Insight Kindling

by Chess Desalls

  I watched as Ray pulled himself up off the floor, shaken and visibly upset. Later, I thought, after he’s had time to recover from what just happened. I couldn’t imagine what images Ray had recorded in his mind from the attack.

  After exiting the aircraft, I found that the bridge ascended from grounds covered with wild grasses on both sides. One side spread out to a large open field. The other side looked like a campground with a fire pit and a small wooden building.

  I breathed in the still, grassy air.

  Ivory led us to the side with the building; a small cabin built out of logs, and motioned for us to go inside. There were two rooms, both unfurnished. The larger front room opened to a back room that had a window but no door. I glanced down at the floor. Like the sod hut, the ground in the cabin looked hard and cold.

  As I studied the cabin, I suspected that the elements of the Nowhere were significant only to Ivory, who had brought us there.

  Ivory waited, with her hands on her hips, until everyone got their fill of looking around and then called for a meeting in the front room. She picked up a couple of sleeping bags in the corner. Throwing one to Valcas and the other to Ray, she said, “We’ll be safe for the night. You two will sleep in here. Calla and I get the adjoining room.

  “There’s a campsite outside where we’ll prepare and eat dinner. You’ll find a change of underclothing wrapped in the sleeping bags. There are no showers here, so feel free to wash in the river.”

  Ray smirked at Ivory’s last remark, which he seemingly tried to hide by hurriedly unpacking his sleeping bag in a corner of the front room.

  “Tomorrow we will begin our search for Plaka,” Ivory said, ruffling her hands through her short white hair. “We’ll start with his homeland, which is what I had planned for today, but—well, we all know how that turned out. From there, we’ll look for leads.”

  I raised an eyebrow. “You mean we’re going to Earth?”

  Ray looked up from his sleeping bag. Almost simultaneously, Ivory creased her forehead and frowned. So did Valcas.

  “Plaka isn’t from Earth,” Valcas said.

  “But I thought— Wasn’t that where you met him?” I stuttered. “His name—isn’t it Greek?”

  The silence that ensued answered my question. We weren’t going to Earth. Tonight, we would stay at the cabin, Ivory’s Nowhere, to regroup.

  My father was from another world. Who knew what news tomorrow would bring.

  I TOOK extra time to lay out my sleeping bag and reorganize my backpack. No one seemed to mind. I assumed they thought I was also shaken up by the Uproar incident, and that they were trying to give me space. I was probably more worked up than I’d realized. It had all happened so fast. I wasn’t sure what to feel.

  I blinked dust from my eyes and took another look around the small back room that I was supposed to share with Ivory.

  A tiny window carved through the wooden walls caught my eye. It held a colored piece of glass that cast an eerie blue light into the room. For whatever reason, that made me feel lonely. I craved being outside and, strangely enough, the company of my team.

  I double-checked to make sure the travel glasses were securely placed inside my backpack and left the cabin to join the others.

  Outside, I found Ivory and Ray sitting by a pile of wood, watching Valcas kindle a fire. His hands moved automatically, as if he’d done this many times, but his forehead was creased; he was clearly thinking about something else. Eventually, he looked up at Ivory.

  “The Uproar has been catching up with us more quickly,” he said. “We can’t afford to have something like that happen again, especially when we’re up in the air. It’s too dangerous.”

  Ray sighed. “It’s not following us… at least not right now.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “It didn’t follow us here. For some reason it retreated after the jet’s engine caught fire. I think the fire repelled the Uproar. Ivory’s good, but she didn’t outrun it.”

  Valcas’ eyebrows furrowed momentarily, but he didn’t argue. “We’ll need to inspect the jet.”

  “It’s not necessary,” interjected Ivory. “If it’s the engine, then we won’t be able to repair it ourselves. I noticed something going wrong, but I couldn’t make out exactly what it was. That’s why I brought us here. Ray seemed too distracted to fill in additional details…”

  Ivory frowned and looked at me. “Calla, follow me, please.”

  Together, we walked across the bridge, past the jet and into the clearing on the other side where there was a landing strip. Ivory narrowed her eyes, squinting off in the distance.

  I followed her gaze. There was something out there, a bright blue object, at the other end of the strip.

  “Ah, good. It’s here. It’s not a commissioned TSTA vehicle,” Ivory said as we decreased the distance between us and the object. “But we seem to be beyond that now. I could tell from the controls and monitors that the TSTA jet had been damaged from the inside, so I brought us here, to a Nowhere, by searching for several things all at once—this bridge near where I grew up, the cabin I’d lived in while in the Aborealian Armed Forces, and my very first training jet.”

  The blue object came into focus and grew larger as we drew nearer. Once we were standing right next to it, at the far end of the landing strip, Ivory carefully looked over the bright blue jet.

