《A Little God in my Hands [Final Draft]》 1 | MESSIAH
A row of levitating coffins wound its way down into the folds of ancient, graffiti-steeped buildings. Accompanied by holographic memorabilia, the procession rivalled the neon sphere sizzling on the horizon past the smog.
Beneath steel quills that once were kaput stairs, wretched wires that summoned holograms, and smashed sliding doors was a dune of Coloradoan debris and sand hosting a protean crowd outside of the cemetery. The cemetery was divinely pristine; it could have been a 21st century asset that spawned from the past. The inhabitants of the desolate city made sure it was a respite in No Man''s Land.
The crowd of mostly teenagers and children swayed from carousal to ululation when the row of caskets descended from the inky sky. A young man''s carousal halted when he poured the remaining moonshine he had onto the potholed concrete in requiem, almost smearing Joaquim''s kaleidoscopic red dress. Joaquim disliked the color red; however it was his older brother''s favorite color and thus his brother''s old clothes were used to make the dress that covered him from head to toe. His worldly body was that of a girl''s according to the reality he was loaded into.
While thinking of him, Joaquim bumped into his older brother after dodging another sandy splash. The fermented air wafted around the peripheral sidewalk of the cemetery, hosting whiffs of perfume, cologne, and alcohol.
"There''s my sister," Gabriel Wami whispered triumphantly. His swaying red jacket could have been taken right out of an Akira poster. The genetically-modified fireflies in his brown knapsack ignited their bioluminescence, heralding the incoming dusk from the last glints from the neon semicircle. Gabe turned himself to face his little brother, the fireflies behind him lending his silhouette a golden halo.
White humans and araks often could not deduce that Joaquim was related to Gabe. It was the only time they did not consider two black people to be related for some wild reason. It was so obvious; their faces gave it away. Sure, Gabriel was light skin while Joaquim was far from it, but they both had the same full cheeks and vivid eyes.
"Where did you go?" Joaquim asked, turning himself as well. He could not quite face Gabe; the summoned holographic Alkrezian mask covered Joaquim''s face. It was designed to require as minimal resources as possible, and it did not obstruct his vision at all. The digital distorts within the loglo temporarily cut the waxing moon and two crosses adorning Joaquim''s neon mask.
"I was trying to shoo away the talking animal," Gabe replied, searching between the mournful trudges surrounding Joaquim. "According to the Aulasy... we are supposed to delete them."
"The beagle doesn''t talk," Joaquim lied. Luckily, his older brother was bad at spotting a liar. "The beagle''s just clever."
The canine must have tugged Joaquim by his ankles how he was suddenly pulled downwards.
You need to be more slick, Joaquim thought while meeting the gaze of high sentience from the beagle on the sand. The sentient gaze that once upon a time only humans and araks had. However, the dog''s despondent appearance signified his true status in No Man''s Land. It was as if his bones could slice through his thin skin at any moment as his joints had more florid skin than fur. The outline of the beagle''s skull jutted further when he opened his jaw in hunger, casting morbid shadows as he was resisting the urge to speak.
Don''t say anything. Please.
Joaquim dug into the patched hoodie pocket on his dress, remembering briefly the last time Gabe wore the hoodie when it was not cut in half. It was many years ago. However, with the backdrop of chewing and a ripping paper bag, Joaquim''s stowed samosa was no longer in the pocket.
Joaquim followed the noises to find... Farouq.
"Thanks for dinner," Farouq muffled through the masticated samosa.
Joaquim could imagine the hunger vanishing from Farouq''s gaze, however he had healed gashes instead of functional eyes. The duper''s delight on his lips were brighter than the neon circle that drowned underneath the metropolitan horizon. The drone Visard that served as Farouq''s eyes buzzed gently above the funeral march going down the dune.
"Why are you angry? What''s wrong?" Gabe asked as Joaquim grabbed Farouq''s beige kameez by the collar. The story has been illicitly taken; should you find it on Amazon, report the infringement.
"That wasn''t yours asshole!" Joaquim yelled, grabbing Farouq''s collar with his second hand.
"Do you really wanna to start a fight when Prophet Ameen is almost here?" Farouq asked with a grin. "You better let me go faggot."
Joaquim''s wrathful fists were about to do a lot more than just hold onto a collar, however he did not have a death wish. The boy with a hologram mask and quilted dress did have a penchant to be self-sacrificing, but he certainly did not have a death wish. He did not want to disappoint the man he came on a pilgrimage for.
Indeed, the brothers did not come for the dead, as they did not know any of the teenagers or children in the coffins. They came for the glowing man behind the last levitating coffin above the dune and buildings.
Prophet Ameen.
The man''s skin gleamed as if the sky was bare. It was a delicate brown; as delicate as sand on a freshly terraformed beach. With his youthful face, totemic jaw, and imposing presence, his appearance placed him anywhere in between his early twenties and early hundreds. Once the refurbished caskets and Prophet Ameen arrived above the crowd, Joaquim peered into the messiah''s sepia eyes. They were so alluring that they reminded Joaquim of Jupiter''s atmosphere, a planet he dreamed all his life to see up close. The levitating man''s irises had the illusion of stretching for miles past the prophet''s skull rather than stopping at his eye sockets. Someone deep within the crowd was yelling.
Please don''t go! I beg you!
The floating coffins descended past a ransacked bodega, turning the block to levitate across the cemetery gate with Prophet Ameen.
"Lil'' Morti, are you awake?" Prophet Ameen asked.
Prophet Ameen was talking to a robot sitting atop the circular cemetery gate, and he levitated a little higher to Lil Morti''s level. The bot resembled a copper toddler with its stature and skinny limbs. His large googly eyes sparked and he nodded. He opened his scalp and threw in his solar-paneled hat, and he pushed down the tiny windmills on his shoulders into his body. He skated down the steel fence, causing the scalpels, forceps, clamps, and saws to rustle in his torso. A make-up kit fell out of the broken clear lid on his torso, but he picked it up right away. The bot lifted his cartoonish head to meet the gaze of a man dragging a reluctant wife beneath the coffins and Prophet Ameen.
"Please don''t go! I beg you!"
With enough force into her sliding sneakers, she stopped him temporarily. He rattled her pull at first, but then he took a few more deliberate steps before a calculated halt. Her eyes widened, she lost her hold of him, and she plummeted into the grieving crowd''s arms. The man then marched beneath Prophet Ameen.
"Do not minister this funeral you false prophet!" the man yelled beneath him.
Before he and Joaquim were aware that he was no longer in the air, Prophet Ameen''s bare feet touched the concrete by the yelling man.
"Do I hear blasphemy?" Prophet Ameen asked gently.
The man''s mouth gaped at Prophet Ameen''s supernatural swiftness, but he regathered some composure by flaring his teeth away from his celestial gaze.
"Young man, I do believe in second chances," Prophet Ameen murmured. "I''ll give you one more chance to stop this nonsense before I arrange your meeting with God. I suggest choosing to stay among the living for a bit longer. Judging by your rib cage I can see through your ripped shirt, you could use my charity."
"You are no prophet. Give my sister back. She is in the third coffin," the man demanded.
Prophet Ameen smiled. "The Lord once said you shall know them by their fruits. I have brought back humans from the dead, cured man-made plagues, and made Babylon''s descendants take refuge in flying cities. The miracles I have performed should be more than convincing."
Joaquim thought about the beagle dog. Now that Prophet Ameen was here, the beagle needed to leave immediately. After squinting towards the left into the horizon, Joaquim found the beagle running into the folds of the desert exhausting her residual muscle. There was a time Joaquim would do his best to denounce talking animals as encouraged in the Aulasy, but he had a soft spot for them. Some of them were born that way. The man that confronted Prophet Ameen was quiet the whole time, going back and forth between a shaky step back and leaning forward.
"I don''t want my sister to be part of this funeral," the man reiterated. "You are just a supersoldier to me."
"I guess you have made your choice," Prophet Ameen said. "I would have given you the coffin if you repented."
The man''s body from the neck downwards flickered. Joaquim stopped blinking, and he saw the body reappearing less and less. The body stopped returning after a final hallow flicker, leaving behind a floating head with a severed spine sticking out. Blood and spinal fluid dripped onto the concrete, the puddle it created raising grains of gravel to the surface. A radiant sphere appeared above Prophet Ameen, and the decapitated head flew inside it.
One by one, the humans in the crowd bowed down to Prophet Ameen. Joaquim threaded through bystanders, holding Gabe''s hand as he strode towards Prophet Ameen.
This was Joaquim''s chance. He never changed his appearance to reflect what he felt inside, that was a sin after all, but Prophet Ameen could exorcize those thoughts out of him. Prophet Ameen was omnipotent.
Is he? Joaquim asked himself. He immediately regretted it; doubting his holy prowess was a sin too. And it was almost as if Prophet Ameen could read his mind, because after Joaquim checked on Gabe one more time to make sure he was coming with him, Prophet Ameen was already observing Joaquim.
All three of them were now within arm''s length.
"I have been waiting for you two, Naomi and Gabriel," Prophet Ameen said. 2 | FLUX
A week had passed since the funerals.
What remained of the city around the mosque the three boys ventured to was more erosion, yellow grass, and wild weeds rather than concrete and cyber metal. It was as if judgment came upon the blasted blocks and only left sacred structures intact. Well, that was until the Byza gang desecrated the beige mosque itself, now adjoined to the urban sprawl rather than defying it. To Joaquim, the Byzan graffiti scratches were a welcome change from the symbols and slurs A Big Satan Under Your Pinky Toe fans were fond of.
