“Why are you in such a hurry to leave?
Aidan couldn’t tell if Michael understood the implications of what was taking shape.
“Albin’s bleeding, Michael. It could be serious. This has all gone way too far.”
“Albin?”
Of course Michael wouldn’t know the name of a misfit. Why would he? Aidan pointed to Albin with his chin, feeling helpless to save him.
“Oh.” Michael didn’t have anything else to add except, “and what about it?”
“Let us go, Michael. We won’t tell anybody about what happened here, but just let us leave. Now.”
Michael gave him another vague and condescending smile.
“And why would I do that?”
Their fate now rested in Aidan’s ability to reason with Michael. More than ever he regretted his accident and its consequences that had led him to this narrow room.
“Because we’ve been friends since elementary school. Because you live two houses down from mine, and that our fathers have lunch together every Tuesday. Because I introduced you to my cousin that you’re still going out with...because I’m positive you don’t really want to end up in prison for murder.”
Michael turned away from Aidan, but this time he seemed to be thinking. The minutes felt like hours, and the seconds stretched out like molten glass threads. Then begrudgingly, but also because it was necessary, he called off his bloodthirsty dogs. That’s when Aidan realized he’d been holding his breath during Michael’s silence.
Michael was even able to control Timmy. His birth right gave him that power, and he only had to shoot one icy look at Timmy to turn him into a frightened poodle. Reluctantly, and only because they had been ordered, the rest of his clan settled Albin back into his chair, looking disgusted that they had to touch him. They took care to avoid eye contact with any of Albin’s group. They had yet to feel ashamed, but that would come later. They then stepped out of the way for the slower-moving ones, staring fixedly at the floor where streams of blood flowed dark and incriminating. Customers as well as employees continued to ignore whatever didn’t concern them, skewing the respect for privacy a little further than necessary.
Aidan, the last to leave, was heading out the door when Michael called out to him.
“Aidan, I listened to you this time. For old times’ sake, for who you used to be. From now on, I don’t know you. And if you ask me for anything else, I won’t even hear you.”
Aidan exited, aware that things would never be the same as before.
When they had gotten a good distance away from the ice cream parlor, Albin winced from the effort and wished he hadn’t said no to the power wheelchair they’d offered him. They stopped at a small, well-worn plot of land inhabited by a few stray pigeons. Albin’s leg was broken, and the bone had pierced through the skin causing blood to flow through his jeans. He had a swollen face and a deep neck wound where his vital fluid was gushing out. And probably other wounds that weren’t visible, but he didn’t complain. They knew perfectly well that they would have to find their teachers, make up a story about Albin’s injury, and get him fast to a hospital because his break was serious. Sara’s cheek where blood beaded up into grass-like blades also needed medical care. But first they had to catch their breath.
Cosmo thanked Aidan, and the others signaled their approval—they didn’t have the strength to carry on a normal conversation. Except Arthur, who spoke in a frightened child-like voice.
“I’d rather be on Lalea. We would’ve been safe there.”
They nodded their heads, forgetting about the clawed monsters who roamed at night, the roads with the dramatic weather changes, and the innumerable unknown dangers. Lalea was becoming their dream haven, a long-lost refuge where children were heroes, and where they fit in.
As Aidan watched Albin pull at his jeans to adjust his leg into a more normal-looking angle, he realized how powerful he was, this guy that he’d viewed as an annoying, spineless puppet. For the first time perhaps since they’d met, he spoke directly to him.
“Albin, I’d like to say something to you. That was really brave of you to defend Sara. And to charge them like you did, particularly considering they were stronger and you were outnumbered. I’m not sure I could’ve done what you did. You should be really proud of yourself.”
What Albin said back is something he would never forget. That was when he realized misfits weren’t different from the rest of humanity. And that was when he stopped feeling superior to them.
“Just because we can’t hold our heads high doesn’t mean we don’t deserve to,” Albin replied.
