by Geoff Rodkey
As Ila and I watched him, our eyes widening in surprise, his whole body began to sway, shifting direction with every downbeat. As the song swelled to its anthem-like chorus, his wings started to flutter, and he rose up several inches off his seat.
I want to live under a blue sky
Don’t want to numb the pain just to get by
I want to give living a new try
Gonna find a way to wash the rain from my eyes
He hovered in the air, his body swaying in snakelike curves as the room filled with the scent of honeysuckle and mint. When the song ended, he slowly sank back onto his stool, then shook his head softly like he was coming out of a trance.
I looked at Ila. Her mouth was hanging open in shock. So was mine.
“That was very educational,” he told us. “I wish to show it to the entire academy.”
“Can we do it quickly, sir?” I asked him. “Because I don’t think we have much time.”
* * *
—
AN HOUR LATER, Ila and I stood with the principal in front of a giant screen on the wall above the faucets in the lunchroom. The entire school was facing us. The shorter Krik stood in the front, with the Zhuri covering every available bit of space behind and above them. From where we were standing, it looked like a solid wall of kids looming in front of us.
Marf wasn’t there. Neither was Ezger. According to a news report we’d watched on the principal’s screen while waiting for school to begin, they were wanted by the government for “distributing emotional content that threatens Choom’s peace.” The report warned its viewers to “avoid all contact with this dangerous and highly emotional material,” and it asked anyone who saw Marf or Ezger to inform the Executive Division immediately.
I was terrified for my friends, and watching the report with the principal, I’d started to worry that he might turn us in. But instead he’d shut off the TV without a word. Now he was getting ready to show some “dangerous and highly emotional material” to a couple thousand kids. If he was afraid the whole Unified Government was about to come down on his head, he didn’t show it.
Judging by the doughnut smell, the Zhuri kids were already primed to like what they saw. As we stood waiting for the video to start, the ones in front whined requests at me:
“Do the walk!”
“Try to fly!”
“Fall down again!”
Ila gave me a bewildered look. “What did you do yesterday?”
I shrugged. “Mostly I just tripped over stuff. They’re easy laughs.”
The principal took flight, zooming up to hover over our heads. “Quiet, please, children!” he shrieked, and they all obeyed instantly—a second later, the only sound in the room was the steady thrummm of hovering wings.
“The human youngers,” he told the crowd, “have been kind enough to create an educational video for us, so that we may better understand their species. Please direct your attention to the screen.”
He dropped back to the floor as a mechanical shade extended over the skylight, covering the room in semidarkness.
Then the video began to play. It was a hit from the opening seconds—with every pratfall, another wave of fresh-baked doughnut rose up from the crowd. When we got to the barfing scene, the smell grew twice as thick, and the chitters of excitement from the Zhuri kids almost drowned out the soundtrack.
Then Ila appeared on the screen, two stories tall, and began to sing “Under a Blue Sky.”
What happened next took my breath away. As the doughnut smell faded, replaced by honeysuckle and mint, the whole crowd of Zhuri began to sway back and forth in time with the music, the same way the principal had. But instead of just one person’s body tracing an S-curve in midair, there were two thousand—and all of them were in perfect sync.
The whole school full of Zhuri danced as one, in a wall of movement that looked as peaceful as it was powerful. Beneath them, the Krik in front bounced on their feet and bobbed their heads. Unlike the Zhuri, they weren’t quite in sync, and their bodies created a ragged green line of movement under the Zhuri’s massive wave of energy.
It was so beautiful that I got a lump in my throat. When I looked over at Ila, she was crying. I think if it were physically possible for them to cry, the Zhuri would have too. Watching them dance was so hypnotic, and I’d had so little sleep over the past days, that as the song went on, I started to get light-headed.
Then, just before the final chorus, the music stopped and the screen went dark.
The spell it had cast over the crowd broke, and the positive energy drained away, leaving only the thrummm of the Zhuri’s beating wings as everyone looked at each other in confusion and disappointment.
What just happened?
A commotion rose up at the back, by the entrance doors—whining, jostling, some kind of disturbance. We tried to peer through the mass of people, but it was too thick, and the light was too low, for us to see what was happening. We could hear the disruption moving through the room toward us, but it wasn’t until the line of Krik broke open right in front of us that we saw the soldiers.
I don’t know how many of them there were. I only saw the first wedge, needles of blue light arcing across their prong weapons as they rushed at us.
They zapped the principal first. Ila and I were next.
It didn’t hurt as much as it had the day before. Or maybe I just passed out faster.
MY HEADACHE WAS bad. But not as bad as the fact that I was trapped in a coffin.
At least it felt like a coffin. It must’ve been built for a Zhuri, because I was squeezed into it so tight that I couldn’t move my head or take a full breath. My back and chest were pressed between the top and bottom walls like a dead bug in a display case. I could move my arms and legs sideways, but only for a few inches until they hit the walls on either side.