"They''re either dumb or ballsy," Farouq whispered just a little louder than Visard''s buzzing above. The sky lit the boys and the scenery quite brightly even though the atmosphere was blacker than ever. Today the smog was too dense for the midday neon circle to crack through.
"I am betting on dumb," Gabe replied.
"Why are we here today?" Joaquim interrupted. "Aren''t we supposed to come tomorrow?"
"Time is relative," Farouq mouthed.
"Shut up. You don''t even know what that means," Joaquim said.
"You got told to come here right?" Gabe interrupted, glancing in Farouq''s direction. The three of them were around two hundred meters away from the desecrated mosque. "Shouldn''t we be hiding? They can see us from here."
Farouq scoffed. "I don''t give a fuck. I got flux too. And so do you."
"What are your powers anyway?" Joaquim asked Farouq.
"What? Are you planning to jump me for eating your samosa?"
"No."
"I am an esper," Farouq finally answered.
"You didn''t answer my question," Gabe fussed.
"What do you think?" Farouq blurted out. "Why am I going to answer something so obvious?"
"If he''s here this early then he got told to come here," Joaquim answered. "Did Prophet Ameen know that Byza would already be here?"
"I guess so. You two have eyes don''t you?" Farouq said.
Sparks and smoke crackled above the corrupted concrete underneath the boys. They all strode away with quiet gasps until the crunching of bark scared them into hopping away from wherever the sound came from. They turned their heads to the direction of the crunch, and it came from a tree that did not forego its own growth despite the remnant of a skyscraper piercing atop its soiled roots. Indeed, the tree''s roots kept growing upwards to the heavens, and it gallantly circumnavigated the mass of steel, the shattered highrise windows, and the debris underneath. The roots wrapped around the mass and converged into a triumphant trunk at the crest.
The barky crunch returned even though it was coming from behind the skyscraper chunk at first. The crunching proceeded to the front of the chunk, activating the roots to slither like lightning bolts or glitching neurons. While the invisible sun helped manifest a rampaging boar''s shadow behind the mass of metal and concrete, what appeared to be stabilizing roots at first were actually the foundation of a deer''s antlers spawning on the frame of the highrise window. Taken from Royal Road, this narrative should be reported if found on Amazon.
Joaquim remembered that there were random sparks on the ground earlier, and he turned his head back to find a smoky silhouette of robes and bare feet. Farouq and Gabe were already observing the peculiarity until gunshots echoed across the polluted air. The boys dropped into a crouch, either rolling or crawling behind whatever frames remained from shops and buildings to protect themselves.
However, it seemed that they had nothing to worry about.
Opposing the Byzan gunners from the mosque stood Prophet Ameen where the smoke once hovered. After a clang and spark from a bullet missing Visard grazed a defunct streetlight, the gunfire immediately ended. Gooseflesh formed on Joaquim''s skin after the sudden silence.
Amidst what could barely be called a gunfight, Prophet Ameen was perfectly still as if he was giving a sermon inside the mosque. What Joaquim mistook for subsonic fire was actually the flying heads of the Byzan gang members. Wooden boards that hid the illicit activities within the mosque''s windows turned to magnolia branches hitting the dead grass, letting the dark shadows of flying heads overflow through all available openings.
Subduing his underlings with an immediate death, it seemed their Byzan boss finally decided to confront Prophet Ameen. Channeled flux poured through his pores and bender-worn suit as he kicked open the mosque doors. When Joaquim turned his head back to Prophet Ameen, he already approached the boss within a flux jump''s distance. Joaquim, Gabe and Farouq ran after Prophet Ameen across the yellow weeds and cracked concrete.
The stupor in the Byzan boss''s step became more pronounced as he focused more flux across his body, flooding out the sounds of hooves hitting pavement. "Does that ability you just used not work on flux users?"
The stupor had yet to reach his voice, and he was hugging a fluxtrode machine within his arms. It resembled a defibrillator that was made with jet black metal and neon blinkers.
He must have used it to awaken his abilities, Joaquim thought.
"You have made it even more obvious that you are new to this," Prophet Ameen said.
The Byzan boss smirked, his lips and skin more parched than the yellow grass beneath him. "I did not expect you to be boastful. I thought you would have just killed me as fast as the others."
"When I criticize your sophomoric debut to a flux fight, let me assure you that your opinion of me is of no concern," Prophet Ameen said. "This is solely about your foolish question. Have your foes ever tried to ask how your aim is so accurate when you fired at them? And were you foolish enough to answer the question with helpful advice?"
"So no helpful advice then?" the Byzan boss joked, his words juxtaposing his forced smile and sweat beading on his forehead. Other than Visard''s buzzing getting a little louder when Farouq examined it, it became eerily quiet again with Prophet Ameen''s nonresponse. The boss''s body below the neck flickered to nonexistence for a snap second until he forced a step forward.
Releasing a battle cry and all the flux he could at once, the Byzan boss flux jumped towards Prophet Ameen. Amidst smashed terrestrial cars on the parking lot of the mosque, the silhouettes of a boar and deer veered in between the two humans. Due to not being able to react due to the momentum he already picked up in midair, the Byzan boss tripped over the boar that oinked in frustration at him and he fell into his demise onto the deer''s antlers.
The crunch of bone and flesh after his second reactive and fleeting scream was incomparable to the mystical crunching of the tree earlier. Joaquim could not deduce if it was due to meeting his end so suddenly, but the Byzan''s boss final scream could have echoed through multiple dimensions.
With the clopping getting quieter with distance, the freshly impaled corpse lubricated the deer''s antlers, the blood aiding the body slide up and down while she carried it behind the mosque.
Even though Joaquim and Gabe winced the whole time at the Byzan''s boss utter humiliation...
Farouq laughed. 3 | DEVOTION "Why''s your head always in the clouds?" Although it was now behind the brothers, Joaquim took another glance at the breathtaking sahn outside. Beyond the prayer hall''s entrance and past his Alkrezian neon mask was gleaming white porcelain seaming into every portico. The courtyard''s architecture was designed to capture all of the light it possibly could from the sullen sky Visard was adrift in, and the captured light gave the courtyard an ethereal aura. Clearly Prophet Ameen''s numinous prayers restored all of the vandalism caused by Byza. However, a strange monolith that broke some of the tiled porcelain floor a long time ago still remained undisturbed. "You did it again." Before he could wonder whether the stygian monolith the Alkrezian inquisitors kept a parental eye over could attract or manifest an earthplexus leyline, or if it had any relation to the strange tree from earlier, Joaquim finally brought his attention to his brother that was speaking the whole time. Joaquim only listened to what Gabe said twice. "Head in the clouds?" Joaquim asked. Gabe raised an eyebrow, or a very faint unibrow when Joaquim peered hard enough. Joaquim''s older brother pretty much finished puberty at seventeen. His mustache and soul patch were growing back already. "You never heard that phrase before?" Its meaning became clear when Joaquim realized how much boisterous yelling he tuned out from the prayer hall. Indeed, the youth flocked all the way to the mashrabiya. The ruckus came from the unconverted exclusively. Well, except for Farouq of course. The only inquisitor-candidate that had the gall to be casual with Prophet Ameen. While thinking of the messiah while Farouq chatted and threaded partway within the crowd, he had arrived. Astonishingly his presence already caused the ruckus to simmer down, Joaquim did not even have to turn around to discover who entered. Within the corner of his eye he espied the appreciable silhouette of the jet black priest gown the messiah donned. He had that presence even among those that have yet to devote themselves to him. "There''s no need to be so... somber," Prophet Ameen said as he scanned the prayer hall. Either way, teenagers donning shipshape thrift clothes moved aside, creating a pathway to the minbar. Those with more traditional wear like kameezes were closer to the usual praying rows. "I know past missionaries gave reluctantly-attended sermons." "We could not come in here for weeks!" a child yelled. "I know. Farouq told me about the uninvited guests that were here," Prophet Ameen replied. Did Farouq use his esper powers to tell him... or did he use the earthplexus? Joaquim wondered. Another appreciable man came in with Prophet Ameen, someone Joaquim was sure he recognized from an earthplexus site, yet no name came to mind. He did not mask himself with the plaid-cloth masks that inquisitors were known for, but he was an inquisitor that did not need to announce his role amongst the Alkrezians and non-believers. Especially non-believers. Simultaneously his warm smile was both inviting and imposing, yet it was not as warm as the sepia irises that captured the spectral light bleeding in from the mashrabiya. "Who''s that with Prophet Ameen?" Joaquim whispered to Gabe. Unfortunately he only realized he was the only one speaking after that question left his lips. Unauthorized use of content: if you find this story on Amazon, report the violation. "Naomi!" Prophet Ameen called. "I am surprised that you are still speaking, however there is no need to be so quiet." "He was asking about Camilo," Gabe said. Joaquim noticed his brother addressed him the way he wanted to be addressed. "Ah, my inquisitor," Prophet Ameen said, glancing behind him. "I do want to touch on another topic before I introduce Camilo to everyone." The messiah stepped up to the edge of the minbar when toddlers shuffled closer while Farouq, Joaquim, and Gabe were not too far behind from them. Now that the crowd outspread across all the available space instead of gaggling into big groups, the cyan prayer rugs beneath them revealed themselves between sandals and bare feet walking away. "Why do we pray four times a day instead of five Prophet Ameen?" a child murmured. Prophet Ameen smiled at the boy. "I can answer that after my sermon." With more teenagers either taking a seat on the floor or leaning against the wall, the seeping lights from the mashrabiya reached Prophet Ameen and the inquisitor he had yet to introduce. "Wait... we have yet to eat anything," Gabe said. "We? I was first at the table," Farouq said. "Do not worry," Prophet Ameen assured Gabe before raising his voice. "Gentlemen sitting on the table, could you please stand by the side so I can take a look at the rations and water from