“I didn’t leave you at the auditorium because I was scared,” he told her. “I left because you told me you were coming. I respected your wishes. I’m sorry if I didn’t do something right.”
“I know you’re a good person,” she remarked. “I’m just a little…” her voice trailed off. “Hammy.”
Tim was shocked to see me there. “Hi there, Dinger,” he waved politely, anger subtly lacing his words.
Oh boy, this was going to be fun. It really was the most inconvenient time for Tim to be here, I thought bitterly. Still, I put on that fake smile able to fool a lie detector test and waved back. “Hey guys. Am I coming in at a bad time?” I asked, somewhat hopefully.
“No,” Gwen smiled, ignoring the crushed looked on Tim’s face. “We were just talking. What’s up?”
“I need your help, Gwen,” I explained.
“What for?” Tim asked.
I felt like punching him or telling him off, or doing something to make him go away. Too bad I didn’t have any real supernatural powers, or Tim wouldn’t be feeling too well at the moment – especially if he was prone to airsickness.
Tim was lucky Adam was there, and young enough to be impressionable. “I was just about to explain,” I said impatiently. Turning back to Gwen, I continued on. “Since I was so helpful to you in saving your life and everything, I was wondering if you could help me with –”
“Wait a minute,” Tim interjected. “You can’t manipulate her into helping you!”
So Tim was capable of being smart, how exciting, I thought sarcastically.
“That’s not right. You shouldn’t force her to do something because you saved her life. If you’re going to do it, why not just make her your slave?” Tim asked, his voice starting to rise.
Tim wasn’t a very good actor, I decided. Tim’s face had jealousy and anger written all over it. “I haven’t even told her what I need for her to do,” I reminded Tim. “It’s not terribly unreasonable –”
“Unreasonable to you, maybe,” Tim muttered.
“You know, if you want to make it into the next play, you might want to work on your acting skills,” I sneered, my anger and impatience getting the better of me.
“Stop it!” Gwen interrupted. “Tim, it’s fine; don’t get involved here. Geez, relax, would you?”
“No! You’re my girl and I have to protect you,” Tim insisted as he took her by the shoulders.
“I’m sure it’s just an expression, Tim –”
“What if it’s not?”
“You’re getting on my nerves. And you’re embarrassing me!” Gwen told him through pursed lips. “Let me go.”
“Yeah, why don’t you let her go?” I asked, looking at the time. “The game’s going to start in fifteen minutes. I’ve still got to get there and get my jersey on. We can deal with your pathetic issues later.”
Tim whipped around. Before he said anything, Gwen cleared her throat. “Wait!”
Both of us turned and looked at her. “What is it?” I asked, trying not to snarl.
“Didn’t you come here with your brother?”
“Yeah. That’s what I was trying to ask you about before I was so rudely –”
“Ham! Hold on,” Gwen threw up her hands. “My goodness, you are both so annoying today. Anyway, he’s gone.”
“Who?” Tim asked.
“Hammy’s brother. He’s not here anymore.”
I jerked around and looked. Gwen was right. I groaned loudly. “No, this can’t be happening! There isn’t enough time for this! I’ve got to get to the game!”
“You’re so selfish,” Tim shook his head. “Don’t you think your brother is scared? I can’t imagine how he feels right now, all alone and frightened.”
Yeah, frightened of your ugly face, probably, I wanted to say. “We’ve got to find him, fast. I need someone to watch him while the game is going on so I can play.”
“All right. You go look over in that direction,” Gwen instructed me, pointing. She turned to Tim. “Will you help us?” she asked.
He should. It was his fault Adam was lost in the first place.
As Tim nodded, Gwen tugged on his sleeve to one end of the park, while I turned towards the nearby woods.
I normally would’ve been sick at Gwen’s egregious generosity if I hadn’t been so worried about my brother – and by extension my life. Cheryl would kill me if anything happened to him.
“Adam!” I called out. I swear, if that kid wasn’t my brother, I’d probably kill him myself.
