A Stranger Thing (The Ever-Expanding Universe)

by Leicht, Martin

  • • •

  My father seems to want to be alone with his thoughts, so I climb up to the front seat, snuggled next to Cole for warmth as he mushes our dogs, following the path laid out by Oates. Honestly, he’s not too bad at it. My Coley may just have a future in dogsledding.

  I guess all this wind and sun is really getting to me, because before I know it, I’m waking up from a nap I didn’t realize I’d taken. Cole’s left arm is wrapped around me tightly and my head is on his shoulder. We are still mushing.

  I may or may not have drooled a little.

  “How long was I out?” I ask Cole, straightening up to relieve my achy back. He loosens his grip around my waist to give me some wiggle room but doesn’t reposition his arm.

  “About an hour, probably. I figured I’d let you sleep, since you’ve been getting up so much with O-Co lately.”

  I blink, surprised. “That was really sweet, Cole, thanks.” He’s smiling off into the distance, a happy, thoughtful smile I’ve never seen before. It looks nice on him. “What are you thinking about?” I ask as I snuggle into him a little closer.

  He shakes his head. “It’s silly.”

  “Tell me.”

  He looks down at me, and I set my chin on his shoulder so that I’m looking up into those gorgeous blue-green-blue eyes, and that constellation of freckles on his left cheek that I’ve always been so smitten with. “It’s just . . . ,” he begins. “When I was a kid, I knew exactly what kind of car I wanted. A red Apple Caracal. I was, like, five,” he says defensively when I start to laugh. I bite my cheeks and nod, urging him to go on. “And, anyway, I had it all figured out—I mean, what color the car would be, and what I’d look like when I drove it, and even where everyone in my family would sit. And while you were sleeping, I . . .” He scrunches up his face, like he knows what he’s about to say is ridiculously goofy. Which, of course, only makes me want to hear it more. “I realized,” he finishes, gesturing to the sled around him, “that I pretty much have exactly what I dreamed up when I was five.”

  “You dreamed that your Caracal would be pulled by dogs, and that my dad would be snoring in the backseat?”

  Cole laughs. “No,” he says. “I dreamed that I’d be at the wheel, with a pretty lady at my side, and a baby snoring in the backseat. Driving to my mother’s for Christmas dinner.” He shakes the bittersweet memory from his head. “I told you it was silly. I was five.”

  “I think it’s sweet.”

  “You do?”

  I nod. “I used to think about stuff like that too,” I tell him.

  “Oh yeah?”

  I settle my head back on his shoulder. “Yep. Only in mine it was a Mark VI, and I was heading to my job at NASA. And, obviously, I was the one driving.”

  Cole grins. “That’s my Elvs,” he says. “I guess I’m fine with sitting in the passenger seat sometimes.”

  “Cole?” I whisper, pulling away slightly.

  “Mmm?”

  And I’m just about to tell him, when I happen to glance over his shoulder to the other sled . . . where Zee is glaring daggers at us. For some reason that stops me before I get started.

  “Nothing,” I whisper. I lean my head back down on his shoulder. And I decide not to tell him. It’s not important anyway.

  Only that . . . when I dreamed of driving my car around as a five-year-old, there was no guy in the passenger seat.

  • • •

  Oates declares that we should stop for the evening right around the time my large intestine feels like it’s ready to eat itself, but since I don’t have a watch and the sun is wonky round these parts, I have absolutely no idea what time it is. Eight o’clock, maybe? It’s certainly time for dinner.

  We pitch our tent with relative ease, although I cringe every time Oates hammers one of the grounding spike thin-gees into the ice. I know the ice is hellz thick, but we’re still going to be sleeping on top of nothing but a layer of flipping frozen water. I’m pretty sure I’m going to have nightmares about drowning in a glass of iced tea.

  Dinner is another scrumptious affair. This time I try spreading a little protein gel on top of my hardtack to give it a bit of flavor. The experiment is a failure. Meanwhile, Oates has a pot filled with water boiling over the heating pod to make his precious tea.

  “Are you sure that’s safe?” I ask for, like, the umpteenth time. “We’re not going to melt through or anything, are we?” Oates looks up at me and, very seriously, gives me a shrug. I can feel a pit forming in my stomach, and then after giving me an appropriate amount of time to panic, he gives me a smile. And I can’t help but chuckle in nervous relief.