here?" The row of teenaged boys looked at each other before walking to the side of the banquet table, and the table was cleared of both. "That tells me most of you came because you were famished and thirsty," Prophet Ameen said. "If you have no further reason to stay, please do not feel obligated to do so. If you were to devote yourselves to God, you must come here due to your own volition, not because you are coerced to do so." Joaquim briefly remembered that those that reached the age of adulthood would essentially be coerced into becoming Alkrezians. I am only fourteen so I am fine. I am starting early. Gabe... how long have you been an Alkrezian for? It was difficult to survive in No Man''s Land; the lack of nourishment made the mind such a fickle piece of flesh hardware. That must be the reason Joaquim had contradicting memories of Gabe''s conversion. "Actually, just stating it so is not good enough. I ask all of you to be frank with yourselves as the truth shall always set you free. Please raise your hand if you only came here to nourish yourselves," Prophet Ameen requested. Expecting hesitation at first, Joaquim felt silly once his red dress waved so gently from Farouq raising his hand in an instant. "I only came here for the food to be honest." The youth in the prayer hall laughed. With Farouq''s sincerity making it easier for others to be sincere, more hands shot up. Even Gabe raised his hand. "What?" Joaquim asked in shock. Gabe shrugged. "Sermons and prayers... can be boring. I still do them to be a good person... but if I were to be honest with myself... I don''t always want to come." "Have you attended one of Prophet Ameen''s sermons?" "Not face to face." Most of the room did not raise their hands. Noticeably Camilo did not. However, Joaquim was the last one to raise his hand. "Huh?" Gabe asked. "There''s a part of me that..." Joaquim gulped and lowered his head. Although he did not want to meet Gabe''s gaze to finish that thought, his wariness as to whether there was anyone turning eighteen that had their hand up and his curiosity as to whether Prophet Ameen''s was displeased with all the arms raised motivated him to tilt his head back up to find... Prophet Ameen beaming. "I want to simply tell you all that this is normal," Prophet Ameen said. "Spiritual growth starts with being honest with yourself and bringing your true self, then questioning yourself as to why you do not want to deepen your relationship with our creator. Let it be known that no matter what ails you, as long as you devote your true self to the Lord will make sure to always feed you, protect you, and clothe you the same way I have done here and will do again now." Could I bring my true self to you? |name i_am_that_i_am While Prophet Ameen performed another miracle to replenish the canteens and spawn more rations, it was impossible to tell if it was the utter awe upon Joaquim or another force beyond understanding accelerating time. It was too late to deduce whether time was flying within his mind or the outside world. The sky shapeshifted. 4 | NEON BIBLE After the sermon about Memoryfeed and walking the path of virtue, everyone in the congregation converted. Either that, or the unbelievers kept their blasphemy to themselves. Either way, all of the children took a copy of the Aulasy home. The Aulasy was a bible that had contents from the true version of the Bible, the Quran, the Torah, a version of the story Beyond the Wall of Sleep, excerpts from the Parable of the Sower, Snow Crash, and much more. None of it was considered science fiction anymore. Ruminations of the tree and the monolith persisted more than any memories of the sermon. All Joaquim could think about was what Prophet Ameen said before the sermon. Bring your true self. "Say," Gabe said. "Was that obelisk at the mosque an earthplexus server?" Farouq halted. The three boys walked in a desolate street inside the abandoned city, and the pavement and crumbling blocks were cloaked in the night''s darkness. With the state of the sky there was no bare moon to lend its luminescence. There was only the lapsed starlight the smog allowed to diffuse through. This time the drone Visard was not hidden away, and it was so Farouq could observe the brothers'' reactions while he gossiped about some of the attendees. The velvet mask strapped to four propellers still swayed backwards even when Farouq stopped suddenly. "The talking racoons or possums would have taken it and tried to sell it to Byza or to a corporation that is still down here," Farouq replied. "It was broken at the top... and the pieces from it weren''t anywhere on the floor," Joaquim said. "Byza took it. Maybe," Gabe wondered. "I also heard those rocks ain''t worth much," Farouq added. "I haven''t heard anyone be able to spawn or attract a leyline with it. I actually don''t know of anyone that was able to sell those rocks either." "Do you think r0cbytes can be made from that obelisk?" Gabe asked. "Nah," Farouq replied immediately. He raised a thumb to point it at his chest. "I would be the first to know if that was possible." "Gabe," Joaquim called. The seriousness in his voice attracted both the attention of Gabe and Farouq, only the buzzing from Visard could be heard. "You know what I''m thinking don''t you?" Gabe smiled. They both turned their heads in Farouq''s direction. "Yea I do." Farouq tried to keep the same monotone expression, but he eventually caved. He laughed, throwing both of his palms behind his head, causing his beige kameez to pull up slightly. "Alright fine. I''ll stop playing stupid. I did try to use the earthplexus in the mosque. Right by that weird ass rock too." "You weren''t scared at all?" Joaquim asked. "Prophet Ameen really told us about the evils of Memoryfeed¡ª" "Of course I wasn''t," Farouq interrupted. "Who the fuck do you think I am?" "I think you''re an asshole," Gabe declared. The longest silence yet fell upon the cracked street. "Look who''s finally saying shit to my face." It was always difficult to tell whether Farouq wanted to seriously fight or playfight, but Joaquim jumped in between them either way. Farouq managed to shove Gabe before Joaquim grabbed his wrist. Stolen from its rightful author, this tale is not meant to be on Amazon; report any sightings. "You''re just trying to change the subject!" Joaquim yelled. That got Gabe to immediately let his guard down rather than continue. "Yea! You better tell us what you were watching!" Gabe added. "It was porn again wasn''t it?" Joaquim asked. Gabe and Joaquim chuckled, getting Farouq to try and grab Gabe again. "That''s haram!" "And you really like watching holographic haram!" Smacks across the head were thrown until Joaquim yelled again. "Seriously!" Stop! What the hell did you do on the earthplexus?" Farouq stepped back, panting slightly. "I was barely able to spawn an image with my imagination. I was able to get an earthplexus site up." "See it was porn!" Gabe yelled, getting Joaquim to burst out laughing. "I''ll kick your ass again bug freak!" Farouq yelled. "What''s going on?" The unknown voice asking the question got the playfighting to cease. Caught wrists were in the air while the boys tried to scan for the somewhat familiar voice. There were auric tugs between their newfound fear and the lighthearted mood established. "Stop touching me." "You''re the one that likes watching girls touch each other." Camilo came out of the shadows. "What are you talking about?" "Uh..." Farouq mumbled. "A chiro girl was cracking another girl in a video?" "Sure," Camilo replied nonchalantly. Gabe and Joaquim let out a synchronized laugh. "You boys are looking for an earthplexus leyline. You three already know we''re supposed to wake up early... well today." Earlier when Prophet Ameen called the three boys to the front after the sermon was over, he got Farouq and Camilo to tell the brothers their purpose. To tell them why fate brought them to the messiah. "No we''re not," Farouq lied. "Have I ever believed any of your lies?" Camilo asked him, placing both of his pants on the waist of his cargo pants. The tension from the inquisitor''s sudden appearance dissipated, and the brothers chuckled at the blind boy. "Say Camilo," Farouq said. "You never told me what your flux power was." "I can simply show you," Camilo said. Camilo''s flesh distorted, at first as if colonies of ants were crawling under his skin, and then like boiling plastic. His skin and flesh split apart without a drop of blood leaking out. His clothes split apart into strings of fabric, changed colors and materials, and sewed itself back together into Ember City''s supersoldier uniform. The uniform had a camouflage design using white, black, and gray squares, and his shoulder hub manifested and projected a hologram of two chevrons with a star. Then Camilo''s skin settled, and he morphed into a female-presenting human that appeared to be a few years older than Gabe. His chin got thinner and pointed outwards, and his eye lashes grew into the length of kitten whiskers. He had black wool-like hair in a bun, a custom for anyone in the Ember City army with long hair. Joaquim remembered to breathe. "So you''re the one sneaking us into Ember city? The city in the sky?" Gabe asked. Camilo nodded, and with a much higher voice he said, "and you will call me Dalia while I am in the city so we stay undercover." "Why would they let people from down here join their ranks?" Joaquim asked. The Aulasy foretold the downfall of the flying cities that housed descendants of Babylon. It was easy to resent the humans up there. Joaquim and Gabe would head down south from the abandoned city to scavenge through falling garbage from Fornia. Thinking about it, Joaquim just remembered most of their army was not white at all except for 1 platoon. Many were not even arak or human, while 1 platoon was always a homogenous platoon. "I think I answered my own question in my h¡ª" "Wait," Gabe interrupted. "Who''s jaunting us up there?" "Another inquisitor we are meeting in a few hours... hopefully you''ll sleep in those remaining hours," Camilo answered. "Now come back to the mos¡ª" "There''s a leyline here!" Farouq yelled, already turned away from the conversation. "Camilo, you wouldn''t mind if I spawned this right?" Farouq turned around to reveal that he conjured with his imagination... A hologram book. The Aulasy. "We already gave you a physical copy." Gabe pulled the hologram away from Farouq, presumably using his mind. "You know I allowed you to take it right Gabe?" Joaquim followed the book to find his brother''s expression changing as much as Camilo''s did. His brother''s bloodlust flooded the street and Joaquim''s nervous system. "You have no idea how long I have been waiting for the prophecies in these pages to pass." As he held the neon bible he read once upon a time as a house of leaves, the way he expressed his desire to hurt the ones above on the trip back to the mosque... he eventually yelled like Prophet Ameen did during the sermon. After spotting a masticated corpse and the mystical antelope with bloody antlers gaiting within the vicinity of the mosque, Joaquim pulled the hologram book away from Gabe using his own mind. The neon bible vanished. 