He then thanked Aidan for his help, opening the door to their reconciliation. But it was his first sentence that had been the most important. Just because we can’t hold our heads high doesn’t mean we don’t deserve to.
CHAPTER 15 THE MOST LOGICAL PROOF ISN’T ALWAYS THE BEST
After the unsettling event, it became clearer to every one of the outcast travelers that their priority would be Lalea. They wholeheartedly believed that if they could accomplish their mission on Lalea, things would work out better for them in their universe. They had given the lamest excuses for what had happened, which everyone seemed to believe. Maybe it was because they didn’t really want to hear the real story. Only Merlin got the full account, which, in a way, reassured him. Whatever they might encounter on the other side, it couldn’t be worse than what they had already experienced. But it had been a long time since Merlin had visited Lalea.
They left, hand in hand, in the unbreakable circle. They arrived on the road to Midway, just past Toutem. A yellow snake lying in front of them blocked them from making a detour, only one way, one road to follow.
There was only one difference, and it was significant. Night had fallen. Aidan, who hadn’t experienced being locked up in a hole, didn’t understand their trepidation about the darkness. The field grass seemed taller than usual, perfect for hiding any odious creature hoping to spy on them. Only Arthur, demonstrating once again his legendary absent-mindedness, seemed just as puzzled as Aidan by their companions’ fears. Sara, in a barely audible voice, explained the reason and warned them to avoid making any noise that could resonate into the obscurity and attract the ravenous creatures. As Aidan was about to express regret that they hadn’t brought weapons with them, Titiana turned towards him. Beneath a silver moonbeam, he glimpsed sadness in her face when she responded to him.
“There are no weapons on Lalea. There never have been, and there is no chance there ever will be. Lalea is peace.”
Aidan couldn’t shake off an unpleasant feeling that she had read his thoughts, and that she was sorry, not about the absence of weapons, but that he hadn’t understood this absence. More than likely this was why he hadn’t retorted that clawed monsters weren’t the best role model for peace. And of course they had yet to see the army that Scarface was raising as he patiently awaited their arrival.
The road leading them to Scarface was dark with no stars to guide them. Only a distant moon that might have lit up their path if it hadn’t been fixated on Titiana, creating a shimmering halo of light on her, a stunning ornament that she wore with panache as she led the way. The first time, in fact, that she had ever taken the lead. Albin in his desire to be the hero, had wanted to pull her back, but Cosmo had stopped him. More observant, he had noticed that Titiana radiated a strength that was both luminous and confident. He couldn’t tell where it had come from, or when it had begun, but he had a vague feeling that it was coming to Titiana from that unique spot, there far ahead of them. As Cosmo despised vague feelings, he wanted to verify what made it plausible. His scientific nature had finally pushed him beyond the absurd. Since he could no longer base anything on his dearly acquired knowledge, Cosmo would have to rely on the empirical method. Simply let Lalea reveal its effect on the personalities of each classmate. He had no way to gauge any difference in Aidan and wished he knew him better. Despite paying close attention, Cosmo hadn’t yet noticed that he too had changed
. His ability to accept all the oddities of their journey was the most glaring proof of all. But he wasn’t ready to admit such a radical change. If the world transformed him, he could no longer put any faith in who he was. He needed to have at least one constant. And like a true scientist, he was perfectly capable of finding a reason for everything, including small changes in his behavior.
They traveled through the night until the break of dawn. Not a single monster or enemy attacked them. Often, Albin thought he heard footsteps from behind, imagined seeing hairy figures creeping in the rustling grass, and once or twice felt he’d heard a demented laugh, feverishly high-pitched, echoing like it was bouncing off mountains, yet distant enough that maybe he’d been mistaken. Perhaps he was being too wary, but he’d rather be on guard in case the moon decided it no longer wanted to share its light and power with Titiana. Because without knowing how or why, he’d come to the same conclusion as Cosmo—Titiana was protecting them from the monsters following them. Albin dreaded the moon’s disappearance and had noticed there was only one of them compared to the four suns. This difference bothered him. He didn’t relax until the morning came, which arrived all of a sudden instead of slowly evolving towards dawn. As if a faraway god had turned on a light switch, a gigantic one. Their forays on Lalea had stirred Albin’s imagination.