  “I’d just like to say, sir,” Dad says, chewing on a piece of pemmican, “that it is a great honor to be out adventuring with the great explorer Captain Lawrence Titus Oates.”

  Oates’s smile fades, and he focuses again on the water for his tea.

  “Were you, like, famous?” I ask, curious. Dad is a big buff on explorers and expeditions, like Columbus to the New World, Magellan circumnavigating the globe, Sergio Altair traveling through the volcanoes of Tharsis on Mars, and whatnot. I think he just got a kick out of reading all the manifests and journals detailing the explorers’ intricate plans to not die while doing something that, at the time, seemed absolutely crazy.

  “Famous?” Dad says, as if I’ve just said the most insulting thing ever. “Why, Captain Oates is legendary.”

  “Legends are tales told to make sense of the senseless,” Oates says. “And rarely do they hold much in the way of value or truth.”

  “Word,” Bernard agrees.

  I roll my eyes. Now my curiosity is piqued about this man—or Almiri, whatever—who keeps showing new layers itty bit by itty bit. But his face has grown dark, and I’m pretty sure he’s done talking on the subject. “Well, whoever you are,” I tell him, “I’m glad to have you on our side.”

  “That’s it.” Zee slaps her can of pemmican down on the heating pod, knocking it from its snow perch.

  “Careful!” Oates hollers, grabbing the pod at its base. “This is a vital piece of equipment, and if it breaks—”

  “I’ve had enough of this Kumbaya shit,” Zee screeches. “Elvan.” She turns to me. “This man is not ‘on your side.’ Nor is this twit.” She waves a dismissive hand at Cole.

  It’s my turn to slap down my food. “Oh, but you’re on my side?” I snap back.

  “More than you know, Elvan.” Zee shakes her head at me sadly. “I’ve been trying to help you since the day you were born.”

  I snort. “Yeah, it was really helpful how you were always not there at all,” I tell her.

  My father puts a hand on my arm, as though to shut me up, so I do. But only for him.

  The wind rattles eerily.

  “I think it’s well past time for me to turn in,” Oates says suddenly. “I’d advise all of you to do the same shortly. You will need your rest.”

  The sun, by the way, is blindingly bright at this point. I swear, I’ll never get used to this.

  “I know I’m beat,” Bernard adds, and he’s gone too.

  Cole remains on his ice chair until my father stands and offers him a hand.

  “Cole?” he says.

  “Oh, thanks, Mr. Nara, but I’m not ti—”

  “Come on, son.”

  Cole looks from me then to Zee, but I refuse to meet his gaze. I don’t exactly want to sit out here and fight with my mother . . . but I don’t not want to either.

  Finally Cole makes up his mind. “I’ll be right inside the tent if you need me, ’kay, Elvs?”

  Where else would you be? I think. Honolulu? But I offer him a tight smile.

  It is silent between Zee and me for a long time. I listen to the muffled sounds of the men rolling out their sleeping bags in the tent, settling in for the night. Pontius snuggles happily at my legs, and I pet his warm, thick coat, not thinking much of anything.

  “I loved your father, you know,” my mother says at last. “Leaving him—leav
ing you both—was one of the hardest things I’ve ever had to do.”

  “Guess you never tried Zumba,” I say to the ground.

  After a few more moments of awkward silence I finally pipe up again. “Why did Dad think your name was Olivia?”

  Zee tosses a pebble of ice into the distance absentmindedly, like she’s skipping stones on a lake. “Olivia was the name I took on when I . . .” She trails off. Shakes her head, as though she’s started the story at a bad angle. She purses her lips and tries again. “I was born Zada Khoury,” she says softly. “My mother was human. She had no idea that there was anything unusual about me, or that my father was Almiri. Even the Almiri didn’t know about me at first—my father, for his own reasons, chose to hide his indiscretion from his comrades. But when I was just about your age, the Almiri found out what I was and came for me.”

  I know that my mom is telling me all this because she needs me to understand some things. And okay, yeah, I’m interested. How many times did I dream of having this very conversation with my mother—where she came from, and where she went? Only somehow, in my dreams, it went very, very differently. I scratch Pontius a little harder behind the ears and do my best to listen.