5 | SKY SHORE Generous was the smog''s veil this dawn, allowing the neon circle to cast light across the dilapidated urban sprawl. However, the overlong morning shadows could not dim the hallow sahn within the mosque where veiled Alkrezian inquisitors stood like hooded angels. The grid porcelain floor beneath their sandals resembled a heavenly slab, like an unsettling gameboard timeless gods moved their human models on. Today the Alkrezians with new identities were jaunting to Ember City, which was apparently approaching somewhere in the sky, and Joaquim observed the haunting gathering behind the threshold of the mosque''s prayer hall. The three boys did not sleep at all, but Joaquim had the benefit of having a mask to hide his baggy eyes. At least for now. Joaquim did close the mask task while Camilo was asleep; there was not a day that he did not marvel at how well the mask could persist even within waning earthplexus leylines. Even in places where the Aulasy could not spawn as a hologram book, the mask mandated to be worn by girls and women was quite spammable. One day Joaquim tried to spam as many masks as he could to squander a leyline to vanishment, but all he was left with was a static cloud of neon masks stalking him like a beast from the book of revelations. It took him the same amount of time he stayed up with Gabe and Farouq to shut down each task individually with just his thoughts. Indeed, the boys sneaked out while Camilo fell asleep on a prayer rug. Discovering a stronger leyline was not something the boys could pass up. Any day could be their last in No Man''s Land, and they were not going to let a leyline go to waste, or let another group of nocturnal teenagers exhaust it. Joaquim did not know what Farouq and Gabe spent their hours doing summoning earthplexus holograms, because he had his own hobby to indulge in. Joaquim binged space videos, and he did that until the neon circle peeked out of the horizon. He would carefully imagine what site he wanted to use, and in this case he used Memoryfeed, because frankly its recommendations were unmatched on any other earthplexus sites. Hesitation had caused him to freeze at first. Joaquim what are you doing? Farouq had asked before Joaquim manifested anything. We''ll use up this leyline before you even get a chance to watch anything! After sensing a presence behind him, Joaquim did not even realize that Farouq and Gabe already joined the gathering at the sahn when he glanced behind. They were long gone from the prayer rugs they had laid on. "Are you coming?" Camilo asked while standing behind Joaquim. Hereby Prophet Ameen declared this day as the beginning of Ember City''s downfall. He spoke to the inquisitors and devotees of divine asteroids and brimstone that would rain on the flying city from the cosmos, using the metaphor of gated communities to describe the cities where descendants of the twenty-first century empire jaunted away to. And after that, especially during discussions of plans, Joaquim zoned out. The space videos were still so very fresh in his mind''s eye. Esoteric planets were much more engaging than the revelation that he was flux sensitive like Camilo, Gabe, and Farouq. If flux could help him reach the stars, then that would be fantastic. Was that all Joaquim was concerned about? When he would interrogate himself on whether he wanted to be different than the way he felt or he wanted to be opportunistic, he would become too afraid to engage with the question for a long time. Fear would paralyze him from being sincere with himself. "Joaquim, I am speaking to you." He was staring past Prophet Ameen''s shoulder when he captured Joaquim''s attention again, and Gabe being his brother knew exactly what happened. "Farouq was trying to watch... extracurricular activities online!" Gabe yelled. Everyone gathered turned their heads towards Farouq. "Nice try, I was just watching soccer matches in New Brazil. And I have one better for you!" Farouq yelled back. "Joaquim told me he wanted to start a star federation!" At first, deafening silence fell upon the courtyard. Apparently starting a star federation was a graver offense than whatever Farouq did last night. However, the mood instantly changed again. Now everyone around Joaquim was laughing at him, but Gabe and Prophet Ameen were not amused. "Silence!" And all the ruckus ceased. Joaquim at first was tempted to lash out at those laughed at him, however a gut feeling told him to turn the other cheek. While he soothed his own temptation while staring at the porcelain floor, Prophet Ameen''s sandals echoed throughout the courtyard. His feet appeared within Joaquim''s field of vision. If you discover this narrative on Amazon, be aware that it has been stolen. Please report the violation. "Is that true?" Prophet Ameen asked. There was no temptation to lie, but there was the desire to drift off again mentally. The sahn and the monolith had this air of surrealness; it all made this whole gathering not feel real. "Yes," Joaquim replied. Prophet Ameen''s feet walked out of Joaquim''s field of vision. The taps from his sandals got quieter as he got closer to the front of the Alkrezian crowd. Amiss was Prophet Ameen''s calmness at the boy''s response. Joaquim even spotted a facial expression on Farouq that he had never seen before on his face. "Gabe told me of why you two went to the funeral, and even who was the most... eager to start and finish the pilgrimage," Prophet Ameen said. "Tell me Joaquim, did you tell Farouq about this desire of yours before or after you devoted your life to God?" "It was before," Farouq answered quickly. His sad frown became more pronounced. "I see now why these two have remained friends with you, but I asked Joaquim and not you," Prophet Ameen said. "There is no need to try to save them. I have no intention of hurting them." Farouq gulped and turned his head to face away from the messiah. "The path towards faith is not a straight line. I do not have any doubts you will have faith in this cause when you start your mission in Ember City," Prophet Ameen said. "You must always remember who were the ones who left Earth in destitution, and who ran away to the sky to avoid judgment. Do not let it fester to anger, but do let it transform into righteousness. Let it transform into the faith needed to summon me in Ember City when the right time comes." Everything before the funeral was fuzzy in Joaquim''s mind, except for the days and nights they scavenged through Fornian waste that fell from the sky. Days and nights spent trudging with utter hunger when there was nothing left in the mosque. Indeed, somedays resentment was stronger than a farfetched dream. The only failed star federations were started by narcissistic robber barons that were happy to let people succumb in space, and they repressed the voices of those who spoke of their crimes against humanity. Prophet Ameen must have known what was going through Joaquim''s mind, because he did not wait for Joaquim to respond. "Yes exactly. I know why you are truly here," Prophet Ameen said to Joaquim. "Before our jaunter Feechi jaunts us, I do need to give you all a blessing." The black robe on Prophet Ameen began to dance as if gust was within the spaces of his limbs, and he raised his glowing palms for them to be open towards the gray sky. Flecks manifested, their hops within Prophet Ameen''s hands forming an outline of some interdimensional dome until the flecks separated again to grow into glimmering seeds. Across all the foreheads of the Alkrezians portals grew, expanding into a perfect circle. After a twisting motion with his hands all the seeds flew into the forehead portals, and all the lights and flickers around the crowd vanished when he thrusted his arms down. The only Alkrezian not affected at all by Prophet Ameen''s blessing, a woman wearing an Alkrezian mask and inquisitor robe of her own walked away from the crowd to join Prophet Ameen. "It might be more accurate to call me a portalist now," Feechi stuttered. If Joaquim had to guess, she was nervous about correcting him. "Ah, you are correct," Prophet Ameen said. "I am sorry for not acknowledging how much you advanced with your abilities inquisitor. Please go ahead with the next steps." Once Prophet Ameen and Feechi split off from each other, he took a few steps towards Joaquim again. "If you have any doubts or questions, or anything that troubles you, we will be able to speak to each other no matter the distance." "Did Gabe tell you everything?" Joaquim asked. To his horror, Gabe did not even stick around or look at him after Prophet Ameen said that Gabe spoke to him. If anything, Gabe was long gone from the crowd. He was with Feechi who was against the wall using chalk to draw circles. Joaquim looked back to the messiah and he noticed that he followed Joaquim''s gaze, observing Gabe too. He then turned his head towards Joaquim and nodded. "Pray and everything will be alright." The circles Feechi drew became portals themselves. However, Gabe hesitated to step through as if he realized something. With a fearful gaze he glanced back towards his little brother, and he ran back towards him. "What''s wrong? Did you realize something?" Joaquim asked with anger. Gabe''s red sneakers dug into the white floor, stopping himself before meeting his eyes again. "Yea... you weren''t paying attention during the planning right?" Joaquim nodded. "You should have asked me fi¡ª" "We can''t talk about that now," Gabe said. "You have to decide now if you are coming. The portals are time sensitive." Joaquim stood still for a moment, then he gave in and followed his brother. While they walked towards the portals Feechi manifested, he counted eight portals against the wall. The brothers were walking to the second one. "Will I get uhm... portalsick if I step through it?" Gabe asked Feechi. "If you do just don''t throw up on me," Joaquim said. The trip was instantaneous. Before they could analyze their new surroundings Joaquim had to glance back at the strange magic behind him. Within the portal he could see the rest of the Alkrezians at the mosque forming lines to step through the portals. Then the portal vanished. "Joaquim?" Since he tried to ignore Joaquim earlier, he was happy to ignore Gabe as the space they were in was clearly inside the Ember City military base. He knew of it because of the lambda spaceships that were housed within it, and the fluorescent ceilings were exactly like the ones in the hangar. Joaquim had to run to see Earth below the flying city. The thousands and thousands of trippy platforms Ember was known for would have to wait. And he ran from Gabe. "Stop! You''re going to get us in trouble!" Joaquim ran past supersoldiers marching in single file and a cluster of cleaning robots close to a war diorama. He blasted past a fire exit and caused alarms to blare without a care. The air was so clean compared to the air in No Man''s Land; how alive his lungs felt could make his eyes well up. And speaking of air, the bluest skies he had ever seen was right within eyesight. He stood at the edge of the flying platform where Ember''s military base was housed on, and cloud waves broke between the platform and his open toes. Despite of what had been said and believed, Joaquim was atmospheres closer to his dream. 6 | /who
Left. Left. Left, right, left.