My head was turned to the left, and there was just enough light to see the wall in front of me. It was smooth plastic, in the same stupid color of beige as everything else on Choom.
I could hear shrieking in the distance. It sounded like protestors. But someone had taken away my screen and earpiece, so I didn’t know for sure.
I lay there for a while. I don’t know how long. Thirty minutes? An hour? It was hard to judge time.
There was a faint rumbling noise, like machinery starting up. The walls trembled.
My coffin was moving.
I felt my equilibrium change. Was I tilting down? Up? I was still so dizzy from the neural disrupter that I couldn’t tell.
The walls above and below me started to expand. I had just enough time to wonder if I was about to fall before I did.
“AAGH!”
I landed in a heap on a spongy floor. I was in a small beige room with no doors or windows. The opening I’d fallen from in the ceiling had already vanished. The room was empty except for a pair of stools and a table.
My screen and earpiece were on the table.
I tried to get up, but I was too dizzy to walk. So I half crawled, half dragged myself over to the table. I put the earpiece in and took my screen, laying it sideways on the floor in front of my head so I could look at it without sitting up.
There was a message from Mom, almost an hour old:
Troops arriving don’t come home
I dragged myself over to the side wall so I could sit up and prop myself against it. I sent messages to Mom, Dad, and Ila:
Where are you? I think I am in jail
Nobody answered. I figured as much.
The headache was killing me. Not literally. At least I didn’t think so. But wow, did it hurt.
I decided I should try to get up. I had no idea what was happening, but I felt like being able to stand would be a plus.
With my back against the wall, I pushed myself up onto my feet. Then I took a step forward so I was standing
free. Right away I started to careen to one side.
Too soon. I lurched back against the wall and slid down onto my butt.
A couple minutes later, I tried again. This time I lasted a little longer before I had to plop back down.
I’d just stood up for the third time when a door appeared in the wall and a Zhuri entered. The door closed behind him, leaving no trace of where it had been.
The Zhuri motioned to one of the two stools. “Sit.”
It was only about four steps over to the stool. But that was two more than I could manage. After the second step, I felt myself listing to one side. I overcorrected, lost my feet, and came crashing down on top of the stool.
It must’ve looked hilarious. But I didn’t get any doughnut smell from the Zhuri. He just stared down at me as I wobbled onto my knees, righted the stool, and somehow managed to dump myself on top of it.
I had to grab hold of the table with both hands so I wouldn’t keel over.
“Human Lan Mifune, who have you conspired with?”
“Do you have any headache medicine, sir?”
“I ask the questions.”
Uh-oh. Gasoline. He’s mad.
“You are part of a plot to disrupt Choom’s peace. Who has assisted you in this?”
“There’s no plot, sir,” I said. “We want peace too.”
“Who told you to create the emotional content?”
“Nobody did, sir. We just thought people would like—that it would be educational for them.”
“Did Senior Official Leeni conspire with you?”
“No, sir.”
“Did Chief Educator Hiyew conspire with you?”
“No, sir. We didn’t conspire. He just thought it was educational too.”
The interrogator’s head snapped back. The gasoline smell got worse.
“Human Lan Mifune. Listen closely. What do you hear?”
“Protestors?” The chanting had been going on ever since I woke up, but after so many days of hearing them in the distance, I’d mostly stopped noticing.
“Those are Zhuri citizens, poisoned with the sickness of emotion,” he said. “They have great anger, and you are the cause of it. If you continue to tell me lies, I will send you out among the swarm—and they will destroy you.”
This is really not going well.
“I’m telling you the truth, sir.”
“Who among the Zhuri conspired with you?”
“Nobody!”
“Lies!”
He was getting so angry that he was giving off a whole new smell. It was a harsh, chemical stink, like menthol and rubbing alcohol.
“We know there is a conspiracy against the Unified Government. You will tell us who is responsible—” He paused, his head drawing back again. “Are you making smell at me?”
“Humans don’t make smell, sir.”
The menthol-alcohol stink was getting much stronger, and I realized it wasn’t coming from him after all. He leaned in toward me, his tubelike mouth twitching rapidly. Then he stood up, raising his head and slowly turning it as he inspected the seams where the ceiling met the wall. He walked toward the far corner, his head still raised and his mouth twitching.
He must’ve been searching for the source of the stink. It was so strong now that it felt like it was searing my nostrils. I tried not to breathe through my nose.
The interrogator flitted up into the air, raising his face to inspect the seam between the ceiling and wall. There must’ve been some kind of air duct up there.
I watched him slowly fly along the wall, his upturned mouth following the edge of the ceiling.
Then his wings stopped flitting.
He dropped out of the air, crashing in a heap on the floor. His collapse shocked me so much that I jumped up from my stool and almost fell over myself. I hoped my dizziness was from the neural disrupter’s side effects and not whatever had just knocked out my interrogator.
