ears and hide my face against the road.
Silence, almost. I hear the rain again, and the sound of idling cars. I turn to see. PUSH. THE. DEAD. MAN. OFF. OF. ME.… Whoa! There’s a woman with a rifle standing above me. From down here she looks like she’s eight foot tall. Did she kill all these people? She’s not FBI, that’s for sure. She’s wearing coveralls, like a boilersuit. Square jaw. Wet hair in her face. She looks like Demi Moore in G.I. Jane after they put her through hell. I crawl backwards and sit against a car. I’m really scared, but I’m also awed. It wasn’t perspective. She’s André the Giant. She’s … I never seen anyone this big. She’s a demigod.
—Shyesecht het?
She’s a Russian demigod?
—…
—SHYESECHT HET?
I don’t underst— Oh my god. She’s reloading. Did she kill all those people just so she could kill me? I don’t wanna die like this.
—Please, ma’am! Please don’t kill me!
Silence. The rain stopped in an instant. She gives me her hand. I take it and she helps me stand. “You can let go now. Or not.” I think she wants me to go with her. Where, though? We can’t just w—
Whoa! The rain is louder than ever. I’m on the ground. She’s still standing above me. I guess none of that was real. I think I’m slowly losing my mind.
Aaaahh! She’s raising her gun now! I DON’T WANNA DIE! I DON’T WANNA DIE!
I— Am I dead? It sounded like thunder this time. Deeper, louder than before. I don’t think I’m dead. I can move my hands. They’re covered in … something. AAAAH! She— Her face is gone! Her whole face! Ewwwww, that’s what it is. That’s her face on my hands. It’s everywhere! There’s bits of brains and bones and … eyes on the car headlights, on my shirt. Oh crud, it’s in my hair. There’s eyes in my hair. There’s a tiny bit of bone. I can’t get it off. I CAN’T GET IT OFF!
She’s still standing there, even without a face. How could she be st—Now she’s falling, slow, just like a tree. There’s someone behind her holding a shotgun. It’s not a cop. They’re on a motorcycle. Black leather, black helmet. Whoever it is, is raising their visor. I can’t make out a face. I—
—Come with me if— Just come with me, Aster.
He knows my name.
—Who are you?
—My name is Samael. I’m a friend of your mother’s.
ENTR’ACTE
Fire from the Heavens
Kaas-ma woke up in complete darkness to the sound of his damaged ship counting down to self-destruction. When the hatch opened, he was hit in the face with four thousand pounds of water. Salty liquid filled his mouth and nose before he could hold his breath. He managed to extricate himself from the ship, but his muscles hadn’t worked in years and refused to comply when he tried to swim towards what he thought was up. Panic had already turned to resignation when he felt something brush against his back—the air-filled pillow his head rested on for eighteen cycles. Kaas-ma extended his arm to stop it, brought the pillow to his chest, and held on. He was convulsing, taking in more water with each cough, but he never let go. Giving up was not an option now, just as it wasn’t then.
Growing up, Kaas-ma could never stomach the affectation and obtuseness of his family’s entourage and spent as much time as possible away from home. Though he could easily sneak out of the family estate, it proved impossible to escape his last name. He would always be “Son of Waari” no matter where he went. His path to citizenship was a ritual of weekly beatings from fellow recruits hell-bent on teaching the rich kid about the “real” world. And though he rose rather quickly through the ranks after graduation, his superiors never missed an opportunity to remind him that he didn’t deserve it. It was during one of those reminders that he’d grabbed the head of his ranking officer and spun it a hundred and eighty degrees. When he was demoted from Kih to Tereshiin Kih, he thought that he’d gotten off easy. He thought wrong.
The punishment was as cruel as it was unusual, but the only thing bigger than the pain he would endure on his long voyage was the chip on Kaas-ma’s shoulder. Every aching moment spent in his flying coffin made him more determined to succeed. When the ship informed him it was time to sleep for the latter half of the trip, his last thought was of waking up on the bright world his people would resettle on because of him.
When he woke again, Kaas-ma was lying on a rocky shore. The small pebbles digging into his hands were the first familiar thing he’d felt for ages and his genetically altered face sketched a first, clumsy smile. Sharp pain rushed to his brain when his eyes opened. The world he lived on spun much farther from its star. This sun also burned brighter than the slowly dimming ball of fire he watched set every night.
Kaas-ma felt a hand squeezing his right arm, more hands. His every instinct screamed to defend himself, sequences of deadly blows flashing through his mind. His body couldn’t have cared less and offered no resistance when the two men helped him to his feet. Kaas-ma was scared, lost, but something else felt wrong, or if not wrong at least odd or out of place. He could not put his finger on it until they sat him up on a chariot and everything looked right again. Kaas-ma was still much taller than the men aiding him, but his head was a couple feet lower than it used to be. He’d never seen the world from that angle, except when crouching or sitting.
