Colliding Skies

by Debbie Zaken

  He opened up his palm to reveal a small, rectangular, translucent, film in his hand. I inspected the strip. No plastic, metal, chips, wires or anything remotely electronic-looking about it.

  “What is it?”

  Ethan raised his index finger. “Watch.”

  He walked to the far side of the room and placed the strip on the wall. It lit up in a swirl of brilliant colors, the rectangle expanding until it was about the size of a computer screen. Strange symbols and images emerged from it, hovering in mid-air.

  I sucked in a breath. “Whoa…Are those holograms?”

  Ethan didn’t answer, his eyes focused on the three dimensional images. They flickered and changed as he moved them with his mind.

  “Oh, come on!” I crossed my arms in front of my chest. “Are you going to explain what you’re doing or not?”

  He laughed under his breath as he went to his backpack, took out a large blanket, and laid it on the floor. “Is there not a saying here about patience being a virtue?”

  “Yes. And another one that says patience is what you have when there are too many witnesses around.” My eyes scanned the room. “We seem to be alone. So hurry up.”

  His smile widened. Digging into his backpack again, he pulled out a thermos and a brown paper bag. “Here. I brought you coffee and some food.”

  “Aagh!” I grabbed the bag and plopped down on the blanket. The delicious scent of warm, sweet pastries hit my nose. My eyes caught the name of the same fated coffee shop in D.C. stamped in big, red letters on the bag. I peeked inside.

  “Chocolate croissants? They’re my favorite.”

  “I know,” he replied. “You told me in one of the dreams.”

  I took a croissant and a sip of the coffee. The warm, creamy sweetness of my favorite latte filled my mouth. “And how I like my coffee, too?”

  “You might have mentioned something about that.”

  I didn’t know what was more tempting: the devilish smile on his lips, the warm chocolate melting in my mouth, or the promise of interstellar travel. “Okay, so now show me this space traveling.”

  “Uh-uh.” He wagged a finger at me. “Food first, extragalactic travel later.”

  “Fine.” I huffed and took another bite of the flaky croissant. “Are you eating, too? Oh, right. Vegans. So what is your primary source of nourishment? I mean, since we’ve established that humans are not it.”

  “You are very inquisitive, aren’t you?”

  “We made a deal, remember? I warned you I had a lot of questions. Besides, I’ve never seen you eat anything. Not at the White House, the coffee shop, or yesterday.”

  “Inquisitive and observant. But you are right. We did make a deal.”

  He looked at me, the uneasy grin he usually got when he had to explain some fundamental difference between us creeping on his lips. “Technically, we are not really vegans—at least not by your definition. For the most part, our food source comes from a high concentrated nutritious supplement. Our bodies make optimal use of nutrition, which means we can thrive with very little nourishment. Unlike you,” he glanced at the chocolate croissant in my hand, “we consume food for nourishment, not for pleasure. Most of the garbage you call food we would never put in our bodies.”

  I kept my face straight while I swallowed a bite of delectable chocolate garbage, knowing full well he was analyzing every little reaction. “Food for simple nourishment? Well, from a purely nutritional perspective, it’s definitely smart. Doesn’t sound like fun, though. I’ve always been of the belief life without chocolate just isn’t worth living. How do you ever survive?”

  His grin broadened. “We get by. Now, are you ready for the show?”

  “About time.” I crumpled the napkin I’d used to wipe the chocolate off my hands.

  He turned back to the holographic images dangling in the air and pointed up to the open dome. “Keep your eyes on the sky.”

  I gazed up, easily making out Orion, Taurus, and a few other constellations. In less than a blink, the familiar pattern of stars disappeared, and in its place was nothing short of a three hundred and sixty degree view of outer space. “Holy Wan Kenobi!”

  Countless specks of light and gases illuminated the infinite darkness. Like glitter and blotches of vibrant paint spilled over a black canvas. Just above us, amidst hundreds of stellar objects, hovered a greyish-blue sphere covered in white swirls and specs of green and brown. Behind it shone the sun, like a brilliant red ball of fire. In the distance, I could make out two more sphere-like planets.