The scenery changed progressively around them. Little by little, trees appeared, lining the road with their branches. At first, they were spaced out and then grew closer and closer at regular intervals until becoming a thick forest. Their translucent leaves turned darker, their branches multiplied, and roots like brazen earthworms crisscrossed their path. Then all of a sudden, the trees blocked their view and had surrounded them. Turning back around, Sara could no longer see the fields they had crossed. Taller and taller, the trail allowed only a small sliver of light to filter through, just enough to make out a narrow trail of what had been their road. They weren’t feeling claustrophobic, at least not until they reached the heart of the forest. When the leaves lost their emerald color, when the trunks looked surreal, flaccid as balls that had lost their bounce, when the trail narrowed to a fragile brush stroke, only then did they realize their vulnerability in the forest hollow. Albin sensed that they were being watched, spied on, even followed. This forest could easily be a refuge for any monsters that abhorred the light. He was so fixated on checking behind them to counter a surprise attack that he failed to notice the absence of any animals except for the imagined ones. An absence that he wouldn’t have found reassuring. He also failed to notice that the leaves had spanned out to the size of platters, and that leaves, trunks, branches, and roots had progressed to blue. The light filtering in turned everything to an iridescent ocean color, even the air had assumed a nuance of blue. The forest looked nothing like it had when they had entered it. The trunks were big enough to house entire families; all six of them holding hands would barely have made it around one.
They were surrounded, and not only by trees. They felt it but couldn’t prove it. A sudden bend of a branch, a shadow that jumped, scarcely hidden eyes watching them. The forest was haunted, and it wasn’t a figment of their imagination.
They had reached the very heart of the forest. A suffocation of blue completely submersed their skin, hair, clothes to an array of blues from indigo to turquoise. They stopped all at once, reaching that point of not being able to handle it anymore.
They were alone, six teenagers lost in a much too blue forest, when suddenly they had company. Hundreds of them jumped out from behind cramped branches, furry, unnaturally calm animals. Dozens of the odd creatures surrounded them. Everywhere was covered with them, the ground and the trees and as far away as they were able to see. They didn’t act threatening, and they weren’t very big, but there were so many of them. The moment they appeared, in a blink of the eye, Albin was on guard, whereas Aidan wished that could have at least brought a knife with them. Albin didn’t relax until he realized at the same time as Arthur that the creatures surrounding them were the same animals that they had mistaken for mechanical dolls. Schlirbs of all sizes, skin as blue as the trees, were staring at them with their big eyes, deep blue and friendly.
The schlirbs studied them with the same curiosity as their own. Sara, paying closer attention, noticed a mother holding a child against her chest, an old male with a curved spine and white hairy head, a group of playful young ones. None seemed scared or even surprised to see them.
The space was inundated with schlirbs, some smiling invitingly with cheeks raised high in cartoonish grins, almost grimaces. In different circumstances, the travelers would have burst into laughter, but in the state they were in, only Arthur stifled a giggle with hands covering his mouth, and then exploded into a guffaw. He broke the tension that had gripped them since the previous night as well as the past few days.
Fascinated by the noise, a young schlirb approached timidly. Its mother called to it, and it ignored her orders. Listening to them, Albin understood the reason for their name. The noises they made sounded a bit like “shlirb, schlirb, schlirb, schliiirb.” It wasn’t a very sophisticated name, but at least it made sense. The schlirb stopped a few inches from Arthur, enough distance to run away in case he tried to capture it.
Arthur had no such intention. He knelt down to get a better look, as the schlirb, hesitating between staying or running away, stood up on its hind legs and then sat back down. Behind Arthur, his friends remained wary, and Albin stared hard at the schlirbs closest to him, watching out for any stray impulse to attack. Consciously or not, the schlirbs imitated him by studying the interaction between the stranger and one of their young members.
