Afro Puffs Are The Antennae Of The Universe

by Zig Zag Claybourne

  During this, Keita had run to one of the service cubby stations, and now slid a chair Quicho’s way.

  “Thank you.” Desiree sat. It felt odd speaking to an “empty” room, but if BE was linked to the walls and the ceilings and the unimaginable tangle of circuitry that made up even this small fraction of the Depot, the room wasn’t empty at all. It was full of an unwanted presence. “I’ve met more people around this entire world who fed me, sheltered me, sometimes even clothed me, for no gain besides my company. Before I knew what Thoom was, I knew true humans. Before all of Nonrich’s so-called clever lies, I loved people who gave zero damns about the gains of wealth. Instead, they enriched me. You take and take, and for what purpose? It must be so sad to wake up with ‘You are part of the problem’ pounding your forehead like a migraine until the only relief for you is to brutalize someone. Your progeny in whatever future you think you have, sir, have already lost at this game you insist on playing out. They won’t even want to play. Progeny, followers, like-minded—you shouldn’t want them to play. The game is strife and stress and useless death. You should want peace for them. And that means it’s time for you to go of your own free will. Change yourself…because you are poison as you are. You exist as disease. It benefits so few, least of all you, who could be growing, building, and evolving. You’re trying to take BE instead of being with her; we will not permit that.” A yawn so strong, it stilled her entire body paused her. She shook her head sharply to slough it off. “I. Am. Tired, but you’re going to listen till I feel a measure of peace. I see you and people like you who use the world because large pieces of you feel small, and”—she leaned forward, speaking at the ground, not to the body but to the spirit—“if I’m honest, and I am, because this is the last time I have this conversation with anyone in this continuum, I don’t care about your smallness. I don’t care about the lack of attention or affection you received as a child. You’ve reached the upper reaches of toxicity, where if you told me you were drowning, I would not lend a hand. Know that lyric? Eighties at its best. One of the coldest lyrics ever written. One of the starkest, most chilling songs you’ll ever hear. BE would plotz over it. But because of you, I’m not even talking to her. I’m talking to a simulation, knowing that she is literally everywhere. I know she’s okay, because as long as she maintains this image, she’s with us. The moment it flickers, I will burn your entire life with such vengeance as to damn my own soul, but I won’t care. There are people who love me, not tolerate me as I stand over them. Intimidation’s neither love nor life; it’s weakness. So, take what I say as a promise…” She scooched the chair closer to the image. She pursed her lips, looked at the floor, felt her elbows stabbing into her knees, and spoke from behind hands clasped as if in prayer or intense self-control. “Get the fuck away from this woman now. If you don’t know how, you’d better learn. Your alternative is dealing with me for the rest of your natural life.” She looked up. The hologram of BE looked as substantial and alive as anyone in the room.

  Until it flickered.

  Desiree’s heart stopped. “Keita?”

  “Nothing I can do.”

  It flickered again.

  “Kosugi,” said Desiree. She stood. “Everybody leave. Get Bobo out of here. Get to the elves.”

  “You know goddamn well we’re not leaving you,” said Yvonne.

  “The worst that’s gonna happen is she’ll wink out and it’ll get a little darker. I’m not afraid of the dark.”

  “But you will self-destruct the dark if you think it’ll help,” said Yvonne.

  “Pot, get her out of here.”

  Yvonne stood a head and a third taller than Keita. “That ain’t happening,” said Keita.

  “If this shit goes south, I want y’all with Neon. Can I trust you to do that?”

  This sent Keita to hit the strobe indicator for Bobo to make his hasty exit. From there, she raced past Yvonne. She knew Yvonne would follow, cussing everybody out, but following.

  Desiree knew this too.

  She watched for a pattern to the flickering while waiting for the soft chuk of the door sealing.

  Chuk.

  Quietude, save the slap of errant waves against the walls of Bobo’s tank.

  Desiree resumed sitting.

