Fresh Ink

by Lamar Giles

“It sounded like it,” Tamia said.

  A faint sound drifted toward them from beyond the end of the flashlight beam: a shuffle or a slide, like dragging footsteps. They instinctively moved closer together, shoulders touching. The flashlight flickered, the bulb making a tiny snick sound.

  “Someone else is in here,” Nic whispered.

  The footsteps were odd, though. They squelched irregularly across the floor, like rain-soaked sneakers worn by someone with a limp.

  The flashlight went out.

  Tamia squeaked. She shook the flashlight, but nothing happened. The darkness seemed to rush toward her, a thick, suffocating fog that slid inside her with every shallow breath.

  The footsteps kept coming.

  Tamia had to get out. If she was trapped in this pitch-black nothingness for a moment longer, she would completely freak, and—

  The glow of Nic’s cell phone startled her out of her growing panic. “Batteries died?” Nic said.

  Tamia shoved her useless flashlight into her pocket and said, “Let’s go.”

  “But what about whoever’s back there?”

  “They can find their own way.” Tamia grabbed Nic’s hand and marched her down the corridor away from the squelching footsteps.

  They soon came to a branch in the corridor; to the left a short hallway seemed to end in a set of double doors, and beneath the doors was a dim crack of light. They hurried down the short hall and pushed at the doors together. To Tamia’s shock, the doors opened. She and Nic plunged onto a deserted concourse lined with glass windows, still pelted with rain. The doors slammed shut behind them. Tamia spun back, reaching for the handle, but there wasn’t one. The doors only opened from the other side.

  Nic didn’t seem to have noticed. She was looking at their hands, still clasped together. They both let go.

  Nic turned away and said, “We must be on the other side of the convention center.”

  The concourse was deserted, and none of the lights were on, but the floor-to-ceiling windows let in a watery gray daylight. Tamia jogged over to the windows. Through the deluge, she saw the airport lit up in the distance.

  Nic joined her. “No wonder the power went out.”

  Tamia checked her reception. “Still nothing. Is there a way to get back to the convention? Other than that hallway?”

  “I’m sure the power will come on soon,” Nic said. “Let’s just wait a minute.”

  Now that they had escaped the maintenance corridor, Tamia was much less anxious. The empty concourse felt like the abandoned set of a science-fiction movie: wide, dimly lit, with glass walls and tall steel columns. Nic, in her costume, looked like she belonged here. Tamia wasn’t so eager to get back to civilization. “Okay,” she said, and sat down on the floor, leaning against the windows.

  Nic lowered herself down too, stretching her legs out on the smooth tile floor. “So,” Nic said.

  “So what?”

  “So, that was a little creepy.”

  “Yeah, I don’t like the dark,” Tamia admitted.

  “I don’t like crowds,” Nic said.

  They looked at each other, and when their eyes met, Tamia felt a surprising jolt of nerves. “I kept imagining that part in The X-Files where Tooms comes through the vent,” Tamia said.

  Nic’s eyes widened. “No wonder you were so freaked.”

  “I wasn’t that freaked.”

  “You were holding my hand.”

  Tamia tried to hide her embarrassment by laughing. “Okay fine, I was freaked.”

  Nic smiled. “Hey, isn’t Agent Scully a physicist?”

  “Yeah, why? She wrote her thesis on Einstein’s twin paradox. Time travel, basically. She thought it could be possible, theoretically.”

  “Sulu’s a physicist too. We have something in common.”

  “Something, huh?” Tamia said slyly.

  “Something.”

  Tamia had to look away so that she didn’t stare, but she kept thinking about the expression on Nic’s face. Did she mean something something or I was actually talking about physics? Flustered, Tamia took out her flashlight, unscrewed the cap, and removed the batteries. “I don’t know what happened to my flashlight in there.”

  “Do you ever read any X-Files fanfic?” Nic asked.

  The question startled her. “A little. Why?”

  “Just wondering who your ship is. Like, are you into Mulder, or do you think Scully is, you know, less straight than that.”

  Tamia nearly dropped the batteries. “Sounds like that’s what you think,” she said, and quickly slid the batteries into the flashlight.

  “Maybe.”

  “Maybe?” Tamia tried to make the word sound meaningful.