  “So then traveling with vehicles is a lot like traveling with the glasses. It requires a search?”

  “I’ve never used an object that wasn’t a vehicle manufactured specifically for time travel; but, from what I’ve heard, the way you put it sounds about right.” She patted the side of the jet. “This old thing will have to do for now.”

  “What is the significance of the river?” I asked as we walked back. “I know that a river should be flowing, but its stillness means we are in a Nowhere. Like Edgar’s workshop in the woods, specific details such as his favorite car and Shirlyn’s brook were built into the Nowhere, which may have been a made-up place sometime before that. This river must be important to you.”

  Ivory smiled. “Yeah, well, we all have things that are important and meaningful to us.” She put her arm around my shoulders as we walked back to camp. “You’ve learned a lot in a short time. You’re… insightful. I can see why Valcas has grown fond of you.”

  Ivory’s last comment made me groan, which of course made her laugh.

  By the time we returned to the campsite, Valcas had a cozy fire going. Ray sat on a sleeping bag that he’d unfolded and spread out like a picnic blanket. Smiling, he invited me to sit down next to him.

  Valcas glared at us from the other side of the fire as I gratefully accepted. His voice, usually so smooth, was now gritty with jealousy. “Don’t get too comfortable, Technician. Give me one more reason to chaperone you and you’re gone.”

  Ivory chuckled as she threw a log onto the fire. “You’re just grumpy because you didn’t think of something like that first. Nice move, Ray.”

  I cringed, embarrassed, and looked over at Ray to gauge his response. His dark blue eyes, brightened by the campfire, were intently watching Ivory. I looked up in her direction. Flames flickered, lighting up her white hair just as strongly as they reflected off Valcas’ dark glasses.

  I couldn’t tell whether Ray was pretending to ignore the conversation, recording Ivory tending the fire or thinking about something else. Just when I thought he’d zoned out completely, he spoke.

  “What if we were to extinguish the Uproar by finding a way to surround it, by backing it into a corner?” Ray’s voice was quiet but tense.

  “Excuse me?” Ivory asked, the steady blaze of the fire dancing in her eyes.

  “I think we could confuse the Uproar by backing it into a large body of fire. It would resist going forward.”

  “The only large body of fire I’ve heard of is the Fire Falls,” said Ivory.

  “The Fire Falls?” I echoed.

  Valcas nodded. “I suppose it could work. The Upr
oar is a sentient being, but I’m not sure it understands that it’s possible to get to the other side of the Fire Falls.”

  Ivory’s mouth dropped open. “You can do that?”

  Valcas stared at me through the flames for an uncomfortably long period time and then twitched slightly, but obviously enough to attract attention.

  “What is it, Valcas?” Ivory asked.

  “If the Uproar resists fire, then even if the Uproar could not be destroyed, the other side of the Falls would be an excellent place to escape. I can’t think of a better hiding place.”

  “So you think—” Ivory said, wide-eyed.

  Valcas nodded. “Calla, your father just might be alive.”

  TO SAY that I had trouble falling asleep that night would qualify as the Understatement of the Year.

  The cold, hard ground bit at me through my sleeping bag. I longed for the warmth of the fire outside, but Ivory had insisted that we sleep inside because it was safer. Safer from what? The Uproar could break through the building just as easily as it could attack us unsheltered, outside in the open air.

  I turned over onto my stomach, which was grumbling, complaining that it was still mostly empty. The canned tomato soup and baked beans from the TSTA jet’s emergency supply had been good, but there wasn’t much. I’d left most of my share for the boys after noting that Ivory hadn’t eaten anything. I didn’t know whether the TSTA expected us to starve in an emergency situation, or whether they thought we’d get lost before we got hungry.

  On top of that, I was so filled with the anticipation of finally getting to meet my father that I couldn’t relax enough to doze. I feared that Ray’s idea would lead to bitter disappointment: either not finding my father or finding him dead. Worse yet, maybe we’d find someone lonely and lost who either would not recognize me or would not want to meet me.

  I turned over in the bag again. We were in a Nowhere created according to Ivory’s specifications. How unsafe could it be? It wasn’t like she could prevent me from going outside for a walk or getting a drink of water.

  I crawled out of my sleeping bag and wrapped a sweatshirt around me.

  Since Ivory and I were staying in the innermost room of the two-roomed cabin, Ray and Valcas were the only ones with access to the front door, which meant that I needed to cross through their room to exit the cabin.

  I carefully tiptoed out of my room and into the next one. It was dark, but there was just enough light trickling in through the doorway to see by. I squinted. The front door was cracked open. I could make out that only one of the two sleeping bags in Valcas and Ray’s room was occupied. The other bag hadn’t been unrolled. I assumed that one belonged to Valcas.

  Curious, wide-awake and with nothing else to do, I carefully stepped past Ray and ventured outside with the intention of hanging out near the fire pit.