  “I’ve got family who’ve been in space, out of contact, the whole time we’ve been dancing over your inadequacies. The love of my life, Jonathan Luther Smoot, hasn’t heard my voice in over a month of interstellar travel. I have no idea what’s going on there. What I do know is that my people are out there because there’s life not interested in seeing your malaise spread. You think I have any fucks whatsoever to devote time and energy to your bullshit? On top of that,” she said, voice gaining bass, “our badasses created a brand-new goddess life form, which you are dripping testes grease on just as she was feeling her best mojo.” She hit her comm. “Po? Gather everything remaining of the original Entrance and the soul box. Prepare to destroy each.” She returned her attention to the hologram. “We can find your soul box. I’ve got a scientist who might be coaxed, after all this, to dissect it. If not, your ex-wife is here. People like you have a history of finding thick-necked, beady-eyed goons too eager to carry out the actions your ugly hearts take pleasure in. Do you think I’m about to tolerate dealing with poisonous, shriveled souls for the next thousand years? My tone is calm but I hope you realize my resolve is fucking molten.” She watched the pattern of flickers for signs. “It’s your choice. Rejoin the cosmic ether or whatever the fuck is beyond our ken, or spend what will feel like several eternities with my foot deep in you.” She stopped talking. She leaned back, threw a leg over a chair arm, and waited.

  She didn’t wait long.

  The pattern changed.

  Long flicker, short flicker, half flicker, staccato flicker then long flicker, long flicker, short and all.

  “Bring your ass home, BE,” Desiree told the room.

  Short flicker, half flicker, no flicker, scrambled flicker.

  Then the image faded entirely.

  Neon entered the room, telling the group getting the door shut in their faces to shut up. Desiree turned immediately to her. “You shut up too,” said Neon, puffs bobbing, grabbing a chair and dragging it on the go. She plopped next to Desiree.

  “I told them to keep watch on you,” said the captain.

  “I was already on my way here.”

  “You up for this?”

  “She woke me up.” The afro puffs bobbed more as she talked, as though they were part of the conversation and agreed with the courses of action about to come. “She’s using me to slow herself down. Pinging me.”

  “Psychic speedbumps.”

  “Psychic speedbumps. My mental humps.”

  “Jesus fuck, you didn’t,” Desiree said, but didn’t try to hide the blooming grin of relief.

  Neither did Neon.

  “We gon’ do this?” said the Earth’s newest sorceress supreme.

  “Bring on your lady lumps.”

  Of course, in Neon’s mind, her puffs crackled with electricity and glowed with elemental fire. As far as she was concerned, they ought to have. And if they ought to have, if she imagined it to be so, then they did. Psychic geometries merged within the twists, curls, and coils, each follicle alight as a powerful bridge from mental electricity to ambient flow of the unknown electric groove all around her, broadcasting knee-deep, spreading totally deep, for countless freaks.

  It drained her, but she totally understood that funk not only moved, it could remove, and life was funky music as played by bass nebulae, on the one-count pulsars, kickdrum comets, and the interconnecting dark-matter susurration behind the essence of everything, which she could only call Bootsy. The nappy metaphysic connection drained in order to replenish, as a swamp became a rainforest, as the kalimba became every stringed instrument around the world, and—for her on a personal level—as artists took life experiences in all cities and turned them into Songs in the Key of Life.

  A hidden u
niverse sang to her.

  It sang to her in her own voice, and she realized the singer was BE. The construct grabbed at Neon’s thoughts as a speeding jet grabbed the lifesaving safety line of a carrier landing deck, only over and over: the first time Neon’d heard Nina Simone sing; the first time sparring with Yvonne; her fourth time having sex and it was actually pleasurable; laughing nervously at self-doubts; watching old horror movies; the Lt. Uhura outfit she kept in her secret stash; the memory of how she made herself happy surrounded by unhappiness. Not solely the memories but the essences of the things, the music they released into the cosmos.

  Then BE sang a song that felt like books, galaxies, dreams, and their sister nightmares. These were songs of BE’s own travels.

  Coming home, BE said.

  We’re here, said Neon.

  Coming home.

  Hold me. Feel me, Neon sent.

  Home.

  Beloved. Protected. Respected.

  Home.