  “I’ve read some Scully-slash-Reyes stuff, but I never really thought that worked.”

  “Well, that’s because Reyes was totally underdeveloped and not that great of a character.” Tamia couldn’t get the cap back on the flashlight.

  “You didn’t like her?”

  “She was okay, but it was too late in the series. Those last few seasons just didn’t work for me. I binge-watched the first six seasons on Netflix over a few months, but the last three took me a lot longer.”

  “I never watched the last couple seasons, but I did read the fic.” Nic held out her hand. “Let me try.”

  Tamia gave her the flashlight. “And you like Scully-slash-Reyes.”

  “Well, I like Scully,” Nic said. She lined up the cap at the end of the flashlight and screwed it back on. She pressed the power button, and the light came on. “Loose batteries.”

  Tamia took the flashlight back. “Thanks.”

  “She’s so smart,” Nic continued. “A physicist, a medical doctor, an FBI agent…”

  “Definitely an overachiever,” Tamia said.

  “What about you? How much are you like Scully?”

  Tamia tried to stop fidgeting with the flashlight. “I am obviously not an FBI agent.”

  “But your badge is so realistic.”

  “I’m good at Photoshop.”

  “See? Genius.”

  “Well, I am on the math team at school,” Tamia joked.

  “I knew it! Where do you go to school?”

  “Westminster High. I’ll be a senior in the fall. How about you?”

  “I go to Fairview in Boulder. I’ll be a senior too.”

  “So I have a question for you,” Tamia said, risking a glance at Nic.

  Nic sat up expectantly. “Ask me anything.”

  “Okay. What about you? Are you…like Sulu?”

  “Well, I’m not the helmsman on a spaceship, although I wouldn’t say no to that opportunity.”

  “Are you on the math team at your school too?”

  “No. I’m sorry to say math is not my thing.”

  “What is your thing?”

  “I want to do something creative, you know? Like work in Hollywood or something, behind the scenes. Produce stuff. I want to help make sure that someday movies do include people like gender-flipped Sulu and race-bent Scully.”

  “That’s really cool.” Tamia noticed that Nic had three small silver hoops piercing her right ear. In the quiet between them, the sound of rain pounding against the windows was a constant staccato.

  “It’s pretty serious out there,” Nic said softly.

  “Yeah,” Tamia agreed. She should be worried, shouldn’t she? She hadn’t heard from Casey or Seb, and she had no idea how to get back to the other side of the convention center. But she was reluctant to get up off the floor.

  Tamia took a deep breath. “So I have one more question for you,” she said.

  “Go for it.”

  Tamia cocked her head at Nic. “Is gender-flipped Sulu gay too?”

  The double doors they had come through banged open. Tamia heard squelching footsteps. She scrambled to her feet, Nic beside her, both of them staring at the thing that stumbled through the doors.

  * * *

  • • •

  “Hi!” the creature said
, gasping. It was an amorphous grayish-greenish blob edged with stiff hairs like giant eyelashes, and as it wobbled across the empty concourse toward them, it left a slimy trail on the floor. “I think I saw you back there in that hallway.”

  The voice sounded like it belonged to a boy about their age, but the blotchy makeup covering his face made him unrecognizable. He looked like a cross between an amoeba and a hairy eyeball.

  “Did you come from DenCon?” Nic asked.

  “Yes!” the boy answered. “I’m lost! Do you know what’s going on?”

  Nic and Tamia traded glances. “The power went out and we’re waiting for it to come back on,” Tamia said.

  “Probably same as you,” Nic added. “What’s your—who are—?”

  “I’m Wesley Holmgren,” the boy said brightly. “I mean, that’s my name.”

  “Um, what’s your costume?” Tamia asked.

  “I’m a Megavirus.”

  “A what?” Nic said.

  “A Megavirus,” Wesley repeated. “It’s a giant virus, with 1,120 genes. The genome is 1.259 million base pairs long. It’s an ancient virus, found by French researchers near Chile.”

  “But viruses are microscopic, even Megaviruses,” Tamia said dubiously. “You look like—you’re like the Thing or something. The Blob. Weren’t those movies from the fifties?”

  “Nobody gets my costume,” Wesley said glumly.

