by Zara Zenia
“I know where we can get a shuttle.”
They all gasp and turn to me, terrified to realize someone was listening in on their conversation.
“Who are you?” one of them asks.
“Does it matter? I can get a shuttle and I can get it right now,” I answer.
“Are you serious? Please tell us you’re not joking?” the girl pleads.
“I’m not joking but it will be risky. Follow me.”
So just after escaping the army compound, I find myself breaking back in, this time with five other people in tow. They’re still arguing amongst each other as they dawdle behind me. I look over my shoulder and gestured for them to shut up and hurry.
“Guys… I’m serious. If you don’t stay quiet, there’s a chance they’ll kill you. We can’t be caught, ok?”
They all go silent and jog to catch up with me.
“See over there?”
I point to a row of shuttles that line the airbase.
“That’s where we need to be. The shuttles are essentially easy to navigate, well in Orba’s orbit anyway. The toughest thing right now is breaking through this fence.”
“Ok, done.”
“What?”
I look over and see one of them has ripped the fence apart with his bare hands.
“How did you do that?”
“I’ve done it before,” he says.
“What’s your name?”
“Ethazol.”
He smiles and reaches out a hand. I shake it enthusiastically.
“I think we’re going to be great friends.”
“I think so too,” he replies.
A few seconds later we’re breaking into a shuttle, pulling the door open and jumping inside.
“Ok, be quick guys, they’ll find us sooner or later.”
A siren begins to blare from behind us. We all jump and look out the windows to see a great big laser spotlight scan the ground for us.
“Too late!” the girl screams. “They’re onto us.”
I dive into the captain’s seat and yank the throttle. The shuttle lifts off the ground slightly before stuttering and falling back to the ground.
“Fuck!”
I try again. Palzu’s troops are behind us, filing out of the compound as they lift their guns to their shoulders and prepare to fire at us.
“Go!” Ethazol yells.
“I’m trying!”
At last, the shuttle lifts into the air and stays there long enough for me to take a deep breath and steer us up and away. A bullet ricochets off a window and the girl screams. But before any more can be fired, we’re going up, and further up again as we leave the Orban atmosphere.
Finally, we’re safe with the stars drifting by us, glistening white and dazzling. I look around at my crew and see the look of disbelief on their faces. They’re slack-jawed and shocked as they stick their hands to the windows and watch the universe glide past.
“I don’t believe this!” shouts Ethazol. “We really did it!”
“This is crazy,” one of the others is saying. “Completely crazy.”
I feel a sense of pride swell in my chest. I did the right thing, I got away. But what about all the other Orbans who we left down there? I shiver as I think about them.
“What’s up?”
Ethazol takes a seat beside me.
“Nothing,” I lie.
“Hey, you’re a real hero, buddy. Thanks.”
He slaps me on the back and I give him a weak smile.
“I wanted to do it as much as you did,” I say.
He stares out the windshield for a moment with wide, childish eyes.
“I’ve never seen anything so beautiful,” he says. “We’re really in space, flying through the stars.”
“We are,” I nod and smile.
“But I gotta ask you something,” he says with a hint of nervousness in his voice.
“Sure. Fire away.”
“How did you know where to steal one of Palzu’s shuttles?”
I can’t tell him the truth. What would he think if I told him I was one of Palzu’s recruits? Although it hurts to lie, I find myself saying:
“I read it in a book once, some random document I found in a library that explained the layout of the air base.”
I hope he believes me and my hands begin to shake as they grip the shuttle’s controls harder.
“Oh, cool!” he says. “You’re a smart guy.”
I breathe a sigh of relief and watch him walk back to the others.
“I don’t know how to thank you,” he says over his shoulder.
“Don’t worry about it,” I answer. “Just make sure the others are okay.”
Chapter 2
Voland
3 weeks later
We are living in a place that is called an apartment on a planet called Earth. Since we arrived so much has happened. It has been a shock to us all and we are all suffering under the stresses of our new life in this world. But there has been so much good to happen to us too. Benzen has befriended a local human girl named Alison. She has been a great help, explaining how things work here and what is expected of us. She has taught us how to do this thing called shopping where we pick out things we want to eat and then pay for them in a place called a grocery store. Alison also helped us obtain this apartment and for this, I am forever grateful. It means we have a place to hide, food to eat and somewhere we can sleep in comfort.
Right now, we are all huddled around a box called a television. Little Victorinth has become quite infatuated with the thing and spends endless hours in front of it with boxes of little, pink edibles that are called candy. There is a man on the screen standing in front of a line of people on a stage. He opens his mouth to speak and the crowd behind him all cheer.
“The DNA test proves that Tyrone… is not the father of your child.”
The crowd goes crazy, screaming and jeering at the woman on the stage. I have no idea what is going on.
“How can a father not be the father of a child he fathered?” I ask Victorinth.
She shakes her head and laughs at me.
“Oh, Voland. You are so naïve.”
I purse my lips and walk away. Earth is strange, humans are strange and television is even stranger.