  The hologram stood resolutely. Not a flicker. Desiree stared, not realizing she held her breath until the holo’s expression changed by a hair’s breadth into a Mona Lisa smile. Captain exhaled and took a step toward the image.

  The hologram suddenly shimmered from top to toe.

  Then it, too, stepped forward.

  It took Desiree’s bangled wrist, raised Desiree’s arm, and laid the captain’s hand on its nonexistent breast.

  Corporeal AF.

  The three women felt comfortable remaining like that for several moments.

  Neon tiredly raised up, crossed over, and brought the group hug. Into this hug Desiree said, “I’m glad I didn’t have to blow this place up.”

  “That’s a good thing,” said Neon.

  “That’s a damn good thing,” said BE. The hug broke. BE immediately frowned at Neon. A small frown, more furrow—ever slight—of brow than full-on frown, but noticed by Desiree nonetheless.

  “You okay?” Desiree asked Neon.

  “I could eat and sleep for three days, but I’m good.”

  “What’s wrong?” said Desiree.

  “I’m still in contact with her,” said BE.

  “And?”

  “I’m not trying to be.”

  “Wait, you’re stuck in here?” said Neon. “Privy to my freaky thoughts?”

  “I’ll work on it,” said BE

  “I guess we should let everybody back in, yes?” said Desiree.

  “Not yet.” BE maintained the door’s lock.

  “Oh, Jesus fuck, what now?” said Desiree.

  “We need to go to the moon. I’ve already sent word for them to emergency-evacuate.”

  Desiree looked at her tired friend. “You don’t have to go.”

  “I want to.”

  Desiree to BE: “You’ll understand we’ll want to do this the old-fashioned way at the present time, considering your condition.”

  “I’m a little ‘tired’ myself.”

  Everyone was evacuated save one. A reconstituted man whose mind had yet to fully coalesce.

  BE, fully conversant now with all the moon base’s systems, kept Kosugi locked in his room till their arrival.

  They stood outside his door. He must have wandered back to where he felt somewhat protected, body on autopilot, because when the door opened, he was still half-dressed, thankfully the bottom half.

  He looked up at them without a hint of surprise, but zero of recognition as well.

  “Kosugi Maurice, you don’t know me,” said Desiree, “but I know you. I know your history. I’m presenting you a choice: leave with us and never be a nuisance again, or stay here.”

  “My people will have me out of here soon,” he said foggily.

  How they’d gotten there, he didn’t know. He was used to weird things happening. What bothered him was the creeping familiarity he felt with the one in armor.

  “In that case, we bid you adieu. BE, leave it unlocked. Kill communications.”

  The door opened behind them. Kosugi walked out. The hallway was eerily silent, especially with the evacuation lights flashing. No klaxon. The women followed him.

  “The moon used to be a quiet place,” said BE.

  “You’re not going to blow this place up,” Neon said to BE.

  “No. I’m flowing with the captain.”

  Neon turned to Desiree. “Cap’n?”

  “Let’s give it fifty years, then circle back.”

  “Sounds good,” said BE. “I’m also feeling stronger.” To Desiree’s questioning glance: “I heal quickly. May I indulge? I would not jeopardize your safety.”

  Desiree nodded.

  They disappeared.

  Maurice stood in the hallway, alone, then took off at a jog, hoping to find others.

  She deposited Neon on the bridge of the Aerie, then BE made another jump, so quickly Desiree felt as if her own brain was in two places at once.

  This second place was joyously familiar.

  It was a starship, almost the same interior configuration as the Aerie, slightly bigger.

  BE and she stood on its bridge. The bridge was deserted save for two people, one of whom was a very haggard Captain Lucious Johnson Smoove in need of a long bath and a good shave.

  They stood quietly behind him.

  He stirred at the presence.

  “Hi, sweets,” said Desiree.

  Smoove smiled. Life was good when it was weird. “That’s not Neon next to you,” he said.

  “Long story.”

  “You staying?”

  “No. Got something to do. Hurry home.”

  “Good trick, luv.”

  “I know.”

