The Time Ender

by Debra Chapoton

  I hesitated and so did Buddy.

  “Bottoms up, Selina,” Alex said. He finished his and I swear he already looked refreshed and healthier. He started to hum his usual food song followed by a couple bars of a suspense theme.

  Right, just do it. Buddy was waiting for me. In fact everyone was watching me and that made me feel like I was back on Earth and the butt of some joke or prank. I’d avoided people and new things and anything social for most of my life. The old familiar nausea was right on the edge of my awareness. But Alex winked at me and wiggled an eyebrow.

  What the heck. I up-ended the bottle and drained it all. My taste buds didn’t complain and my throat worked fine. My stomach accepted the pleasant contents with thanks and I, wonder of wonders, did not fall into an eternal slumber.

  “Not bad,” I said. Buddy gulped his down and repeated my assessment. The guard collected the bottles, crushed them with his bare hands and pushed them into a receptacle on the wall. Before the receptacle closed I got a big whiff of galactic lard. Klaqins must be the ultimate recyclers. Crap, that made me think of my grandpa. I’d never view recycling the same way again.

  “All right,” Mr Rimmon said, “everybody good? Let’s get back to business.”

  I swear we worked a couple more full double-moons on the problem and when we came to a consensus—nice that Alex’s and my opinions were treated with respect—we had a final plan:

  We could use a delicate combination of pacing and bending to create something like Marcum’s time stopping. We would call it time-ending.

  CHAPTER 6

  #Lullaby

  THE CONCEPT WAS difficult, but the application was simple. One of the scientists said, “While we’re on Klaqin, our hearts beat more slowly. Wherever we are, our biology is in sync with the local time. And a day or a double-moon wherever we are is a day or a double-moon. But a time-pacer can shrink that time and a bender can lengthen it.” He paused to acknowledge me as well as Buddy, but he didn’t explain how we did it. Buddy cracked his knuckles and stood a little straighter. I smiled, still building my social skills. “The trick,” he went on, “is to take Klaqin time to Gleezhe and since we know that bending and pacing don’t work underground we need to make a portable capsule that can be a protective case for whoever we put inside and must be able to allow bending and pacing even underground.”

  The key to making it work was an element on the planet called raw purlass. The male purlass was what we had to use; the female element wouldn’t work they told us. I suppressed my urge to giggle and didn’t ask how they classified the sex of an element.

  There was a ton of boring speculation regarding dimensions and shape, then we did research, and yada, yada, yada, thanks to the time-pacers, stuff got done fast. Proposals were made, Klaqin guards and Fifth Commanders served our every wish and we worked for several double-moons straight, taking turns catching cat-naps in the corner on a large round cushion.

  Real work. With my dad and the others. This was worse than school. I know we had at least five more “meals” and though they perked us up and kept us going I would have preferred some of mom’s home cooking.

  My dad was called to consult with another group. We were ready to start the actual construction but the scientists dismissed us youngest ones, Buddy and Alex and me, to get some real sleep. Hooray. It must have been due to the faces I made. Yawns bubbled out of my mouth like clowns out of a clown car. Buddy grabbed the cushion and started snoring immediately so Alex and I went out in search of some other place to crash.

  Alex had an idea. He had to ask for directions from a Fifth Commander named Rander, a frog-faced kid Alex swore was his cousin. Rander spoke a little English and kept making strange hand gestures, placing three fingers on his thumb and wagging the leftover pinky. Alex figured out his meaning and we made it to his room—Marcum’s old room—without bumping into my my dad or his. That would have been awkward. I thought my mom was around somewhere; surely they wouldn’t have taken her to that Plickken city. I was a little uncomfortable about the thought of sleeping with Alex. But hey, I had no idea how to get to the females’ pod and nobody had assigned me any new living quarters. A girl needed her beauty rest, right?