"Are you stup¡ª"
The deafening alarm drowned out Gabe''s voice. Beyond the gargantuan crimson base behind him was the vastness of uncountable metal platforms forming a sky-filling collage of skyscrapers. The panorama captured Joaquim''s gaze after he turned away from the cloud waves beneath him until another human stepped outside.
"I don''t see a fire here," she said. After talking into an earthplexus hologram icon of a speaker following her, the fire alarm ceased blaring.
Her tear-shaped eyes met Joaquim''s, probably noticing his mask first. "Did you two just get here?"
"They''re with me Corporal Woo," Camilo shapeshifted as Dalia answered as he stepped outside. He did shapeshift back to his original form back in No Man''s Land before going to sleep, but Joaquim was sure that something was slightly different about his face back then. Now his Dalia form looked slightly different than the first time he demonstrated his flux powers too.
Is it her nose? Joaquim thought to himself.
"Hey... did you do your bun differently or something?" Corporal Woo asked Camilo. "It''s been years since you last called me by my rank."
They both had their dark hair up in a bun as required to adhere to Ember''s military dress code.
"The fire alarm brought out the more serious side of me," Camilo said, suddenly shifting his serious tone to a more casual one.
Did he just realize she knows the person he shapeshifted into?
"You never cared for being serious... the army is just a bunch of glorified mercenary bands," Corporal Woo said. "If anything, all the officers give you so much leniency since you are so good at combat and bringing in revenue. We''ve had kids go the wrong way all the time since we are extremely understaffed... are you doing alright Dalia?" A case of theft: this story is not rightfully on Amazon; if you spot it, report the violation.
Camilo took a few moments to respond to the question. "I.. I''ve had a rough day."
"If you need someone to talk to I''ll be at the mess hall," Corporal Woo reassured him. "Hey, how come you didn''t ask me to jaunt these new recruits? You got a shitty jaunter didn''t you?"
Corporal Woo crossed her arms and smiled while asking that, and Camilo nodded in response.
"Okay, you three need to come in. My offer still stands if you need it Dalia."
Past the diorama Joaquim ran by earlier was a 21st century carbine weapon on a glass display. When he came back with Gabe and Camilo, there was only one cleaner robot that remained in the area. It resembled a two-headed giraffe with its two heads acting like impromptu limbs. Attached were cameras sold in No Man''s Land acting as its eyes. However, it was more likely it was being remote-controlled rather than being autonomous.
The area with the displays, the fire exit, and the two-headed giraffe robot trifurcated into three hallways, and Camilo while still shapeshifted led the brothers to the one opposite of the fire exit. Their marble floors had a beige and white checker pattern, a pattern that could belong to a school beneath the clouds. However, all the paintings and photos against the wall made it clear where the boys were.
It did not take long after their walk to arrive to their destination; an appreciable entrance that led to a convex under the military base. A shameless display of child recruitment awaited them below the stairs after Camilo pushed the entrance open with his trimmed hands. Visible past the floor-to-ceiling windows were clouds the convex was submerged in. The grayness they casted over the rows of seated seats gave this ominous overcast mood rather than the whimsical mood they had under the blue sky. It did not take long for a self-replicating police robot to approach the trio from the shadows.
"Please remove your mask and identify yourself," it asked Joaquim.
The unexpected request seemingly knocked out the air out of Joaquim''s breath. Gabe''s presence behind him felt overwhelmingly looming, he knew what was coming. He never told him his real name until this moment.
"Joaquim Wami."
With trepidation, Joaquim turned his head.
Gabe''s face became unfamiliar in disgust. 7 | RELATIVITY
Camilo as Dalia might as well have vanished like a jaunter.
To say it was like he left to destroy or save the cosmos would be an understatement. Perhaps load in a handful of timelines and macroverses, and then one could accurately communicate the state of emergency that was accompanying his combat boots bashing into the checkered floor outside.
Joaquim willed his mask off, revealing his face to the police robot.
"Sit down," the police robot commanded of him.
A darker cloud by the floor-to-ceiling windows must have passed the recruitment hall because the shadows weakened around the humanoid machine. As gray moisture and minerals in the state of gas smeared the imposing glass with condensation, the condition of the machine''s steel shell made it clear that it came from multiple generations of self-replicating white and blue alloys. Fractals of fictional and non-fictional faces pasted into its training data were fading faceward on its helmet. Its metal attire resembled glitchy and opaque palimpsest while the artifacts of mammal chests were undecipherable on its floating torso. Meanwhile, at a microscopic level, the sentient aluminum-flux cells must have still been trying to correct its replicating mistakes as sporadic subsections got smoother over ticking seconds.
The reputation that preceded these law enforcement robots was inescapable within the dead silence of the sitting teenagers awaiting their security clearance. While seeking a free seat after walking away from his brother and the aforementioned robot, Joaquim knocked over a teenager with a newsboy cap. After his bottom hit the carpeted floor, tiny pieces of round metal with human faces fell out of his pockets. Joaquim''s unyielding curiosity could not be restrained while he helped the stranger get up.
"What''s that on the floor? Do you want me to pick it up for you?" Joaquim asked after pulling the boy up.
"Those are coins," the boy answered, ignoring Joaquim''s offer as he threw himself back on the floor to retrieve them. "Have you never seen coins like these before? Which village are you from?"
The entrance of the recruitment hall slammed against the wall, demanding everyone''s attention. Upon entering the dark silhouette of the floating maratus spider with eight tentacles suffused to shamrock and onyx under the grey sunlight inside, the army base''s hallway lights now sealed off behind the closing door. The narrative has been taken without permission. Report any sightings.
"Wexil sir!" the police robot exclaimed with its self-correcting arms at its sides.
"At ease," the arak Wexil commanded.
"No!" the boy by Joaquim''s feet screamed.
What were called coins apparently were pulling the boy towards the futuristic beings at the door. The coins not giving a damn about any kind of gravity made his brown porridge-stained trousers look sentient. Snarling as the trousers were now forcing him to drag his dress shoes against the carpet, he seized the edge of his flying pocket and he mustered all of his might to pull it. His coins tore through his trousers, and he fell backwards on the floor once more.
"I can hear this dumbass all the way here. You really like the floor huh?" Farouq yelled from somewhere amongst the crowded seats, his voice sounding deeper from afar.
The coins were flying fast to the front.
"Don''t make me whoop your ass again!" Joaquim yelled.
"Again?" Farouq yelled back from a distance.
The coins slammed into the floating robot, the metallic screech bringing the hall to a silence once more. Meanwhile the arm the coins flew into smoothed out perfectly, ghostly seams of human arms and hands vanished.
However, even though the youth were quiet, the muffled whimpers from the boy on the ground echoed across the hall.
"I fucking hate this kid!" Farouq yelled.
"I''ll make you hate me even more!" Joaquim yelled back.
"SILENCE!" Wexil screamed statically. "Put him in jail, and his little sister too."
During the bickering and the coin debacle Gabe was handcuffed. His frown met Joaquim''s. Now that it was quiet, it was easier to hear Gabe from where Joaquim stood.
"Why? I heard I am not the first to walk the wrong way."
"You seem to be under the impression that this is a discussion," Wexil said. "It is not."
It was apparent that the extraterrestrial from Brennisteinn and the police were scanning for Joaquim, and he ran before they had the chance to even think of needing to extort the information out of his brother.
"Thank you," the boy on the floor murmured to Joaquim under his grief. Joaquim climbed the convex stairs as fast as he could, tripping on the final step thanks to his dress. However, he threw his right leg forward, catching his own fall before he stumbled further.
Joaquim panted. "You''re... you''re looking for me?"
Busy from trying to catch his breath, Joaquim did not get the chance to look up at Wexil until now. His green sex-marking tentacles came into vision first, then eventually its colors blended into his black and green pattern on his torso that housed his waxy eyes. He wore a shamrock ring on one of his hind tentacles.
So it wasn''t a conspiracy theory?
"Yes we are," Wexil said. "Thank you for making this easy for me this time."
Huh?