Elysian poked his head out of my backpack. “Your backpack’s starting to get wet from your sweat,” he complained.
“Elysian! I don’t have time for your whining,” I snubbed him. “Adam decided to get lost. I don’t know where he went. He could be anywhere.”
Elysian jumped out of the backpack and onto the ground. “I’ll go and help look for him over this way.” He hurried off before I could tell him Gwen and Tim were already looking over there. Elysian is too fast for his own good sometimes, I thought, half in admiration, half in aggravation.
I was just about to go over and rifle through the bushes when a prickly feeling on the back of my arm spiked my nerves. “Huh?” I looked down to see the four-point star on my wrist was glowing. It was an unfortunate confirmation. “Oh, great, what’s going to happen now?”
A moment later, I heard a familiar scream pierce the evening skies.
There’s no time to think. “Gwen!” I yelled.
A rustling sound behind me caused me to look up; Elysian poked his head out of the bushes. “Your friend is in trouble,” he announced.
“Is she okay?” I asked, a little hesitant to know the truth.
“She won’t be if you just stand there!” Elysian huffed at me. The small dragon started to transform into his larger self. “Come, we must go!” His wings popped out of the scaly sea on his back, and he took off.
I nodded and started to run, following the shadow of the flying dragon.
It was not long before I saw Gwen’s bright tresses through the trees.
“No, please, no!” Gwen was screaming. Another one of Maia’s hideous monsters, no doubt.
I could see Gwen blink the sweat out of her eyes as she dodged another attack. She tripped and fell, rolling over the ground.
“Gwen!” Tim shouted. “Let’s run for it!” Pulling on her, he practically dragged her across the grass.
I watched as my run slowed to canter, and then to a walk, and then to nothing at all; Maia suddenly appeared, blocking their path. “Augh!” Tim yelled. “This way!” he redirected his steps, heading back the other way.
I almost had to laugh; if the danger wasn’t real, it would’ve been hilarious to watch him tug Gwen around the park. He wasn’t doing himself any favors, treating her so roughly.
“Oh, pardon me,” Maia grinned as she called forth her power. A nice-sized sizzling ball of energy began forming in her hand. “I hate to be in your way.”
Tim and Gwen, now on her feet, stopped in their tracks. They knew they were in serious danger now; they had the one ugly thing coming one way, and the blue lady staring ominously at them from the other.
“Do you remember me?” Maia called out with a smile.
“Do you know this lady?” I could barely hear Tim ask.
“She’s the one who attacked all those people at the play!”
Maia laughed. “Of course it was me; all those people were very helpful –but I never did get a chance to collect your contribution to my grand purpose.”
“Leave her alone!” Tim scowled, taking out his cell phone. “Or I’ll call the police.”
Maia laughed harder. “You stupid boy! There is nothing you humans can do to stop me!” With that, Maia threw her energy ball at the two of them.
Tim pushed Gwen back just as it hit.
“Tim!” Gwen screamed as he convulsed, the power tearing at the flesh of his chest. “No!”
I couldn’t see him from my angle, but I could just make out
a rasping, “Gwen…” before he slumped over.
“Tim!” Gwen hugged him to herself as she started to cry.
And while this was happening, I stood there, paralyzed to the point where it hurt to breathe. I watched through the trees as Maia’s power continued to gravitate around Tim.
I couldn’t feel my legs, I noticed. And did I pee myself, or were my legs just uber sweaty all of a sudden?
Apparently, I’d arrived just in time to overdose on fear.
“Hamilton!” Elysian huffed. “Aren’t you going to do anything?”
“Uh…” I couldn’t even seem to speak. It’s like my tongue was swollen or my voice had been swallowed. My body started to shake as Maia continued to taunt Tim and Gwen with her power, this time hitting Gwen as well.
Gwen screamed again, this time with pain more than surprise.
I was stuck; salty water had gotten in my eyes somehow, and I still couldn’t seem to move. Someone had to do something, I thought, but there was no way I could.