  I pointed at the celestial skyline. “That’s not our solar system.”

  “No. It is Gliese 581g, an exoplanet. It has some similarities to Earth and your astronomers have interesting theories as to the likelihood of it being potentially habitable for humans. It is not, though.”

  I scratched my head. The exoplanet looked so real I had to question if we hadn’t left the Earth’s surface without me realizing it. Maybe the tower really was some sort of Dr. Who style spacecraft. “Did we leave Earth?”

  He chuckled. “No. You are still very much on your home planet. What you are looking at is a live feed from our nanosatellites. It is the same principle as your satellites only ours are much smaller, travel at greater speeds and can reach farther into deep space. I used the virtual transponder to connect to it and feed us back the images.”

  “Oh...so this is kind of like a show at the planetarium.”

  “You could say that. Except what you are looking at is not a reproduction or a movie. These are real images in real time. What the satellite sees is what we see.”

  I took in the incredible view I had of the universe. It was a strange illusion, because even though gravity kept my feet planted on the ground, part of me felt like I should be weightless.

  “How far is this exoplanet from Earth?” I asked.

  “Not too far, only twenty two light years away.”

  He came to sit next to me on the blanket and looked at me intently.

  “Now, I want to explain exactly how this is going to work. I am controlling the satellite with the transponder. The satellite is going to travel at a speed that will be hard for you to grasp. Your sensory system is going to trick your brain into perceiving motion. Just remember, you are not moving. You are here. You still might feel sick, lightheaded or nauseous. You could even black out. If you feel any of these symptoms, tell me at once and we will stop. You understand?”

  I nodded, suddenly regretting eating that croissant. Blowing chunks on a first date was far from romantic.

  “Ready to travel to the outer limits of space?” His eyes widened with excitement.

  “Oh, yeah.” I swallowed down my nerves with a sip of latte.

  The last thing I saw was Ethan’s encouraging smile. In a nanosecond, the grayish-blue luminescent globe over our heads exploded into a million shooting lights and a blur of colors flashed before my eyes. The hyperfast propulsion hit my body like a rocket. My heart thudded in my ears, my stomach dropped to my feet. I kept telling myself I wasn’t really moving, that it was just like a simulator at an amusement park. But my senses seesawed, completely disconnecting from my mind.

  Time bent, like we were sucked into a time warp. I didn’t know if a second had passed or twenty minutes. What I did know was that I was lightheaded and my stomach was in knots. I gave Ethan’s hand a not so gentle squeeze.

  “We will stop for a second.” I heard him say.

  Everything came to a freezing halt. The blurring lights vanished, but the room was still spinning. I covered my eyes with my hands.

  “Are you all right?” Concern brimmed in Ethan’s voice. But I was too nauseous to answer.

  “Here, drink some water. You look a little green.”

  I took a few sips and finally, when the spinning stopped, gazed up at the opened dome. A massive orb of blue and green gases spiraled over my head, surrounded by hundreds of brilliant stars.

  “Wow. This is incredible. Where are we now?” My voice was even
, though my head still wobbled a bit.

  “Kepler-22b. Another exoplanet.” Ethan’s cautious eyes remained on me. “NASA scientists think Kepler might have the conditions to support life: water, atmosphere, surface, moderate temperature. But again, it is not habitable. The planet is mostly gas and some liquid.”

  “Like Neptune. How far is this one?”

  “Six hundred light years away, in the Cygnus constellation,” he replied.

  “Six hundred light years? That’s impossible. You can’t travel that kind of distance, even at the speed of light. I mean, it would take—”

  “Twenty two million years with your technology.” He shot me a smug look. “But our ships can travel one light year in an Earth week, our unmanned satellites in milliseconds.”

  My mouth opened and shut a few times before I could get the words out. “How? Warp drive? Solar sails? Negative mass?” I tried to recall every interstellar travel theory I’d read.

  “It is not about speed, but about loopholes. The right loopholes. It is about manipulating space-time—the fabric of space. And that is not limited by the speed of light.”