  “I had to run,” she says, “and hide. No matter where I went, the Almiri did their best to smoke me out. I was young, and terrified, and . . .” Her eyes drift to the distance, where she’s tossed the stone. “One day I woke up, and I decided it was time to start fighting back. I ferreted out more people like me, clusters of Enosi who had also been in hiding, and we learned to help one another. We started to organize. I knew it was exactly what I was meant to be doing. And then, well . . . then I met your father.” She picks up another ice pebble but doesn’t throw it, just studies it in her hand. “I thought I could go back to being human, I really did. I changed my name and tried to forget what I was. I suppose deep down I knew I couldn’t hide in plain sight forever. I always lived just on the edge of fear, worried they’d track me down sooner or later. But it was a lovely, lovely dream, being with your father, one I didn’t want to wake up from.” She looks up at the sky. “But when I discovered I was pregnant . . . well, I guess I thought there was a chance that if I wasn’t around, the Almiri wouldn’t ever find you. If you were just a little girl with a human father, they’d never . . . so I left.” She looks at me finally, staring so intently that it’s unnerving. “And I know you’d do exactly the same thing, Elvan, if you thought it would help your daughter.”

  I close my eyes. Picture my precious baby. Would I do the same? Would I abandon my daughter in hopes of protecting her? Honestly, I’m not sure. What I do know is that I’m thoroughly tuckered out.

  I’m about to tell my mother good night, that we’ll work on Mother-Daughter Bonding Round Two tomorrow, but she beats me to the punch.

  “I want you to end your relationship with that Almiri boy,” she tells me.

  “Excuse me?” I say, practically choking on the last traces of my pemmican.

  “I said that I want you—”

  “I heard what you said,” I interrupt. “I’m just shocked you think it’s any of your business.” And that at least has her stunned enough that I manage to get out another sentence. “That Almiri boy’s name,” I tell her, “is Cole Archer. And maybe you had a good reason for leaving me and Dad. I believe that, really. But you left. And you can’t just expect that everything that happened while you were gone is yours to change.” I give Pontius one last pat, then rise to my feet. “I will see you in the morning,” I say.

  Zee does not wish me good night.

  Two minutes later I find myself with the others, slipped into our thermal bags—which are, for serious, crammed right up against each other. I listen to the breathing of my traveling companions slow as they nod off, one after the next, and I wonder how so much tension and awkwardness can fit into such a tiny tent. I squeeze my eyes closed, but sleep doesn’t come.

  “Elvs,” Cole whispers softly into my ear as we snuggle much too closely. I guess he can’t sleep either. “Elvs?”

  I shift my ear toward him so he knows I’m listening, but I don’t respond.

  “It must be nice to have your mom back,” he whispers. “After all this time. Right?”

  I think about Cole’s dream of driving to his mother’s home in Milwaukee with his imaginary family for Christmas. I think about how, thanks to the illness that took her life more than two years before I met Cole, that’s never going to happen. And suddenly I feel very guilty for the way I’ve behaved with my own mother. Not for her sake—but for his.

  I close my eyes against the still-bright evening outside the tent, and do my utmost to settle into sleep.

  • • •

  I do not sleep well. I would toss and turn, except that there’s nowhere to toss and turn to. I can’t help wishing that now that my mother is finally in my life, I could find a way to make more of an effort to stop being such a raging asshat to her all the time. But then I do some more not-tossing-and-turning and wonder, Why isn’t she the one making the effort?

  When I finally drift off, I have fitful dreams filled with the eerie thunder from the day of our arrival.

  Crack-BOOM!

  Crack-BOOM!

  “Wake up!” comes the call, much too early. Someone is shaking me. “Elvs, wake up!” Cole. I must’ve slept more deeply than I thought.

  “Cole?” I sit straight up, bringing the top half of my sleeping bag with me. Outside the tent I can here Oates shouting and the dogs howling. “What’s going on?”

  “I don’t know,” Cole says, “but Oates is freaked out. We have to move now.”