  The fifth member of the Gang of Four, in her sweet Wheelchair O’ Repair, threw a confused wave at Desiree from the rear of the quiet bridge. She held a huge wrench in her hand. Desiree waved back.

  “We’ll talk,” the captain told Smoove.

  “Understatement.” It was hard for him to speak around the huge smile on his face.

  “I’d kiss you but I don’t want to torture you.”

  “Wisdom.” Smoove pointed to an oddly shaped piece of metal on his chest. “Officially a Bimaiy citizen. We were successful. On our way home. Not a shot fired.”

  “Don’t tell the boys I was here.”

  BE smiled at Smoove in acknowledgment. She gave Desiree a nod. Then the implosive microflash. Both she and Desiree popped out.

  Back at the depot, BE asked, “That wasn’t too bad, was it?”

  “Just enough. Thank you. Now let Neon know to come on home.”

  “Done.”

  23

  The Very Last Thing Before We Go

  Wind curled through Desiree’s hair, snaked down her collar, and settled gently near her spine.

  She felt like she could breathe now. Felt like she could take a minute.

  A little time to herself.

  Way too many people had never seen a shambles. They’d seen a mess here and there, they’d seen disorder, they’d even seen disaster at a distance. But they hadn’t stood in a shambles to feel the heaviest press against life the universe had yet devised. Shambles negated all and mocked all at the same time.

  The fact that people themselves negated and mocked one another was proof of zero shamble contact.

  She regarded the shambles around her. Ash, crashed timbers, glass in enough pieces to mimic a glittering lake. She was glad she’d come alone, not out of any desire for others not to see her cry but because she and this place had started out alone, her finding that remote waterfront spot one of the first times she’d ventured into Atlantis, her imagining a life there with a man she’d recently fallen in love with. The mindset grew that it should enfold others. Welcome others. An entire community. Water’s Edge.

  Desiree cried. Frustration tears. Hot, acidic sonsabitch tears. She also sweated. A few drops of each created craters in the ash, but—as she bent to heft a stud off a snapped sheet of drywall—neither would prevent her doing what she came to do. She’d complete the build.<
br />
  She hauled the stud to open grass and laid it down, thereby establishing her keep pile. It was unseasonably hot. No matter what, this home would be built. She and those she loved would sit on its porches. No matter who tried to tear it down, or who thought they had claim to it; no matter if the universe itself declared Desiree Quicho an outlaw and all her works brought down.

  No matter fucking what.

  She was damn glad she’d worn short sleeves. Sweat already sheened her shoulders and biceps. She snatched a bandana from her back pocket and tied her hair, then cinched her gloves tighter, adjusted her mask, and moved deeper into the ash.

  Everything that had changed in the world could change without her for a bit.

  This home would be for those with imaginations and heart. No matter. Fucking. what.

  She worked quietly a whole hour before BE popped quickly in and out. Desiree was in no way surprised to find Neon suddenly standing beside her, staring at the same work to be done. “You got a hard head, Ms. Temples.”

  Neon patted her puffs. “Shock absorbers.”

  “Yeah, okay.”

  Neon nudged a line in the ash with a booted toe. “So, Becks, Crewcut, and Cotton-Eyed Joe get to live happily ever after, huh? Here?”

  “Sharon and Compoté are lined up to teach children’s self-defense. Hellbilly and Guerilla: going fishing and calling it water poetry.”

  “Kids need that here?”

  “Need that everywhere. Y’know, I don’t care what they do, as long as they stay out of my way.”

  “Maybe him and Guerilla’ll become a thing. Mature his ass up.”

  “We can hope,” said Desiree.

  Neon stared at her steel-toed boots a second. “We’re not likely ever to end with that cool-ass scene of everybody getting medals, right?”

  “Not likely, luv.”

  Neon chewed her inner cheek and nodded. “And we sticking with Water’s Edge for this thing?”

  “Yeah.”

  “Cool. Cool cool cool.”

  “Anybody else know you’re here?”

  “Not yet.” Neon grinned. She had that cagey eye. Desiree waited for the drop. “If this is gonna be Water’s Edge, I can’t be Neon for it.”