  “Unreal.” I shook my head. “You’re actually bending space-time.”

  He leaned in, a small smile touching his lips. “You know, your father is one of the people working with Abigail and Aaron on developing a vessel that would allow earthlings to travel safely through space over these long distances.”

  “No way!” My eyes grew as big as the exoplanet floating above us. A gush of pride for Dad swelled my chest. “Do you think it’ll be ready soon? Could I travel with you?” My heart sped up at the possibility.

  “Well, it is not that easy. Right now, a human body would implode from the pressure produced by the energy needed to power such a vessel. Your bodies are much more fragile. Speaking of which, are you feeling better?” He scanned my face like he was looking for any sign of injury.

  “Yeah, I’m fine.”

  “Are you ready for a little more traveling? There is one more place I would like to show you.”

  My stomach had finally settled. What was a little nausea compared to the only kind of space travel I’d ever get to experience? If astronauts could handle it, I could too. “Definitely.”

  He held my hand in his as everything exploded in a burst of lights. Only a silver blur streaked before my eyes. I was spinning, on a hyper-speed roller coaster, being thrown from side to side. Cold sweat broke out on my forehead as the nausea rose up again. Just as I thought I might actually lose the contents in my stomach, I heard him say, “Here we are.”

  The lights had stopped, but the room whirled around me like a tornado. I put my hands on my head and waited for the roller coaster feeling to stop. Finally, my eyes focused on a bright blue orb over my head. The brilliant sphere had swirls of blues and purples.

  “Celeia,” I whispered.

  “Yes, this is my home. Two thousand, two hundred, four light years away from Earth.”

  Two weeks ago, when he’d mentioned showing me his planet on the White House grounds, I never imagined I would really see it. With my palm over my mouth, I gazed at the planet shinning like a blue diamond in deep space. “It’s breathtaking.”

  “Not as much as you are.” His gaze, intense and tempestuous, latched on mine.

  Drawing closer, he ran one finger from my temple down to my jaw, gently moving a strand of hair away from my eyes. Waves of pulsating currents raced through my cheek. His face was now inches from mine. Moving slowly, he tilted his head toward me. His breath, minty and electric, made my lips tingle just the way they had in his car the day before. With my heart fluttering in my chest, I inhaled, waiting for his mouth to press down on mine. Then out of nowhere, panic struck his eyes and he jerked back. I blinked, the hypnotic spell broken.

  A nervous smile twisted his features. “What else would you like to know? You said you had a long list of questions.”

  I stared at him blankly, trying to recover from the sensory overload. I was so dazed by this gorgeous extraterrestrial and all the mixed signals he was sending me. Covering my face with my hand, I gave my head a shake, trying to rid myself of the confusion and disappointment stinging my insides.

  Again? Why didn’t he kiss me?

  “Okay. How about we go with the obvious,” I said, looking up at him. “Are all Celeians as inconceivably beautiful as those on the delegation?”

  “Inconceivably beautiful?” His brow snapped up. “Is that how you see us?”

  “Uh, not just me. Don’t you read the news or watch TV? Everyone talks about the splendid beauty of the Celeians.” I smiled at the sheepish look on his face. “What? No mirrors in your supersonic spaceship? Why do you think people gawk at you?”

  He cleared his throat, his fingers rubbing the cleft in his chin. “Yes, I have heard that in the eyes of the Earthlings we are physically attractive. I have just never heard you say it before. I also posited that it is our phlegmatic nature that makes your kind ill at ease— that makes you mistrust us. Not our looks.”

  At that, I laughed out loud. “Yeah, well, trust me. You’re all very perfect. That can be a little intimidating.” While Ethan seemed genuinely embarrassed to learn just how alluring his kind was to us, something told me that Abigail was fully aware of her ethereal beauty and the affect it had.

  A muscle in his jaw clenched, his shoulders tensing. “Perfect, we are not. Far from it, quite honestly. Do I intimidate you, too?”

  “No. You overwhelm me.” My gaze sunk to the blue blanket underneath us.