  Cole looks sufficiently freaked himself, inspiring me to jump straight out of my sleeping bag and into my boots and thermal. I’m pulling the last boot on, the thermal dangling off one arm, as I come hopping out of the tent. And that’s when I see it. The meter-wide hole in the ice, just at the edge of the dogs’ tarp.

  “Oates!” I shriek. “What happened? What’s going on?”

  “Stop standing around, girl, and grab the gear!” he shouts at me. There is another thunderclap.

  CRACK-BOOM!

  “A storm?” I ask, still fuzzy. The dogs are going apeshit, and Oates has a hell of a time getting them into their harnesses.

  “That’s no storm,” Oates says as he wrestles with the dogs. And that’s when I do a head count. Two sleds but only eleven dogs.

  Oh God, I think, as I look back at the hole in the ice, the black water sloshing around beneath it.

  Pontius is gone.

  Chapter Seven

  In Which our Group Realizes They’re Going to Need a Bigger Float

  “Move your ass! Move!” Oates shouts at no one in particular. He’s strapping the remaining dogs into their harnesses, while Dad and Cole frantically pack all our gear onto the sleds. Bernard and Zee, meanwhile, are whipping the tent poles out of the ice so quickly, they nearly spear me several times.

  “Leave that!” Oates says as I move to help dismantling the tent. “The food and the heating gear only!”

  “Leave the tent?” I ask, incredulous. What the hell is going on? “But what are we supposed to use for—”

  I’m cut off by another incredibly loud CRACK-BOOM! Only this time I don’t merely hear it. I feel it.

  In the ice.

  “Leave it all!” Oates shouts. “Get on the sleds!”

  Booming ice seems to be all the incentive we need. Each of us instantly drops what we’re doing and jumps aboard the sleds, me with Dad and Cole, Zee and Bernard with Oates. Oates and Cole frantically urge on the dogs, and we take off. There’s another CRACK-BOOM! which jolts the entire sled. The runners bounce up several centimeters off the ice and slam back down with a thud. But the dogs keep running, like creatures possessed. I may not have any idea what exactly it is we’re running from, but those dogs sure seem to.

  “Is the ice breaking apart?” I shout at my dad over the chaos. “I thought you guys said it couldn’t do that!” I look behind me, a
nd sure enough, the ice is breaking away. But there’s something . . . else there too.

  “What the hell is that?” I scream. Back at the campsite something beneath the ice pushes through to the surface. It’s dark and smooth, glistening with beads of water rolling down its sleek shape. The ice around it disintegrates, and our tent and all the supplies we were forced to leave behind plunge into the black water.

  The dogs yelp and skitter on, running ever faster.

  “Is that a submarine?” I holler. Holy shit. Of all the ways I imagined the Jin’Kai might track me down, this wasn’t one of them.

  But then the shadowy form turns sideways in the water. And although I’m not super up to speed on my maritime craft, even I know that submarines don’t have eyes. For a second one large black eye meets mine, and then in a flash the creature dives deep into the murky depths of the ocean again.

  What. Duh. Fuh.

  Dad hollers something at me, but I lose it in the wind. We’re whipping along far faster than we’ve gone before, the dogs tugging the sleds forward until it seems their harnesses might snap. Cole urges the dogs even faster, trying to keep pace with Oates beside us. The CRACK-BOOM!s are beginning again, closer together now, sometimes overlapping. The ice all around us trembles and cracks. I look down and see a dark shadow racing along after us under the ice.

  Hunting us.

  One jolt hits directly beneath us, and again the entire sled lifts into the air and slams back down with a smash.

  Whatever the hell is underneath us, it means business.

  I twist around in my seat to grab at a box of protein gel just before it tumbles to the ice. What few supplies we’d managed to secure are dropping quickly away, sinking down into the newly forming cracks around us.

  Suddenly Oates veers away from us, breaking hard to the right. He’s shouting something to us, but again, I can’t hear it over the cacophony of creaking ice, barking dogs, and wind. He’s pointing to his left, directly ahead of us. I turn to look. In front of us the ice is groaning and breaking free as something pushes through from below.

  “Cole!” I scream. He’s got his head down to keep the wind out of his eyes, and he doesn’t seem to hear me, so I slap him on the back. Just in time he looks up and sees where I’m pointing.