The schlirb with its big chestnut brown pupils looked straight into Arthur’s eyes. It held out a hand with four fingers, each with suction-like tips. It waved it before placing it on Arthur for a fraction of a second. Still getting no reaction, the schlirb got up the nerve to place its delicate paw on him again, this time a little longer, then touched Arthur’s clothes and next his face. It seemed amused by the differences, and even laughed, its tiny shoulders shaking with joy as it picked at Arthur’s hair. Its gestures became more warmhearted when it glided its palm gently over Arthur’s cheeks and then gave in to an urge to cradle his face.
Judging the hug as an act of aggression, Albin tried to rush over to Arthur, but Cosmo restrained him. He had noticed the rest of the schlirbs letting loose a big sigh of relief; the schlirb had just adopted Arthur. An unusual adoption since the schlirb was so tiny that its hands couldn’t clasp all the way around Arthur’s neck. Lost in the hug Arthur had instinctively given it, but with enough room to reveal its contented little face.
Arthur gently stroked the schlirb’s back, saying words like “good animal, good animal.” The schlirb mimicked him, but adapted the words to fit its speech, “shlirgood, schlirgood.” A rudimentary conversation that Albin rudely interrupted. He opined that since the schlirbs weren’t posing any big danger, why waste any more time there. He didn’t remember demonstrations of interracial happiness being part of their mission.
With sadness yet convinced Albin’s was right, Arthur tried to set the schlirb on the ground and return it to its family. But it stubbornly grabbed Arthur, its thin arms holding him tight with all its force. Arthur raised his head, taking a long look at each of his travel companions, a plea for help. Every one of them looked away. Except for Albin who strode over to Arthur and his accessory and grabbed the smaller one in an attempt to separate them. The pain from having its arms pulled spread across its face as it let out a heart-wrenching cry of distress, staring straight at Arthur, begging or accusing him, and visibly wishing for help that Arthur couldn’t refuse. In a hoarse yet firm voice, he told Albin to let go. If the schlirb didn’t want him to leave, he would take it with him. Furthermore, Arthur challenged any of them to say no. Arthur’s determination eroded Albin’s newfound authority, and no one saw a major problem with having a new travel companion. Even Cosmo, a fanatic for orderliness, had nothing to say
. What he didn’t admit when he refused to support Albin was that he was looking forward to studying these strange blue creatures, these rather crazy, hairless marsupials called schlirbs.
Later they would learn why the absence of schlirbs hanging around them had often disturbed the people they’d met. At every wedding celebration, a well-wisher gave a schlirb as a gift that was received after a special ritual was performed. The schlirb would be a guardian for the children to come and a support for the one who took care of it. No parent would have allowed their children to roam the streets without at least one schlirb accompanying them. Unless they were such bad sorts that even schlirbs wouldn’t have anything to do with them. And everyone put faith in the judgment of these blue chatterboxes.
They were off again to Midway. The road began to widen, and the leaves on the trees returned to green. The schlirb, refusing to let go of Arthur, kept squirming around to get a good view of the road and to make cute faces at the others. Charmed by it, Sara walked over to Arthur.
“You should give it a name.”
“A name?”
“Of course. We can’t keep calling it ‘the schlirb,’ it lacks dignity. First we need to know if it’s a male or female, right?”
“I don’t know. How would we know?”
“Maybe it’s the same as for us. I’ll take a look...”
Arthur lifted the schlirb from his torso, trying to stop it from fidgeting so they could scrutinize the groin area. During these attempts, Cosmo and Aidan began placing bets on its gender. Aidan was sure it was a boy, Sara and Cosmo, a girl, and Arthur couldn’t make up his mind. Titiana, standing at a distance, seemed indifferent to the discussion, and Albin grumbled. Noticing the muttering, Aidan looked up and challenged him to guess the gender of the schlirb. With an ironic smile and a dangerous look, Albin rejoined the group and pointed at different places on the schlirb.
Far Side of the Universe Page 9