  “Beauty is in the eye of the beholder. Is that not another saying here? The way you see us is not necessarily how we see ourselves, or others of our kind, for that matter.”

  I wasn’t sure I completely agreed with that. “Beauty may be subjective, but if seven billion people around the world agree, then there’s some level of truth to it.”

  He lifted my chin, and his eyes narrowed in on me. “It is fascinating to me that you are so cognizant of our beauty, yet you seem unaware of your own. Do you not know the affect you have on me? How hypnotized I am by you?”

  I shook my head. “There’s no comparison.” I could never compete with any Celeian female.

  He grasped my hand and turned it so it covered his, palm on palm. With his free hand, he traced the lines of mine with his fingers, like a palm reader. “You are more alluring to me than anyone or anything I have ever seen. Your courage, your compassion, your intelligence…It makes you fragile yet strong, emotional yet rational. Imperfectly perfect.”

  I looked down at my hand, every pulsating jolt of his fingers tickling my skin.

  “The currents, when we touch. It’s like electricity. I can feel it now spreading from my palm to my fingertips. Why? How?”

  The corners of his mouth twisted into a seductive smile. “Do you remember learning in chemistry class about atoms?”

  “Atoms?”

  “Yes, the building blocks of matter. What are atoms made up of?”

  Playfully, he glided his fingers from my palm up my arm. I quivered. How was I supposed to answer the question when the only chemistry on my mind was not the kind taught in school?

  “I know what atoms are.” I breathed out the words.

  “So answer the question.” The tips of his fingers traveled all the way to my shoulder.

  I squeezed my eyes shut and took a deep breath, trying very hard to focus on something other than the electric currents heating my skin.

  “Protons, neutrons and electrons. Protons have a positive charge, electrons a negative one, and neutrons are neutral.”

  I opened my eyes to see him smiling smugly, like a teacher impressed by his pupil’s answer.

  “Correct,” he replied. “And when the electrons in atoms are stimulated, you get…” Electricity.” Like the tantalizing waves coursing through me as his fingers caressed my arm. My breath whooshed out loud, but he continued taunting me with this hands-on science experiment.

  “The human body is a huge
mass of atoms that generates electricity. Everything you do is controlled by electric signals running through your nervous system.”

  “Like the brain and the heart,” I said.

  “Correct. That is also true for us, but you could say we run at a much higher frequency. Our bodies give off powerful electrical currents. That is the energy you feel when we touch.” As if to prove his point, he tapped his fingers lightly on my shoulder, sending warm pulses running up and down my spine. “For us, however, it goes beyond a function of our nervous system. It is a survival skill. A weapon used to defend or attack.”

  “You can harm someone with this energy?”

  A shadow fell across his face while his fingers traced a line from my shoulder to my collarbone, lingering just above my chest. “The voltage our bodies produce can easily shock, or kill. One jolt straight to the chest is all it would take to stop your heart.”

  I looked down to where his hand rested just below my collarbone. My chest rose and fell with my uneven breath. “All I feel is warmth.” A tantalizing, slow burn.

  “We can control it for the most part— lower it or augment it as we wish. The degree of strength is the difference between the soft pulses that tickle your skin now or a raw, hot and painful electrical shock.”

  The heat from Ethan’s fingertips intensified, stinging my skin and I cringed. The pain lasted only a split second before his touch sent pulsating currents that numbed it away. His hand slid up my neck until it curved around my face, tilting my chin.

  “I want to kiss you, Skye.” His voice was hot and gritty, as his gaze burned into mine. “I have longed for it in every single one of your dreams. I wanted to kiss you in the car yesterday, but I was afraid to. Although we can control the energy, we avoid coming in physical contact with Earthlings. It is impossible for us to predict with accuracy the affect it may have on the human body. Too many variables that can interfere…like whatever it was that caused your fever. And that was only from the energy you received from afar. The pain you felt just now came from a very low current. What if I hurt you?”

  I shook my already spinning head. “You won’t. I trust you. You’re touching me now…” I pressed my face against the palm of his hand, the currents intensifying. “And it’s...” I couldn’t find the words to describe it.