The men repeated the same thing several times, bringing their hands to their chests. Kaas-ma deduced they were speaking their names and introduced himself formally, last name first, first name, followed by his rank and unit.
—Hah-Waari Kaas-ma Tereshiin Kih Traahen
For whatever reason, the men started referring to him as Tereshiin. On his world, that would have been an insult, but he did not object, out of respect and an utter lack of linguistic knowledge. The landscape was more “normal” than he expected, recognizable even. An endless field of dirt and rocks with resilient patches of green breaking the beige monotony. Kaas-ma had often imagined what the land he grew on looked like before it was defaced by mining rigs, and this was surprisingly close. He was taken to the men’s dwelling in a town called Ḥalpa, where he was presented with a fresh set of clothes and a bowl of something presumably edible.
The substance rolled in his mouth and he gagged a few times before swallowing, but he did not feel sick that day or that night. He had noticed people carrying oversized metal knives upon entering town, had seen other metal objects. Kaas-ma did his best to contain his excitement, but the evidence at hand led to only one conclusion: His people could live here. The air was breathable. This world could provide sustenance and minerals. The people were small and frail, making for an easy conquest. The only question left to answer was whether enemy forces were also present. There was another small problem that dampened Kaas-ma’s enthusiasm. Whatever he found out about this world, he had no way to tell anyone. The beacon he carried was at the bottom of the great Salt Lake and likely exploded with the ship. His only hope now was that the other ship had made it and landed intact. He had to find his only ally. How hard could it be to find one person on a whole planet?
It took several weeks for Kaas-ma to regain his strength and gain a basic understanding of his surroundings. Learning the Hittite language, the “language of Neša,” as people called it, proved harder than he thought. He picked up the grammar easily but did not know what most of the words referred to. He understood enough, however, to know the men who came to his rescue had been drawn by a streak in the night sky—no doubt his ship entering the atmosphere—and had come to collect “fire from the heavens.” He had asked if another of these streaks had been spotted around that time but received only headshakes as answer. One night, he heard his host yell, “Tereshiin!” from across the wall and ran outside. He arrived just in time to see a bright streak of light disappearing into the eastern horizon. Kaas-ma had a goal, and now he had a destination.
He stole a horse and chariot the next day and headed east towards the Mala River. He had hoped to get supplies in Emar, but he found the city in ruins. An entire city destroyed, presumably quite fast, or those he spoke to in Halpa would have known about it. Kaas-ma realized this new world was not a peaceful one. Its inhabitants, it would seem, had at least one thing in common with his kind.
The people on the other side of the river spoke a different tongue, something that really puzzled Kaas-ma. The river itself had different names depending on which side one stood on. Everything he’d learned was now useless, dangerous even. If the two sides of the river were at war, using the wrong word for bread could get him killed. Madness, he thought. He wondered how far the next river was, and if this new language was even worth learning.
Despite his reservations, Kaas-ma learned Akkadû very quickly, but while he knew the names of things, he still lacked knowledge of the things themselves. He didn’t know the kings and gods who ruled over these lands. He knew only what he had experienced, and had no time to form a concept for most of the words he learned. That ignorance, paired with the fairness of his skin, made him seem out of place no matter where he went. The words “Sea People” were often whispered behind his back, and the sword he’d picked from his victim after his first fight saw almost daily use during his travels.
His reputation soon preceded him wherever he went and most stayed clear of the ghostly man searching for paths in the sky. They called him Rādi kibsi.
ACT II
7
Stupid Girl
The woman at the cash register keeps staring at me. You don’t know me, lady. Yes, this T-shirt is too big for me—mine was covered with eyes. We stopped in this tiny tiny town. I might have hallucinated the sign, but I think it said Strawberry. Maybe this is the real Berry Bitty City. Whatever this place is called, I didn’t mind stopping. I ordered soup and a biscuit. Really good soup. I needed it. My brain turned to mush after last night. I think I’m in shock. I should be crying, screaming, but I’m supercalm. My hands are a bit shaky, but I’m pretty sure that’s the cold. I’m a walking Popsicle. That man, Samael, gave me a jacket, but it’s freezing out there. Literally. Still, I never been on a motorcycle before. I like it. Him, I don’t know. We didn’t talk much. You can’t hear anything on the bike.
I didn’t see his whole face until we stopped just now. He’s white as hell. And old, like forty. He looks … I don’t know what he looks like. A cop, maybe. A detective. A vampire detective! He does look like Angel on Buffy now that I think about it. He seems … niceish, but he’s superserious. He did save my life, so … I asked why he was helping me. He said he owed my mother. Whatever, I don’t wanna know. I want nothing to do with her. I wish we could talk about something else, though. Anything. We just been sitting here, eating our soup. Oh no, Londo’s getting restless again. I better let him out before he throws a fit.