I didn’t know the first thing about my so-called supernatural abilities! What would happen if my powers weren’t enough? And how would I stop them anyway? Would I have to kill them? I didn’t really want to kill anything, even if they are killers themselves. What could I do?
“Hamilton!”
“I… can’t! I can’t do this, Elysian!” I finally blurted out. Ashamed of myself, I turned my back on my friends and started to run away.
Elysian sighed. He looked up heavenward and asked, “Is this some kind of test!?” before he slithered out of the bushes in the opposite direction I was headed. “Fine! Even if my sad excuse of charge wouldn’t fight, I will!”
I ran until I couldn’t see. Tears were welling up in my eyes uncontrollably. I finally stopped running all together as they poured down my face.
I slumped over in the grass, trying to block out the sound of Gwen’s screaming and Tim’s whimpering. This was not what I wanted, I thought desperately. It had to be another bad dream or a hallucination. This can’t be real! I screamed in my head, still unsuccessfully able to hear.
I felt the fear shake through me, convulsing all through me, painfully, guiltily, stirring me up all the way from my head to my fingertips.
I didn’t want to fight, as much as I knew I should’ve. I didn’t want this to be real, as much as I knew it was. The ominous shadow of light was hovering closer.
There was nothing I could do. I was done for. I would just die.
I cuddled up on the grass and hit the ground with my fists, angry at things for not being as I wanted them to be, or at least how I’d thought they were supposed to be. “This isn’t fair!” I cried.
The truth is not always easy to take.
“Kid!” Elysian was calling out for me. “Where are you?”
Trapped in the dark corners of my mind, I barely heard Elysian calling, but there’s nothing I could do or say. It’s happening, I thought.
My powers, even though I’d never known them or even really wanted them, were surely leaving, taking hope of ever knowing the truth. My own truth was about to become a lie that would be the truth to me forever. My last defense against the relentless pursuer, the ghost who haunts me even as I try to run from him.
I don’t want this, I thought again, as I sunk further into despair. I don’t want this at all.
And yet…
There was a part of me that wished I could. I wished I could’ve wanted this. But I couldn’t. I didn’t know. I didn’t know what to do. There was nothing that I could do. I couldn’t do this.
It’s all right, something inside of me whispered. I felt the lies tangling around me, settling into my skin like new clothes. I felt my consciousness further slipping away from me, as though I were suddenly watching myself sleep. The voices, at the heart of the emptiness inside, continued to whisper – comforting me, soothing me, telling me my happiness was the most important thing, the only thing…
“Kid!” Elysian called out again; this time it was louder.
Don’t listen to that ugly dragon, the voices insisted. He is full of nonsense, stories and fairy tales…
I heard Gwen scream for help again, but my relentless hesitancy refused to let me move. Time seemed to stand still, as though I was frozen. I couldn’t help it; nothing was more important to me than myself.
“Hamilton! Your friends need you!”
I cringed, torn between retreating further and going back.
Couldn’t they understand? I didn’t know who to listen to anymore! All my life, the world said everything was relative, there were no absolutes, certainly no good or evil, there were no miracles, fate was a delusion, humans were here by accident, science was the way to see what was really true, I was in control… all these things, I believed and heard and experienced for myself… but now… now it was all circumstantial…
Either choice I went with would call for sacrifice on my part.
I started to breathe more heavily. “I… can’t do this…”
Calm down, the voice inside said. It’ll be all over in a moment, just allow yourself to relax…
But I don’t listen this time.
“I… am afraid,” I admitted. Somehow, the hold on me seemed to grow weaker. “I am afraid to fight.”
“Kid! Are you listening to me!?” Elysian called out.
I opened my eyes, slowly. The grass came into focus slowly. “I need help,” I realized. “I need help to fight. I need help to save my friends. I can’t do this on my own!”
All of a sudden, the wind blew back, shaking through the trees, stripping my world of all traces of blurriness and bleariness. The leaves scattered all around, and I was caught up in a burst of light.