  The room was small with not much in it. No personality beyond a single large window. I hesitated before entering, then left Alex standing at the threshold. I eyed the single sleeping platform as I walked around it to the window and looked out. I heard the door swoosh closed followed by the tap of Alex’s boots. He touched my shoulder with the delicacy of butterfly wings. I waited for the inevitable song lyrics he’d come up with to describe the view outside. We were several stories up and we could see a lot of buildings, though none were as high as this one. I didn’t feel dizzy looking down, unusual for me, so I guess I was overcoming a lot of my fears. The nervousness I felt was not from heights, but from depths. I had pretty deep feelings for Alex, but my confusion over Marcum had not relented even though he was light years away.

  Alex’s hand rested heavier on me and he pulled me into an embrace that, in my limited knowledge, seemed to mean something other than affection.

  “You’re not afraid, are you?”

  I wasn’t sure he meant afraid of the height or afraid of sharing that unappealing platform behind us. I’d been appalled at the thought of spending the night of the power outage in a guest room at his house. Now I had butterflies. Emoji: confounded face.

  “Afraid of what?” My voice squeaked up. Probably an octave. He’d know.

  “Of that spider on the wall.”

  I jumped back and he laughed. Good old Alex.

  “Ha, ha. You know, I haven’t noticed any bugs on this planet.” I took another step back and sat on the bed which was more comfortable than I expected.

  “Oh, I have, for sure. Big and small. Bees, too, or something like them. In the pechan field.”

  “The what?” I yawned and pulled my feet up. I couldn’t resist stretching out full length. Not having a pillow didn’t matter. Whatever this thing was made of it conformed to my body like the seat in the Galaxer.

  “We’ve got a lot to talk about. Scoot over.”

  He plunked his big frame down before I finished adjusting myself into what I assumed was Marcum’s body groove. The bed didn’t move with Alex’s weight. I turned toward him and relaxed, put one hand on his cheek and peered into eyes. We were close enough to go cross-eyed so after a second I closed my eyes. I was sure he’d take that opportunity to kiss me and maybe he did. I don’t know. Sleep claimed me first.

  When I woke I was facing away from Alex, but he was closer, wrapped around me like a burrito. His nose was tucked into my hair between my shoulder and ear. His breath, warm and moist, rose and fell in calm reassurance. His left hand, also warm and moist, held mine, his arm over mine as restful as a weighted blanket. Comfort and security and contentment radiated from our being connected like this. So this was intimacy.

  I closed my eyes again and let the feeling enfold me like a whisper. And then Alex did whisper, ruffling my hair and tickling my cheek, “You awake?”

  “Yes,” I whispered back. A shot of prickly excitement launched up and down from my navel. He shifted and I realized his left leg had also been protectively—possessively—lying over my lower half. He moved it and scooted back enough for me to turn over toward him. He released my hand and I cupped it over my mouth, blowing discreetly to check for bad breath before I faced him. I snuggled up against his chest as if I’d done it a million times and he drew me into a long, surprisingly wet kiss that sapped me of every thought.

  When we came up for air I giggled like an idiot. I was quite embarrassed by the way my body was betraying me: my head said take it slow while other parts of me were screaming something different. I snorted a self-conscious laugh.

  “What’s so funny?”

  “Us. This.” I squirmed a bit in his embrace, kissed his cheeks and his nose and rubbed my lips against his in a tasting experiment. Pretty bold of me. I was torn between which direc
tion this make-out session—my first ever—should take. He giggled with me then, though his was a low purring rumble as his arms tightened around me and his hips pressed forward. Uh, oh. “Alex … um.”

  “Right,” he agreed. Of course he would, he’s been reading my mind for ages. He knew what I was thinking before I did. He gave me a quick finishing kiss and rose up on an elbow. “So … I wonder what they do around here for showers.”

  “Oh, I know. I had one in the girls’ pod. Very automatic and you don’t have to take your clothes off.”

  “So we can shower together?”

  I rolled my eyes at him and gave him a negative grunt. I sat up and focused on the bottles sitting neatly on the single shelf across from the bed. “Breakfast?” I desperately tried to clear my head of other thoughts.

  “I’d rather hold you a little longer. Want to cuddle?”

  “Cue the flying pigs. Is this Alex? Being, dare I say it, romantic?”