Without any notice Joaquim only heard the snap of handcuffs behind him, as if the robot was trained to stealthily arrest humans. 8 | DECADENCE
It was not until the brothers were sequestered to the rooftop that Joaquim came to comprehend the massiveness of Ember''s military base. The unbroken blue across his eyesight could be likened to clear skies, but Joaquim knew that the topmost clouds in the atmosphere were beneath them now. Behind him the police robot shoved him forward, leaving him no time to gawk. After the shove the naked sun, the skyscraper collages tinted with blue hues, the steel railing, the concrete rooftop, and its crimson edging came into sight.
The duration of the elevator ride could have been likened to an eternity, but it came to an end as the doors closed behind Gabe, the police robot, and the levitating arak named Wexil.
"Who brought you two?" Wexil carried on.
Gabe stayed quiet. He must have ran out of ways to obfuscate Wexil''s questioning.
"We were adopted by Trickster," Joaquim blurted, garnering a raised eyebrow from Gabe while Joaquim replied back at him with a glare. The police robot summoned an earthplexus screen briefly, logging something away. Joaquim tried to do the same thing out of curiosity with his imagination, but nothing spawned.
"Why did you log what she said?" Wexil yelled. "You ruined everything!"
Wexil''s fixation on arresting these brothers in particular was quite odd. A high society arak probably had more pressing matters, but then again, the wealthy were known for using their wealth and time for frivolousness and accelerating human extinction. Only the humans that treated them like gods or wished to join their ranks believed otherwise, and eternal damnation in the hell simulation awaited for them too. [/AMEN]
"I must stay committed to my logging protocols sir," the police robot said, its voice both human-like and electronically monotone. "Everything must be recorded."
"You already have a camera on you! Goddamn it! I need to work on the prompt I used on you!" Wexil yelled.
"Negative. The camera did not print successfully," the police robot corrected.
Wexil expressed his lividness the best way an arak could, arcing his curled tentacles and raising them towards the top crimson brim of the elevator doors. His airborne limbs convulsed before his tendrils opened again. "Just take these terrorists away! I knew better than to trust a human invention!"
And the machine obeyed. After a moment of calibrating itself somehow to ignore gravity, it floated higher while still holding onto Joaquim''s dress and Gabe''s handcuffs. While Gabe was oblivious to what was going to happen to him, Joaquim winced at the handcuffs now digging into his wrists midair.
"Count the platforms Gabe. Try not to close your eyes," Joaquim instructed.
"You didn''t care if I was going to throw up earlier... why do you care now?" Gabe asked.
"I always care. I am pissed of at you though," Joaquim said. "You never seem to try to be in my shoes, but I always try to be in yours."
Before Gabe could start the argument, the police robot picked up speed and Gabe had to put his focus entirely on not getting queasy. The nearest platforms lost their blue hues, the police robot''s speed becoming alarmingly apparent. Thrown forward from the police robot''s sudden stop, Joaquim had no chance to check on how the sporadic motions were affecting his brother. Stolen novel; please report.
The perfect blue sky and the cloud sea below them were hidden away. Flying city platforms and its skyscrapers covered every crevice possible, a photo from where Joaquim was suspended from could not be told apart from an image inside an underground city. While the robot slowed to change directions, Joaquim glanced up at the bottom of the platforms'' hemispheres. The hundreds of humming hemispheres each had a glowing yellow circle drifting within the midpoint, occasionally lagging to a random direction until it recalibrated. The entrances to the platforms'' hemispheres were wrapped in steel railings and stairs by the lower but walkable edges of the platforms. All gates and railings were plastered with ominous warnings with no further directions below them. Well, other than the sheer drop to another platform or the black seams within the airborne districts below.
DANGER: PERFECT SPHERES ELITE ESPERS ONLY DEADLY FORCE IS AUTHORIZED
The brothers rocked. A nauseated groan followed. Meanwhile, the robot performed a sudden and stomach-churning dip. Blurs of office windows, magnetic cars, and residential balconies covered Joaquim''s eyes. He spotted a medieval platform in his periphery at a brief stop, the decadent cheers of a dense faire echoed behind him.
They all rocked again. Joaquim heard a rip from his dress.
"Your clothes," Gabe barely said.
"You call these clothes?" Joaquim yelled.
From closed nightclubs for the daytime, to lofty patios and drink clinks, to a gargantuan hologram poster for A Big Satan Under Your Pinky Toe with the main character Eve in the center with her iconic pigtails, to a massive encompassing platform with cemeteries only. Joaquim felt something warm smeared on his shoulder as he spotted lavish tombstones in all directions.
The brothers experienced another violent rock. The police robot picked up so much speed that now they were now passing hundreds upon hundreds of undecipherable platforms, only blurs and lights were discernable. Skies were peaking out of crevices now, and a fluffy cloud was visible below. However, every direction was still covered with concrete, steel, hemispheres with yellow circles, and crowds. Joaquim was sure the population was much higher than any city on Earth.
Now that residential platforms could be discerned, Joaquim glanced to his right to find his brother passed out, his wrists florid from the robot''s uncaring rocking.
"Gabe!"
With the robot slowing, Joaquim prayed that they were reaching their destination. They were reaching the outskirts of the flying city again, but they were definitely very far from the military base.
In the outermost part of this flying city the three of them have reached, a colossal structure loomed, a monument of dominance that struck awe and trepidation into the hearts of all who beheld it. It almost was absorbing the luminosity of the blue sky, as if a dark metallic aura emitted from the hive. The self-replicating police station, if it could be called such, transcended the mundane realms of human architecture. It was far beyond anything the American suburbs, highways, shopping plazas, and oversized parking lots that were copied and pasted across No Man''s Land could offer. When Joaquim could glance at the horrifying height the police robots raised him to, he could see No Man''s Land smog coat from a satellite''s point of view. Even though Joaquim always dreamed of being in space, he did not realize how close he was to it until now. The flying city was in a spot where dense man-made oxygen could linger and was still at a comfortable distance from the vacuum of space.
Even though the station appeared anti-human, a jaunter station was at the edge, helping supersoldiers recalibrate the momentum of their jaunts to make sure they were moving at the speed their new locations would be moving to too. And another sign was there.
Welcome to Ember City POPULATION: 51,300,000
The police robot rocked once more and Joaquim''s dress ripped away from the robot''s hand.
Joaquim was now in freefall. 9 | PLAYING GOD
Time became treacherously slow. The last time Joaquim experienced time like this was when he first witnessed someone''s death. As his downward spin lost momentum momentarily, Ember''s financial district came into sight. Adrift was his torn dress inside the flying city gust, dancing like rose petal tatters around his handcuffed brother waking up. Towards his upward spin Joaquim found his brother''s wounded wrists trying to reach out to him in vain.
Now facing earthwards once more, the lively sunlight seized all of Joaquim''s senses while circumnavigating any platform shadows, making the financial skyscrapers below resemble golden ingots cut into a neat grid. The euphoria from the vista, the beautiful sun, his free shaved yet coiled hair and blue boy clothes were no match for the fear that competed for his senses too.
Joaquim finally screamed, the jaunting station long out of sight while the police robot stayed suspended in midair with his swinging captive. It seemed more than capable to swoop down and rescue him, but it observed his fall with its face-faced helmet.
When he faced the financial platform again, Joaquim searched for any potential rescuers. Ember city, the namesake of the robber baron''s daughter that sponsored this city and the conglomerate that would own it all, showed no self-replicating rescuers anywhere on the golden flying platform. Upon the father''s untimely death, all this levitating splendor Joaquim was falling towards was passed on to his fashionista daughter, and Ember became the wealthiest human being that ever lived, even though she no longer inhabited a flesh body these days.
As Joaquim spun up to find the shadowy silhouettes of Gabe and the police robot, he felt a pair of arms emitting numinous air around his back, breaking his fall until he was caught him midair. Garnering a bearing was hard at first. Joaquim became even dizzier trying to find where he was among the blurry swath of white, black, and gray squares until it all settled into an Ember supersoldier uniform. The aloof supersoldier that caught Joaquim had the baggiest eyes he had ever seen, and his skin was a shade away from being considered brown. Mere seconds passed and they were close to the supersoldier''s leap destination, and Joaquim looked away from him to find the skyscraper glass roof they were arriving to.
With a gentle thud hitting the glass, the supersoldier Joaquim just recognized still struck terror into the office workers below them. Some dropped their probably-printed coffee while others began to flee.
"Relax! There''s no fight happening!" Trickster tried to yell past the glass in vain.
"Trickster?" Joaquim asked. Enjoying the story? Show your support by reading it on the official site.
"... you shouldn''t call me that in person. You can call me Colonel Felix," Trickster, also known as Colonel Felix, murmured. "Is that who made you fall?"
Joaquim followed the Colonel''s pointed lips, and he glanced up to find two black dots still in the exact same spot. He nodded in response while the Colonel dropped him off to stand on the glass gently. Out of wanting a semblance of privacy he turned away from Joaquim to speak into an earthplexus speaker icon briefly, and Joaquim heard something about jaunting. He barely spotted Corporal Woo before he found himself standing on the jaunting platform by the police station.
The exhaustion from not sleeping at all was setting in, but Joaquim still held himself up on the metal floor he was now standing on with Colonel Felix. The police robot finally left his midair spot, letting Gabe''s feet touch the jaunting platform, perhaps from Colonel Felix interacting with the earthplexus with his mind.
Why was she such in a hurry?