“I’m going to my room,” I say.
No one looks up from the television. They’re all engrossed in the spectacle of a woman crying in front of an audience.
“Whatever,” I shrug.
Back in my room, I pull the curtains closed and sit on my bed with the darkness enveloping me. Speaking telepathically to one another is an Orban privilege, one that not all of us can do. What my team doesn’t know is that I am a master of telepathy and can talk to anyone at will. What they also still don’t know is that I was one of Palzu’s troops. It has been a hard secret to keep, one that has kept me from sleeping as I lie awake aware of my betrayal. But it is better that they don’t know and I can’t bear to tell them about all the atrocities that my squadron perpetrated. They wouldn’t understand the horror of seeing bodies scattered in front of you, wouldn’t be able to fathom the gut-sucking terror that comes from being surrounded by gunfire.
Clenching my eyes closed, I have one person on my mind. Diviak… He’ll have the answers I need and I need them now. There has been a terrible feeling inside me since we crash landed here, the endless thought at the back of my mind is that Palzu must know we have escaped from Orba.
“Diviak…” I whisper into the darkness.
Silence.
“Diviak… I know you’re there. You’re always awake, always wired and ready to fight. You’re awake now, lying sleepless in the dormitory in your bunk with your eyes cast to the ceiling.”
“Voland?” he answers.
I knew he could hear me.
“Yes. It’s Voland.”
“Where are you? How are you doing that?”
“I’m speaking to you from a safe place,” I say.
“How is this happening?”
I envision him sitting bolt upright in his bed, his eyes wild and darting as he looks for me.
“It’s happening because I am in your mind,” I explain.
My words do nothing to placate the anxiety within him.
“You’re telepathic!” he gasps. “I never knew that.”
“There’s a lot you don’t know,” I tell him.
He’s quiet for a moment but I can hear his heavy breathing, can sense the nervousness in his body. I can almost taste the sweat that’s forming on his brow. For a second I can hear something flapping, the sound of something being repeatedly hit off a wall. I realize it’s his tail flicking back and forth. I remember the nervous habit of his and how his tail often seemed to have a mind of its own when he was worried.
“Voland?” he says with a tinge of fear making his voice quiver. “Where are you? People are looking for you.”
“They are?”
“Yes! You stole a shuttle and escaped to Earth.”
My heart thuds in my chest.
“Wait, how do you know I’m on Earth?”
There was an awkward silence. I hear him part his lips to speak before he closes them again.
“Because all the shuttles are traceable,” he says. “Palzu tracked your journey. Troops are already on their way.”
Shit! It won’t be long until they know where we are.
“Thank you for being so honest with me, Diviak.”
“I sh-shouldn’t have said a word!” he stammers. “I could be in so much trouble for this! If they find out I’ve been speaking to you… What will they do?”
“Calm down, please. I will say goodbye to you now.”
His breathing becomes heavier.
“Good luck, Voland. I think you need it.”
I know what I should do but it makes me feel terrible like I am some sort of traitor. I need to lie to my crew, tell them something that is little more than a figment of my imagination, but I know that if they believe me, it may save their lives.
I ventured outside and told them I was working on the shuttle, attempting to fix the damage that was created when we crashed. They never questioned me or assumed I was doing something else. They are such trusting people, such kind and lovely Orbans, and that makes me feel guilty. I should not lie to them, but I know that I must. Standing outside the door to the apartment, I flex my fingers in and out and I can feel how my hands are hot and sweaty. My heart is beating fast with the fear that if I say the wrong thing, they may discover my real identity. I always was a terrible liar. I remember how my mother always knew if I was stealing food because my face would shine bright red when I lied. I hope it’s a habit I’ve grown out of. I press my hands to my cheeks and hope it’ll somehow stop them from flaring up.
“Just relax, Voland. You’re doing the right thing.”
Taking a deep breath, I burst through the door. Everyone turns to stare at me, their jaws dropping open at seeing my melodramatic entrance.
“We’re being followed!” I yell.
Then for added drama, I spin around and look through the peephole to make me look extra paranoid.
“Followed?”
“I saw them,” I take a deep breath and begin to explain. “When I was out fixing the shuttle I could see them, in the sky!”
“See what?” Benzen asks.
“More shuttles!” I ball my hands into fists and wave them at him infuriated. “Palzu has sent people to us. They have followed us! We are on the cusp of being discovered, Benzen,”
Everyone gasps.
“What do we do?” Ethazol panics.
“We split up,” I say.
“What?” Draygus seems annoyed at the idea. “Why would we do such a thing? Our whole Orban race is about community about sticking together! Don’t you remember Voland? I think you’ve lost your mind,”
“Look,” I explain through gritted teeth. “I am your leader, in a way, and you must do as I say. I know we are meant to stick together and that has made us survive thus far but… If we stay together now, we are simply a large target. If we split up and move around, we will be difficult to zone in on.”
Everyone looks at each other, their faces scrunched up with concern as a tense silence hangs in the room.
“Ok,” Draygus says as he lowers his head.