  “You think you know me as well as I know you, but I’ve been holding back vital personality traits. I’m sensitive and compassionate and empathetic and, and … very optimistic.”

  “Optimistic, huh?” I got up and pulled a bottle from the shelf. “Could this be a love potion? Did you drink it?”

  “Don’t need one.”

  I chuckled. “You are optimistic. I wonder what’s in this.” I turned the bottle so he could see the white furry face on the product’s label. It was a strange monkeyish thing with a beak-like nose. “Monkey milk?”

  “I don’t want to know, but I’ll drink it if you will. That stuff is so concentrated that we won’t need anything for days. What I wouldn’t give for a bag of chips or some French fries.” He plopped back on the bed and sang a couple fast food jingles while I opened the bottle and took a swig.

  “Here. It’s not bad.”

  It tingled on the way down. Not the same kind of tingles of a few moments ago, but, hey, there wasn’t a lock on the door and I was nervously aware of continuous foot clomps up and down the hallway.

  ***

  EITHER WE’D SLEPT longer than we thought or the other three time-pacers had done their thing because when we entered the space reserved for us no one was there and a message to us glimmered on the wall. It instructed us to go to a particular hangar to participate in further experiments. That meant another trip up the crazy steps. We came outside and wandered past some of the Earth ships. We gawked at the bridges that lanced between buildings and Alex told me how he’d seen the recruits practice fighting on them, swaying precipitously. The bridges were as stiff and still as concrete now in the breezeless sunshine. We’d seen a large hangar from Marcum’s bedroom window, and we were pretty sure that was the one the message meant, but things looked different from ground level. Alex’s sense of direction was better than mine and he dismissed the first two hangars we passed and found a human-sized doorway into the third. He picked correctly since there was a monstrous clear capsule in the center of the hangar and several Earth men and one boy admiring it. The other end of the hangar opened wide and tall unto a tarmac that held dozens of Parallaxers and other ships, Moon-chasers, Flamers, and a couple that looked like Coreg’s Intimidator, that had probably been moved outside to make room here.

  I paused to appreciate the clever workmanship and noticed Fifth Commander Rander off to the side, watching us. I almost waved.

  I breathed in the oily air and slowly processed other things: the extraordinary variety of noises, from the creak and crack of whatever elements had been used to build this place—definitely not lumber—to the scrape and scuff of objects pushed or rolled across the floor and the faint echo of a shout somewhere outside.

  “Ehk. Where have you two been?” Buddy said when he saw us. The grunt he made was markedly un-Buddy-like, but reminded me instantly of Marcum and a freezing shiver skipped over my skin. I wondered if Marcum had spent time with my little brother while he was on Earth.

  Because of Buddy’s question my shivers were followed by blushing heat. Alex answered for us. “Hey, Buddy, do you want a tour of the Academy? I was just showing your sister where they fight the bridge battles.”

  Alex’s way to sidestep my brother’s question helped bring my complexion into Klaqin compliance. I moved closer to the purlass capsule where my face reflected my awe in dull green tones. And to think I would have given up chocolate to lose my pale blue asphyxiated look.

  The lead scientist, A.J., lifted his head from the tight conversation he was having with Henry. They never said, but from looking at them I decided they must be brothers, though A.J. was significantly shorter than giant Henry. Their skin was that yellow jaundiced I-need-a-tanning-booth-now shade. They both had hair in that cinnamon red color like Sama’s. As Klaqin-Americans they could blend in on either planet.

  “Selina,” A.J. called, eyebrows nearly touching his hairline, “we need you. Buddy’s bending isn’t as slow as yours.” I glanced at my brother to see his eyes flit to the floor. Crap.

  “Come on, Bud, we’ll do this together. Alex can give you a tour later.” I was more than a little ticked that A.J. would single the kid out like that.

  “So, once we start bending what do you want us to do to help?” I asked. As usual I held back the comment I wanted to make partly because Alex’s hand was on my elbow and partly because I was astonishing myself with my speaking skills. I never used to speak in public let alone to people I hardly knew.