"This robot''s printing seems to have gone through aggressive reprompting," the Colonel said, leaving Joaquim''s side to examine the odd artifacts left under the machine''s sheen. He stopped to glance over to Gabe who was panting and hanging his head.
"Can you let me know what happened? I''ll need to investigate this."
"No," Gabe blurted. After being able to recover for a bit, he revealed his furious gaze and stared right into Joaquim''s soul. "What is this about? What are you wearing? Why did you say we were adopted by him?"
"What''s wrong with you?" Joaquim asked. "Seriously?"
"I could ask you the same thing," Gabe replied. That got a reaction out of Colonel Felix too while he uncuffed him, but he went along with what he was doing and let his arms free.
"There is no warrant for you, but I do need you to go back to the military base. Can I ask you two¨C"
"You said your name was Joaquim or something?" Gabe interrupted the Colonel to continue speaking to his brother. "Did I hear you say that? What''s up with that?"
Joaquim looked away to glance at the sun rising from a residential platform, the glass from an apartment building refracting its light in all directions. He hung his head not being able to come up with a response.
"Don''t follow me," Gabe commanded Joaquim. "I am going to do what''s best for you."
"I''ll have to follow you though," Colonel Felix said to him. "I have to make sure you get back safely."
While Colonel Felix was midsentence, Gabe began running. About six meters away from them was a jaunting platform the citizens of Ember used; a technological marvel created by jaunters, computer scientists, and engineers working together. It seemed he picked a location at random on the hologram screen as he did not even look at it, and he vanished within the center of the golden disk screwed to the steel floor.
"Stay here," Colonel Felix said, resummoning an earthplexus speaker icon.
His mind going blank from tiredness and conflicting thoughts, a piece of red clothing floated back to the side of Joaquim''s sandals. It was Gabe''s red hoodie that was stitched into his dress earlier, and it still had a dried samosa stain by the pocket.
Joaquim''s eyes got glassy while staring at it. 10 | NESTING MEMORY
A row of raindrops wound its way down into the folds of a prehistoric, untouched jungle. Accompanied by an incoming storm, a lightning bolt struck a tree rivalling the dimming atmosphere past the mountainous skyline.
And behold, fire!
Well, the homo erectus approaching did not know of such a word, but she knew she came across a magical light past the foliage. She believed the whitely jagged horrors in the sky shapeshifted into a dancing red glare rather than vanishing within a blink, but another horrific rustle fast approached her. A deformed hand made of branches and leaves gouged the ground, furcating fingers barely missing her hairy figure. After coming to terms with her fortune and the cut across her triceps, she realized the violent wooden hand was a tree. Becoming violent itself, the rain forced her to deliberately climb the fallen branches to follow the newfound smokey odor. She rested a flat hand to her forehead not unlike how her future descendants would perform a salute, delaying eyeward waterdrops to discover the red glare on a stump''s branch.
Fear and curiosity competed for the homo erectus''s will. The victor could be found within her firm steps up the downed tree and towards the mysterious light waiting within the clearing. She hopped down the ripped portion of her fallen assailant and her bare feet landed on the clearing.
She halted. Fear was winning ground within her mind.
She took another step anyway.
She paused again.
The rain could very well be soaking her shaking soul at this point, however she mustered all the curiosity she had left within her heart. With no quarter she marched towards the next phase of evolution for her kind, now leaving footprints in the mud beneath her. Time became treacherously slow, but her progression continued. Before fear could catch up once more, she was within arm''s length of the blazed branch.
Instant and numinous hums drowned her ears, freezing her being to stand still. More sparks joined her, the fire, and the rain, eventually expanding into three glowing circles containing growing grids. The grids within revealed vistas of strange places, of past and future times, of bizarre night skies, of nightmares, of imagined stories, and of unimaginable horrors. Of futuristic and white hairless hands tapping at a bizarre tool with symbols reminiscent to those she found once in a cave.
Clockwise and counterclockwise these places and memories spun until a bright sheen covered all the levitating circles, and they looked like floating slices of the prehistoric sun no longer visible behind the charcoal clouds above. Then, three children stepped out of their respective slices of light, the nearest child to the fire not hesitating to rip out the branch before the homo erectus could.
"Ew!" Eve shrieked, her pigtails swaying as she brought the branch closer to the virtualtop-wearing teddy bear in her other hand. "This is mine! Invent showers first you stinky animal! Disgusting."
All of this took place on an earthplexus hologram screen inside the police station Joaquim tried his best not to watch, but his boredom won out and he realized its victory after witnessing the title screen.
A BIG SATAN UNDER YOUR PINKY TOE
The show where Eve, Ace, and Isabella ride on S.A.T.A.N. in a perfect simulation of the universe to explore the deepest questions historians have about human history. Like, what if instead of Abraham Lincoln being assassinated, Eve instead gave the assassin John Wilkes Booth a painful wedgie? What if cocaine was always used in every soda? What if humanity had only one type of apocalypse during the 21st century instead of all of them at the same time?
O humanity! These children could provide answers for the most pressing questions, but these children only cared about one pressing question:
How could they doom the human race even further?
"Shut up narrator," Eve said on the earthplexus hologram screen, a laugh track following her words before Joaquim could tune out the generated show. The hivelike police station built by Ember''s police robots, both the city and the CEO fashionista who invented them, were swarming through the hexagonal hallways, the unremarkable white waiting room Joaquim was in, and the line up of jaunting disks to jaunt somewhere for duty.
Gabe would have found this place interesting. It''s like a bee brain were added to their training data, Joaquim thought. He then groaned thinking about him, forcing himself not to let his eyes get glassy again. *Why did you backslide again? Are you afraid of...
Pitter patters interrupted Joaquim''s mind, reminding him of the talking beagle that never introduced himself at No Man''s Land. I also backslid once on talking animals didn''t I? After Gabe read us stories from the Aulasy of what talking animals tried to do to humanity. Maybe... maybe I should stay... a girl to keep Gabe safe.
Whoever''s paws was touching the white marble floor revealed herself to be a husky. The recognizable gaze of sentience were in her periwinkle eyes reminiscent of the bygone icy arctic under twilight, and her pupils were like black planets filled with dusky mountains. She also had the uncanny neck many talking animals had, and in this city she had no reason to hide it for the most part. Especially in the Harlynx platform which Joaquim guessed would be near the center of the flying city how the Imogen Generators were built there. That must have been who Iker sent after him because the talking husky was staring right at Joaquim. When Colonel Felix checked on Joaquim through an earthplexus call, he asked him to call him Iker how he became his impromptu dad and he was out of uniform.
"Naomi? Sorry... did I dead name you?" the husky asked upon her arrival near Joaquim''s seat, coming to a sudden realization examining him. "That''s the only name we could found attached to your face."
"Wait... there''s a record of my identity?" Joaquim asked.
The husky nodded. "Why? Is there something we should know?"
Joaquim looked away briefly before meeting her gaze again. "I am just shocked. I''m from No Man''s Land."
"Sorry, I should introduce myself," she said. "My name is Lucia."
"... Joaquim."
"You''re not from Denver?" Lucia asked.
Joaquim gave her a weary smile. "Is that the name of the city? M¨Cuh... sorry... I haven''t slept at all... the Don of Byza tried to rename the city I think. So it was called Denver huh."
"Heh," Lucia said, showing her fangs with a grin. "He''s Earth''s don pretty much. Byza might be more powerful than the gang that runs Mars or the one that runs the prison in Proxima."
Joaquim stayed quiet thinking about the leader of Byza.
"Sorry... we went off on a tangent. Well... to be honest... I also wanted to see if you were comfortable around me," Lucia confided. "Are you ready to leave? I''m sure you''re dying to be out of here... especially with the slop on TV."
"You guys still use the word slop up here?" Joaquim asked with a laugh. "Yea I definitely do... do you know where Gabe is?"
Lucia shook her head, turning back towards the hallway she came from. With the intention to follow behind her Joaquim tried to get up on both of his feet, but a wave of mystical lethargy washed over him. Even when he stayed awake for days in No Man''s Land or the part of it that used to be Denver... he never ever felt this fatigued.
What the...
He barely was able to slam a foot near Lucia, stopping himself from faceplanting.
"Joaquim!"
Despite Joaquim breaking his own fall, Lucia''s voice became a distant echo within the crumbling void with no care for his eyes remaining open. The echo ignored the police station having no way to stretch her operator-like voice for that deceptive eternity.
A dense heat awoke Joaquim. His body felt as if it doubled in weight as he tried to push himself up, and somehow this was more comfortable than his previous weight. A light breeze brushed his eye lashes, and he spun himself to sit on his rear. Whitely skies filled with four-dimensional hands and eyes were above him and the familiar smell of mortar and pollution filled his lungs. Joaquim almost coughed from the stark difference it had from the air inside the police station. He looked to the distant right to see a massive statue of Prophet Ameen, raising his arms as if he were holding up the sky. Crawling on his behind, he moved away from the statue while burying his hands deeper into the rough sand beneath him. His hands went in deeper than he thought they would. This story is posted elsewhere by the author. Help them out by reading the authentic version.
Around him, crosses were erected, sometimes glitching into looking like power lines. Some would glitch so fast that it looked as if some of the crosses were made of power line components. Sometimes they would appear in uniform lines, and at other times they blinked at random locations.
An instant sandstorm manifested over Joaquim. When he could glimpse past his sandy arm he used to cover his eyes, he could see a row of human heads being dragged across face first into the sand. When he focused long enough he could hear faint but agonizing screams.