  “Sorry, dude,” Nic said. “Nobody gets mine either. Why do your shoes squish like that?”

  “I drenched them in this goo—it was from a Ghostbusters costume kit. I wanted to represent cytoplasm. But it makes walking around kind of gross.”

  Tamia nodded politely. “Okay. Well, points for going all out.”

  “Do you know how to get back to DenCon?” Wesley asked.

  “We think we’re on the other side of the building,” Nic said, “so we could go around the outside—”

  “But it’s raining,” Wesley protested.

  “No kidding,” Tamia said.

  “I don’t think my costume’s waterproof,” Wesley said.

  A buzzing sound jolted through the convention center, and the overhead lights blinked. With a hum, every light panel suddenly snapped on, bathing the concourse in a white glow.

  “Power!” Wesley cried.

  Off to their right, a digital display flickered to life. “I think that’s a directory,” Tamia said, and headed over to the monitor.

  Nic and Wesley followed her to the bright touchscreen. Tamia pointed to the pulsing red dot that indicated YOU ARE HERE. “See, we must be in the west concourse,” Tamia said. “We can take it to the end and then go down this walkway that connects to the east concourse and DenCon.”

  Nic’s phone dinged and she pulled it out of her pocket. A text from her brother read: Where are you? You okay?

  A series of chimes rang from Tamia’s phone. “Finally!” she said, and began texting.

  Nic responded to her brother and then said, “Should we head back?”

  “Can I go with you?” Wesley asked. “I get lost really easily.”

  “Sure,” Tamia said.

  Nic suppressed a sigh. She would’ve been happy to be stuck alone with Tamia for a few more hours.

  * * *

  • • •

  On the walk to the east concourse, Wesley regaled Tamia and Nic with the history of the Megavirus, also known as Megavirus chilensis, never letting either of them get a word in edgewise. As they approached the entrance to the convention, Tamia spotted a few cosplayers dressed like Wesley waiting by the entrance.

  “That’s Mimivirus, Pithovirus, and Pandoravirus,” Wesley explained excitedly, and pointed to the design on the front of his blob-like costume. “See, we’ve differentiated our markings to indicate our different genomes. I have to go meet them. Thanks for your help!”

  “Sure thing,” Tamia said.

  “Yeah, no problem,” Nic said.

  Tamia stopped as Wesley ran over to his friends. She glanced at Nic, who seemed a little subdued. “Where are you headed?” Tamia asked.

  “I’m meeting my brother over by registration,” Nic said, gesturing to the right.

  Tamia checked her phone. “My friends are waiting for me by the entrance to the Rocky Mountain Ballroom. That’s where the Queen of the East preview was, right?” She pointed in the opposite direction.

  “I think so. I guess this is it, then. It was nice to meet you.”

  Tamia smiled tentatively. “Yeah. If I had to be stuck in a power outage with a stranger, you’re the one I’d pick.”

  Nic grinned. “Likewise. So…”

  “So…” Tamia still couldn’t read the expression on Nic’s face. Was she waiting for Tamia to make the first move? Or was she worried about finding her brother? All the words Tamia could say were clogged up in her throat, blocked by uncertainty and nerves. Tamia’s phone chimed again, like an alarm. Time’s up. “I guess I better go,” she said reluctantly.

  “Yeah, okay.” Nic started to turn away.

  “Bye.” Tamia waved at Nic, then felt like a dork. Who waved at a person two feet away from them?

  “Bye,” Nic said, raising her hand in response.

  Disappointed, Tamia forced herself to turn away before she did something even more embarrassing.

  * * *

  • • •

  Nic saw her brother standing near the registration booth with a phone held up to his ear. The concourse was full of confused con-goers and harassed-looking convention volunteers in hot-pink DenCon T-shirts. Nic slowed down as she approached her brother. Now that the power outage was over, she wasn’t sure why she needed to find him anyway.

  She thought about Tamia and that last question she hadn’t had a chance to answer. Is gender-flipped Sulu gay too? Had she imagined the nervousness in Tamia’s face? But also, hadn’t the answer been obvious? That was the problem with being queer. You should never assume, but if you didn’t assume, you had to ask. And asking directly was so hard to do.