  “You’ll get inside with some pacers and alternate bending and pacing. We need to collect some data before we finalize.” He nodded up at Henry who held a handful of thumb rings and a cheat sheet of symbol translations.

  “Sure.”

  Without any fanfare First Commander Gzeter strolled into the area along with two bodyguards. He’d given us a thirty double-moon deadline and I figured we must be way ahead of schedule.

  “I’ve been looking for you.” He walked up to me and reached for my hand. I wasn’t expecting a hand shake and I didn’t get one. He slipped a thumb ring on me before I could jerk away. “This is yours. Found in the possession of captured leaders and Klaqin traitors in a raid in the central region.”

  “Oh.” I couldn’t remember the Klaqin word for thanks at first, mostly because I wasn’t thankful. That ring had caused me indescribable pain. “I … uh … thanks.”

  The Commander clucked and turned his back on us to approach the transparent capsule.

  “You speak Klaqin?” Buddy whispered. “What’d he say? What’d he give you?”

  I jammed the ring on my thumb, held it up by his face and whispered back, “This is a ring that has more functions than a cell phone. I, uh, lost it and he was returning it.”

  “So you understood everything he said to us when we arrived?” His lips quivered in a silent stutter.

  “Yeah, I guess.”

  “I picked up a few words from the guards. Maybe you can teach me some more.”

  My heart caught in my throat. This was my little brother who, when I left, stammered and lisped and worked with a speech therapist daily. I was suddenly overcome with pride at his advancement and at the thought that he wanted to learn a foreign—make that galactic—language.

  I glanced at Alex and he signaled back that he was thinking the same thing. We’d have to take Buddy to the language cabs and Alex could pace him through the basics.

  Alex nodded. “I’ll go ask the First Commander for permission.”

  He went to wait behind one of the bodyguards while Buddy and I kept whispering. He told me how they had molded the purlass like play dough and he had tried to time-bend while helping to smooth it around a large template. Alex’s dad, he said, made the process go faster most of the time.

  “Hey,” I asked, “where is Mr. Rimmon? I don’t see him anywhere.”

  Buddy’s upper lip wobbled as if it were searching on its own for the right words. “He’s inside the capsule.”

  “But the capsule is clear. I don’t see him.”

  “It’s clear camouflage. Ther
e are some reflections though. See yourself? And me? There’s some kind of invisibility function too. The r-r-ratio of bio-metals to purlass is less on this than on one of their spaceships. Did you know they can camouflage them to look like their s-s-surroundings?” Buddy’s face held the same childish wonder I’d seen a million times. The return of his speech impediment was understandable.

  I nodded as I thought back to when Marcum took me into the woods to see his ship. It looked like a mound of snow at first. “So Mr. Rimmon’s inside and nobody can see him. Hmm.” My imagination took off in a new direction. I know we’d discussed who would be inside the capsule, but … hmm.

  My thoughts were interrupted when my dad led a group of men into the hangar like a flock of misplaced sheep. In fact, they sounded like sheep, bleating out expressions of wonder as they swarmed around the capsule. There was a bit of nervous posturing among the First Commander’s guards, but the First Commander himself acted unfazed by the presence of the weapons assembly and defense group.

  Alex spoke first to one of Gzeter’s guards who in turn spoke to the Commander. He turned his attention to Alex. I couldn’t hear him, but he pointed at Buddy and I knew what he must have asked. I don’t think Gzeter was receptive to the idea. He stared at Buddy a long time, squinting his eyes, puffing his pink cheeks out more and moving his head in a slow shake from left to right. Mission fail.

  Alex suddenly stepped back, his face an open book of surprise as an alarm sounded. Had to be an alarm. Loud and piercing. Gzeter yelled at his guards, sending two of them scurrying toward Buddy and me. I grabbed Buddy’s hand and looked for my dad, but he’d disappeared. I had no idea how to protect ourselves if the alarm meant an imminent Gleezhian attack. I hoped the guards did. They herded us around the men and to the other side of the capsule where a door-sized rectangle held no reflection and we could see inside. Gzeter was there and so were my dad and Alex’s. I didn’t hesitate as the guards pushed us through the liquid-like purlass.