"Godbane," a voice said. Joaquim stood on his feet and turned around to see an ethereal man with a patch of hair dyed blonde.
"How do you know my name?" Joaquim asked. Wait... how did I know that nickname?
"Go to the water," the man suggested.
Past a row of roofless homes that spawned, a dying oasis was a few meters away from Joaquim. He ran past the palm tree that was holding on to its last leaf, got on his knees, and looked at his reflection in the water. In his reflection, he saw a wider jaw, buzzed hair, and broader shoulders. He was taller too.
"You look even more... heroic in person," the man said, levitating above Joaquim.
"Godbane?" Joaquim asked.
"It is the name the enemy will give you," the man said. "Or you could say have given you. The fourth dimensions is a funny... uhm... place?"
Joaquim''s overwhelming emotions were catching up, but he was not sure if it was from the punishment the humans nearby were experiencing, from his new appearance, or from the mysterious entity speaking to him.
"Joaquim, you must understand that this is no mere dream," the man said. "This is Ameen''s influx ability. Whoever has been given an angel seed by Ameen can be forced to sleep, and they will be able to meet and communicate in this pocket dimension."
Joaquim rubbed his chin in thought, his armored gloves being fingerless. "So if we were to betray him, we would need to remove the seeds first, or he could put us under a permanent sleep."
Joaquim was always deductive teenager, but even now, his deductive reasoning was kicking in faster for some reason.
"Yes exactly," the man said. While in midair he turned to glance at the human heads being tortured. "The first nations he went after were Israel and what remained of Palestine. He appeared where many of their leaders and diplomats were gathered and gave them an order. The order was to give up their worldly obsession with their nations, and let him rule over them as part of the New Earth foretold in the book of Revelations. He killed everyone he could that let the Palestinian holocaust happen and that refused to convert to the Alkrezian religion. Anyone that died during that time and place... ended up here."
Joaquin frowned as he watched the unimaginable suffering in front of him.
The sandstorm, the oasis, and the tortured humans vanished, and instead Joaquim was all alone with the ethereal man in a field of mechanical crosses.
"Joaquim, you must be steadfast when he arrives," the man said. "Nothing good will come from you continuing to repress yourself. You must do it for you. For me. For Gabriel. For all the beings Ameen is torturing. This is all you need to remember. He is coming closer, and his power is too strong for me to continue intervening like this."
The ethereal man transformed into ominous black smoke and it consumed the horizon. Joaquim had to cover his eyes at the supernatural smoke bursting up, he was forced up on his feet and he was almost swept away into the white skies until he dug his combat boots into the sand. As the black smoke glitched, Joaquim could see a mushroom cloud, a burning apartment building, and multiple flying cities in a crash course towards the ground. Then, there was no mistaking the glint of light in the middle of the towering black smoke. The same glint of light Joaquim saw at the funeral.
Prophet Ameen was descending down towards Joaquim like a levitating saucer.
"Naomi, is that you?" a voice asked.
"Who''s that?" Joaquim asked.
"It''s me, Camilo, the shapeshifter," Camilo said. "In this dimension, you''ll appear as your true self. You can''t see me?"
Joaquim did not want to say it out loud, but Camilo appeared as nothing. His voice was right beside Joaquim, but there was no body that hosted it.
"You need to change back, dumbass."
Even though his voice was deeper, Joaquim knew he was Farouq. Joaquim turned around to see that he got his eyes back and he got older.
"So this is who you truly are? Just an older you?" Joaquim asked.
"You can willingly change your appearance here dumbfuck," Farouq said.
"When have I believed anything you say?" Joaquim said.
"You''re getting out of hand Naomi. Change back now."
Joaquim turned around to see that Gabe had already spawned. He looked exactly the same way he did the last time Joaquim saw him, his wrists still recovering the handcuffs. "When he lands you need to repent."
"What did you tell him?" Joaquim yelled.
Gabe did not bother responding to him. He stared forward coldly. He could not even look at Joaquim.
Prophet Ameen''s bare feet landed on the sand close by. He stood in front of the aberration made of black smoke, his white robes flowing with the desert wind. The smoke used the different mirages of mushroom clouds and flames to form a spider-like face. Then a lion''s face. Then wheels of eyes and hands. Then tenebrous tentacles. Then back to a spider.
Fear swept Joaquim as the realization of its sentience dawned on him. More Alkrezian boys and men were still appearing around Joaquim to be greeted with the image of the two powerful beings in front of them.
Joaquim''s mouth dropped ever so slowly to speak. "It''s a... it''s a..."
"Yedaliuth," Joaquim and Prophet Ameen said at the same time.
Humanity had yet to figure out if it was a black hole, some other space phenomena, or a lifeform. A group of scientists, supersoldiers, and PhD students pooled their knowledge, technology, and talents together to research what happened to GN-z11, and all the humans came back to their families with scribbles and the vernacular of a newborn. Ever since then academia had decided to leave it as a mystery.
Yet a Yedaliuth was here as Prophet Ameen''s pet. His pocket dimension plaything.
"How are we still keeping our sanity looking at it?" Joaquim asked.
"Because anything is possible through God. Can I get an amen?" Prophet Ameen requested.
The large group of boys and men murmured amen.
"This is a demon," Prophet Ameen declared. "There have been warnings that demons will come and be called aliens and extraterrestrials, but let it be known that they are agents of the Satans. The araks that have subjugated the human elites in the flying cities are servants of Samael. We must go to the cities and exterminate them all."
The Alkrezian boys and men cheered.
Joaquim frowned. Despite the bad experience with Wexil, he knew not to assume that every arak was like him.
"Once the flying cities come down, I will declare a holy war on Brennisteinn, and I will wipe out their civilization before first contact," Prophet Ameen said.
Whether humans and araks have made first contact in the official sense was debated amongst scholars, and even though Joaquim had a hard time deducing what was conspiracy and what was true, he knew at least that both cultures were still mostly unaware of each other now that Joaquim knew that Wexil indeed existed.
"You know a lot about this creature, don''t you, Naomi?" Prophet Ameen said, pointing to the Yedaliuth. "You''ve always been fascinated with space even though you want to serve the lord. God will not be happy with you entering the heavens, but it seems you are doing everything you can to stray from God."
"I think if anything you copied over passages you do not understand," Joaquim said.
The atmosphere got denser around Joaquim, the bloodlust of everyone around him pouring onto him. The ominous glares coming his way were like lasers piercing through his body.
"I have been waiting for you to be forthright with me ever since we met in No Man''s Land," Prophet Ameen said. "This can be a moment of healing. A moment for us to exorcize the demon that possessed you."
"Please, let him help you," Gabe begged Joaquim, taking a few steps closer towards him. "You don''t have to be this way."
"I know who I am," Joaquim declared. "And you do too."
Spurts of feathers flew out of Gabe''s shirt. Feathers manifested themselves and grew over his face, then his head transformed into one of a chicken. A beak came out of his mouth, and his lips disappeared.
The group of boys and men laughed at him.
"Gabe..." Joaquim muttered.
"Wait," Farouq said. "So deep down he wants to help her? "
"Gabe," Joaquim said. "You always knew this, didn''t you?"
"No, I had no idea," Gabe lied. He turned away from his brother and lowered his wattle.
"Face me," Joaquim said. "I would never abandon you like you did to me."
"From what I''m hearing from letting you speak, Naomi, is that you have no intention to return to God," Prophet Ameen said. "Gabe''s intervention has not convinced you."
"Ameen," Joaquim said, letting Ameen''s name without a title hang in the air. "Taming that yedaliuth came at the cost of your sanity, didn''t it?"
Ameen''s seemingly impeccable composure cracked. The white in his eyes amplified and he clenched his teeth.
"How dare someone possessed by a demon allude that I am not sane!" Ameen shouted.
"I am the most sensible one here," Joaquim said. "And that includes my brother, who clearly doesn''t know who actually loves him."
Gabe turned around to meet Joaquim''s eyes, some feathers falling off his face to reveal human skin.
"So you are an apostate," Ameen said, pointing an open hand towards Joaquim.
"Gabe, I love you," Joaquim said quickly.
Ameen brought his hand down and made Joaquim''s avatar vanish.
Joaquim woke up in a blue bed with Lucia sleeping near his feet. He apparently had a change of clothes and a shower, and it made him clench his teeth.
"Why did you change me in my sleep?" Joaquim yelled.
Forced to wake, Lucia hopped off the bed and stretched her body. "You did. You don''t remember? Are you alright?"
Alarmed by Joaquim''s yelling, Iker barged into the room that already had all the things Joaquim would want, including a virtualtop. It was almost as if they read his mind or...
"Hey! Hey! You alright?" Iker yelled. "Sorry for yelling. Octavia Butler you scared me."
"Why did you change me in my sleep?" Joaquim yelled again.
"Joaquim... you got ready to go to sleep after you did the bootcamp," Iker said. "You don''t remember?"
No, they did not read Joaquim''s mind.
He ended up in the future.
"When is this? When is this? When is this?" Joaquim kept yelling. His accelerating heartbeat was pushing up against his rib cage.
Joaquim had no memory of asking for the things in the room or from the bootcamp he apparently went to.
Only from the dream he woke up from.
"How long ago were in the police station?" Joaquim asked Lucia directly.
Lucia stared at him with the deepest worry a husky''s face could show.
"It... it was a week ago."