  “Nic!” her brother said. “You okay?”

  “Yeah, I’m fine.”

  He ended his phone call and came over to her. “I have to get back to the control room, but if you need to go home or anything—”

  “No, I’ll just—” She shook her head. She knew what she had to do. “I have to go.”

  Her brother looked surprised. “You have to go?”

  “I’ll text you later,” Nic said, turning on her heel.

  “Nic?”

  “Later!”

  She dodged a Harley Quinn, a Rogue, and two Iron Men, then began to jog as she reached the main concourse, following signs for the Rocky Mountain Ballroom. In the lobby outside, several DenCon volunteers were herding people into an orderly queue. Past the zombies—there were always zombies—and beyond the Star Trek contingent and the Gryffindor quidditch team, she finally saw the girl in a red Agent Scully wig. She was talking to two guys dressed in suits.

  “Tamia!” Nic called.

  Tamia looked around.

  “Tamia!”

  This time Tamia saw her. She broke away from the two guys, coming over to meet Nic. “What are you doing here?” Tamia asked.

  Nic was a little out of breath, but she told herself it was because she had jogged from registration. “I’m looking for you,” she said.

  Tamia smiled. “You are?”

  “Yeah. I need to ask you something.”

  The shorter guy Tamia had been standing with joined them. An FBI badge on his lapel identified him as Alex Krycek. “Mia, who’s this?” he asked.

  “This is Nic,” Tamia said. “Nic, this is my friend Seb.”

  “Hey,” Nic said.

  “Hey back,” Seb said. “Tamia said she met a girl, but I didn’t realize she met a girl.”

  Tamia elbowed him. “Shut up.”

  “Ow!” Seb complained.

  The other boy, who had a Mulder FBI badge pinned to his jacket, came over too. “Hey, guys, we have to get in line or we won�
�t make it into the preview.”

  “This is the girl Tamia met during the blackout,” Seb said.

  Mulder looked sharply at Nic. “Oh, really?”

  “Nic, this is Casey,” Tamia said. She gave Casey a pointed look. “Casey, take Seb to the line and I’ll meet you both there.”

  Casey grinned at Nic and grabbed Seb’s arm. “Come on, leave ’em alone.”

  Seb waved at Nic. “See you later, I hope!” he said as Casey dragged him away.

  “Those were my friends,” Tamia said. “You know, Mulder and Krycek.”

  “I guessed,” Nic said.

  Tamia took a step closer to Nic. “So, you had something you wanted to ask me?” she prompted.

  Nic felt her face heating up. “Um, yeah.” She pulled out her phone before she could lose her nerve. “I was wondering if—if you want to meet up later. Can I get your number?”

  Tamia broke into a wide smile. “Yeah, of course! Give me your phone.”

  Nic handed it over, their fingers brushing. While Tamia entered her number, Nic saw Seb and Casey lurking near the doorway to the ballroom. Seb gave her two thumbs-up.

  Tamia returned the phone to Nic. “Text me so I’ll have your number too.”

  “Bossy,” Nic observed with a grin, but obeyed. “Just to be clear, you understand why I’m asking for your number, right?”

  Tamia’s phone chimed. She checked the message, then met Nic’s gaze. She looked a little too long, just to make it extra clear. “Message received.”

  On the first day of Seventh, Hayley Sampson leaned against my homeroom’s radiators. Her eyes said: “Do not blow my cover, Doobie, if you know what’s good for you.” The Rez school only took us to the end of Fifth, and then we were merged into the massive Junior High just beyond our border. There, among the nine hundred white kids and a handful of black kids, we each made decisions about how Indian we appeared, and we respected each other’s choices.

  Hayley snapped her eyes at the beadwork keychain on my backpack. Did she recognize it as one made by her aunt? Margaret Sampson, June 1975 was written on the soft tanned leather backing. Even now, a year after Margaret had made it, the keychain held up. It was the gift I’d received at the Moving Up dinner held at our elementary school. Adult Beadwork Class members, mostly City Indian gramma types and younger Rez ladies, made them for all levels of Indian graduates: Elementary, High School, and College. The class members were relearning beadwork skills they’d lost, or learning stuff their own mothers had refused to teach them.