Leaning against the wall for support, I made my way over to where I thought the door had been. I knocked hard on it. Whatever had just happened to the interrogator, I didn’t want to get blamed.
“Hello? HELLO? HELLOOOO!”
There was no answer. Still leaning on the wall, I made my way over to the interrogator’s crumpled body. He didn’t look like he was breathing. Then again, I wasn’t exactly an expert on Zhuri biology.
I went back to the door and pounded on it again, turning up the volume on my screen’s speaker and directing it at the door so the translation would broadcast as far as possible.
“HELLOOOO! HELLLOOOOO? SOMEBODY PLEASE HELP!”
I didn’t hear anything except the distant, angry chants of protestors outside the building. My chest started to tighten with panic. I was right on the edge of a meltdown when the door opened.
Marf filled the doorway, the strap from a thick satchel across her chest.
“MRRRRMMMM…!”
The sound of her sexy-actress rasp in my earpiece was so comforting that my panicky fear started to loosen its grip on my chest. “Oh good!” she said. “You still have your translator. Come help me find your sister.”
I fell into her arms, and she gave me a quick, warm hug. Then she grabbed my upper arms with both hands and stood me up straight.
“I am glad to see you too. But there is no time for affection.”
“I wasn’t trying to hug you,” I said. “I’m just not real good at walking right now.”
“Oh. That could be a problem. Try to hang on to the wall.”
She stepped away from the door. I grabbed the wall with one hand and did my best to follow. Beyond her was some kind of control room, with stools set up in front of an array of screens and panels.
Four Zhuri were crumpled on the floor next to their stools.
“What did you do to them?”
“It’s a long story. I’m very clever. Hurry up.”
Marf was headed for a door a few feet from the one I’d just exited. I lurched after her, grabbing the edge of the control panel for support.
Marf opened the narrow door, turned herself sideways, and squeezed her body through the opening. I got as far as the doorway, which led into a second interrogation room. Nobody was inside it except Marf. She picked up a human earpiece and screen from the table, then motioned for me to get out of the way so she could squeeze back through the doorway.
She handed the screen and earpiece to me. “These must be your sister’s. I think she’s in the main detention area. Put them in your pocket and hold on to my arm.”
I let her half drag me past the Zhuri bodies on the floor toward a larger door on the far wall.
“We have to hurry,” she told me. “It won’t be long before they wake up.”
I glanced back at the bodies. “They’re not all dead?”
“Of course not! I’m trying very hard not to commit any crimes that can’t be forgiven once we overthrow the government.”
“We’re overthrowing the government?” She hauled me through the door into a long hallway, empty except for a couple of unconscious Zhuri lying on the floor.
“I’m afraid it’s my only choice,” she said as she lugged me down the hall. “I seem to have gotten myself in the kind of trouble you don’t get out of unless you change the rules of the game.”
She paused at a door, checking the Zhuri-language sign on it before moving on. “It’ll be quite good for you, I think—a new government will almost certainly welcome humans. That is, if we can stop the current one from killing all of you in a desperate attempt to hang on to power—aah! Here we are!”
She stopped at another door and examined the locking mechanism in the wall next to it. “Hmm. Biometrics…Lean against the wall, will you? I need both hands free.”
I did as I was told. Marf lumbered down the hallway toward the nearest un
conscious Zhuri.
“Personally, I’d rather not overthrow the government,” she said over her shoulder. “It’s going to absolutely ruin my business. I’ve been making very good money selling illegal videos to Zhuri. But the whole scheme depends on the government suppressing emotions. If they stop doing that, the videos I sell will become common as dirt, and the prices will collapse.”
She lifted the fallen Zhuri up by his midsection and began to drag him back toward the door.
“What kind of videos were you selling?”
“Humorous ones. To trigger the laughter smell. Crude amateur stuff, mostly—household accidents, Zhuri falling down, flying into windows by mistake…the occasional Krik trying to eat something bigger than their head, then getting it stuck in their mouth…”
When she got back to the door with the unconscious Zhuri, she held his head up, placing his compound eye directly in front of the wall sensor.
The sensor beeped, and the door opened. Marf gently set the Zhuri down on the floor and began to help me step past him through the door.
“So…bloopers? You were selling blooper videos?”
“I don’t know what that word means. But probably yes. When I saw your Birdleys videos, I figured they’d be quite a hit. The Zhuri wouldn’t understand the words, but they’d love the parts where the birds fly into things and get kicked in their reproductive organs.”
We entered a large, high-ceilinged room that looked like a giant mausoleum. Hundreds of two-foot-by-two-foot square drawers filled three walls, stretching all the way to the ceiling. Along the near wall was a control panel. A pair of unconscious Zhuri lay slumped in front of it, along with a pair of prong weapons that they must have dropped when they fell.
Marf guided me to an empty stool next to the sleeping Zhuri. “Do me a favor and yell for your sister.”
“Ila?” I yelled.
“Louder, please.”
“ILA? ILAAAA? ARE YOU THERE?”