My mouth gaped open. “Huh?” I stood up, wiping my hands on my jeans and looking around. The woods had just been filled with a blinding, warm light.
Then I understood.
My fear had been covered up by the world’s lies, but the truth was breaking through, like the breaking dawn after twilight.
I gasped as the light, blazing, pierced straight through to my heart.
And then I saw him. The one who had been pursuing me.
A man with bronze skin, and fiery eyes, who wore a golden crown on his white hair… The man wasn’t old, but he was not young; he seemed beyond time, beyond measure, somehow. I couldn’t look at him directly, but the picture was burned into my mind with a startling clarity.
The man smiled gently, like a friend from long ago. “Rise up, and believe,” he whispered. “I am here with you.” He pointed to my right hand; I looked down to see my mark glowing again. I glanced back up, wanting to ask him the questions for which I had no words.
The one that did manage to leak out was, “Who are you?”
It sounded so hollow and weak I would’ve hit myself. But the man just looked at me and he said, “Who do you say I am?”
He was the Prince, of course. Elysian’s fairy tale prince; the ruler of Stars, protector and keeper of earth.
But who was he to me? I could recognize the face, but I couldn’t name the reason I knew him or understand why he would come and see me.
Then the strange vision melted away, and the lies I had been afraid to flake off peeled off like dead skin. All the greatness I’d ascribed to myself over the years all slithered off of me, and for the briefest second, I got a good look at myself.
It was not pretty at first. Selfishness, pettiness, materialistic, whiny, angry, frustrated, stubborn, hateful… like rejected crayon colors, they all flew away from my coloring, melting into rejuvenating hues.
The memories of a different time and place stirred in my memory – not dreams, but memories. Memories of another life – no, another part of my life – as an Astroneshama…
They cloaked me within a renewed sort of skin as my heart burst with a stream of power, full of truth and light. My back tingled painfully – but not entirely unpleasantly – as a pair of wings finally sprouted. And then I found myself wearing thin but durable
black armor and a red tunic, with black half-gloves on my hands. Strange, but not foreign to me.
There was no going back. I had accepted my battle. I had accepted the consequences of embracing the truth. I wondered why I’d been so afraid of the truth.
“Hamilton!”
I smiled and turned around. “I’m here, Elysian!” I called back. “And I’m ready to fight!”
Elysian stopped in his tracks. “It’s you!” he cried with joy. Then a second later, after his awe apparently wore off, he started to snicker. “I was starting to worry, kid.” Then his snickering broke into full-fledged laughter.
“What?” I asked, irritated.
“I like the wingdings,” the dragon laughed heartily. “They add a nice touch.”
“Huh?” I reached up and felt the small pair of feathery wings arranged into a crown-like shape on my head. I sighed, glaring down at Elysian. “At least I’m not as ugly as you,” I finally huffed.
19
Fight Back
I was surprised to find Maia and Starry Knight fighting hard against each other when I arrived on the scene once more.
When did Starry Knight get here? I wondered. I stopped for a moment as I caught sight of the pretty fighter. I shook my head almost immediately. What am I thinking? I wondered. She wasn’t that pretty. And she wasn’t very nice. In fact, I really didn’t know anything about her… My thoughts went down this trail for a while until Elysian slithered over to me. I glanced sideways at him as he interrupted my thought trail.
There must be some adversity in my look because he glared at me. “What?” he asked. “Be glad she’s here. If she hadn’t come, I wouldn’t have been able to go get you and protect your friends from Shezape.”
“Huh?”
Elysian rolled his eyes exasperatedly. “The eela!” When he saw this meant nothing to me, really, he added, “The monster over there.”
“Oh.” That clarified a lot.
So, you want to get going, there?”
“Just trying to think of a plan.”
“I suggest you think faster!” Elysian exclaimed, jumping out of the way of a random attack. He took to the skies to help Starry Knight defeat the Deadly Sinister.
The Starlight Chronicles: Slumbering Page 18