Although we didn’t know each other for long, saying goodbye was painful. As I leave everyone behind, saying farewell in the apartment building foyer, I walk aimlessly. I still feel awful for lying but splitting up is the best thing to do. I was telling the truth about one thing, we’ll be a more difficult target to catch if we’re spread out. Maybe this way Palzu will realize capturing us is futile, maybe he’ll realize that we were smarter than he anticipated. Or maybe we’ll all be captured and taken back to Orba. At this point, my mind is a mess but all I know is that we need to make it as difficult as possible to catch us. I also have a little trick up my sleeve, or rather a communicator.
There are so many secrets I’ve been keeping from the crew, and one of them is that in the privacy of my room, while everyone has been asleep, I’ve been making something. It was difficult at first, but with parts I salvaged from the wrecked shuttle, I managed to create a little communicator like those we have back on Orba. It is not too different from the human cellphone, a small device in which people can call each other. Except mine does not depend on signals and it cannot run out of battery.
I hold it in my hand now as I plan my next move. It’s all very well splitting up to hide from Palzu but there needs to be something else to help us escape him, something a little sneakier.
Arriving at the train station, I buy a ticket, Alison once told us how to take human transport, and I jump on board a train heading north. Of course, the things seem so strange and primitive to me. They run on fuel that damages the planet and are immeasurably slow. At best, they can be described as a predecessor to the Orban solar shuttle, a form of transport for royalty that moves at the speed of light.
Taking my seat, I relax back and think of the crew I just said goodbye to. For a moment, I thought I was close to tears but had swallowed them back before anyone could see me cry. It is not the Orban way to show such feeble emotion and they would no doubt fuss over me and make me stay behind if they knew how sad I was to leave them.
The countryside rolls past the window. I marvel at the beauty of the ever-changing landscape. One moment we are in the city then the next we are out in the middle of nowhere with fields rushing past the window.
Looking up and down the carriage, I see that there are only two other people near me, a young boy with his head in a book and an old lady who appears to be tangling string together with two threatening looking needle-like devices. I wonder if she is an assassin, after all, who would need to own such implements unless they had to kill people. But as I study her face and frail body, I see that she is not a threat. Still, I keep my eye on the needles.
Closing my eyes, I lean forward so that my head is in my lap. Looking at my skin, I see that it has turned blue again. It always does when I know I am not being watched. Although, I’ll be able to switch back to a more human color in the blink of an eye if I need to.
“Diviak…” I whisper.
I know he can hear me, I can sense his presence.
“Voland? What are you doing now?”
I imagine him in the army compound, the desert dust kicking up a storm around the barracks as he runs ahead of his comrades. They’re in training, sweating as they run the circuit they do every morning.
“Diviak. I need your advice.”
“No, Voland!”
He swats at his face as though he’s trying to flick away my voice.
“Yes, Diviak. I need you to do something for me.”
“You’re going to get me in a shit ton of trouble, brother. Sorry, I can’t help you.”
I take a deep breath and stay silent for a moment before saying:
“You must.”
I see him stop running. He bends over to c
atch his breath, his hands resting on his thighs as his sweat drips into the sand. The other troops run past him, their boots kicking up sand as they run.
“Saurad,” I say. “You once worked alongside him, didn’t you?”
“Yes,” Diviak says. “Why?”
“I need to speak to him.”
“You can’t! He’s Palzu’s most trusted advisor. He’s impossible to reach. He is psychically defended too so will not be accessible via this little telepathic party trick of yours.”
“I know. I have a communicator. I just need his coordinates.”
“Are you fucking crazy?”
“Maybe.”
“What the hell do you want from me?”
“The coordinates. Do you have them?”
His tail begins to flap from side to side.
“I do,” he sighs. “But if I hand them over, will you leave me alone for good? I can’t stand hearing your voice in my head.”
“I’ll leave you alone, Diviak. That, I can promise you.”
“Ok,” he relents. “Listen carefully. I’m only going to tell you them once and I swear that if you tell anyone where you got them from, I’ll have to kill you.”
I chuckle to myself at the thought of him traversing the galaxy to find me on Earth.
“Very well,” I say. “Give me them.”
It’s dark outside now and the train is still speeding through town after town, the sporadic cluster of streetlamps punctuating the seemingly infinite darkness of the countryside. Diviak had given me the coordinates for Saurad and I immediately punched them into the communicator. But I still haven’t called.
I’m not quite sure why. I’m just nervous I guess. I’m scared that he will be able to track and find me or worse, he knows where I am already. I’m scared that he’ll answer and I’ll open my mouth to speak but no words will come out, I’ll just be a bag of nerves and wheeze something incomprehensible out.
The train slows to a stop as we arrive at another town. Looking out the window I see we are in a place called Darlington. The old woman with the needles jumps down onto the platform clutching a little plastic bag of string. What is all that stuff? Meanwhile, the young boy snores loudly with his head leaning against the glass, his mouth hanging open as if he’s set a trap for some tasty flies.