  Dry grasses crackled beneath my feet. Drawn to the glow of the fire pit’s dying embers, I knelt down and rubbed my hands above their warmth.

  Before long, I felt the presence of someone else. I looked up and saw a shadow, a figure approaching me from the direction of the river.

  “Calla?”

  Valcas wore his glasses as he walked toward me, but then he took them off when he reached the camp. His hair was wet, presumably from having bathed in the river, and he’d changed into warmer clothing.

  “Hey, Valcas,” I said as he squatted down next to me. With only the soft light of the embers to see by, his pale eyes didn’t appear as freakish to me as they had in the past. If anything, the red-orange glow provided color to his irises, where color was lacking.

  “If we don’t find him tomorrow,” I whispered, “can you take me to see a past version of him—of my father?”

  Valcas shook his head and responded softly. “That wouldn’t do either one of us any good.”

  I felt my chin tremble and quickly looked away. “But I thought you said that seeing past versions of others, of silhouettes, could be a healing experience.”

  “I’m sorry, Calla. There are many things I would do for you, but I can’t be intentionally responsible for that. I can’t let you, much less help you, become lost.”

  I sighed, remembering how easy it was to get caught up in a past world while time slipped by.

  Valcas took my cold hands in his and pulled us into a seated position on the ground, nearer the warmth of the fading campfire. “If I could, I would bring silhouettes of him to you, as many as I could find, but I don’t have that talent. Even if I did, I still wouldn’t have the insight to recognize whether or not it was truly helping.”

  I nodded and squeezed his hands briefly, to let him know that part of me understood and agreed that what he was saying was true. As I looked into his eerie eyes, I knew that what was real was the present, along with all of its good and bad.

  “I owe my life to Plaka,” he said. “He saved me from myself—he taught me how not to get lost.”

  I frowned. I felt like he kept telling me the same words, over and over; yet, each time he made me wonder what those words meant. “What exactly happened to you to—?”

  Valcas grasped my hands again and pulled me closer. “But, there’s something else. You also saved me.”

  “Huh? Me?”

  “Yes. When I made my promise to Plaka, you gave me a purpose, something real and present.”

  Wincing, I scooted back slightly but didn’t pull my hands away. “I had nothing to do with my father’s request. I was just a baby—”

  “I’m sure I doubted what I saw captured in the photograph, the daily reminder that no longer exists,” he said. “But when I saw your memories and recordings of your time spent with my younger self at the White Tower, I started to wonder whether something more between us was meant to be, whether it was even possible.” He swallowed. “Did you really feel that way about me?”

  The blood drained from my cheeks and then rushed back in again. My head swam with everything that Valcas had just told me, and the meaning behind it—the reason he’d turned red when I told him about recording at the White Tower.

  He’d already known I’d learned how to record. The travel glasses told him that—my pair, the original pair altered by Edgar. Valcas had borrowed them from me before leaving TSTA Headquarters, when we’d swapped glasses so he could look up something his current backup pair hadn’t correctly captured. There’d been a malfunction.

  My mind raced, searching for the answer to his question that hung over my head as thick as smoke and as just as stifling. He’d seen us together, along with my thoughts and feelings toward green-eyed Valcas, his past self, during and after our last flight at the White Tower.

  And I, who was so concerned all of the time about others delving into my private life, had given him the glasses without thinking. I’d been so preoccupied with my own loss and regret—not to mention the recent TSTA hearing and penalty—that I never considered anything like this would happen. I’d just handed them over to Valcas—my private thoughts and feelings—as if they’d meant nothing to me at all.

  But they did. Green-eyed Valcas’ words sounded in my ears: Then whichever version of me that is with you will be extraordinarily happy. That version of Valcas was gone, as well as all of his memories of me, and just the thought of it made me sick. The photograph of us, the daily reminder, had been destroyed by the version of Valcas that sat before me—the version who wasn’t just asking me if I’d had feelings for him, but something more. Buried deep inside his question was another one: whether I could feel that way about him again.

  I sucked in a deep breath as I prepared my answer. “I couldn’t help being charmed by the way you used to be, before the travel glasses changed you. I didn’t expect to feel that way, but yes, I did. It happened and now it’s over.”

  Valcas cringed. When he spoke again, his words sounded choked, as if I’d just punched him in the gut. “Of course, I’ve lost some of my looks. Have I changed much more than the color of my eyes?”

  I frowned as I considered this. �
�Yes. You seemed broken, but not nearly as much as you are now, and there was something more lively and hopeful about you.” Looking down at Valcas’ grip on my hands, I added, “You were also a lot less threatening.”

  He let go immediately. “Then I will need to change my disposition as well as my eye color.”

  I pulled my sweatshirt around me more tightly and wondered aloud: “I’m not sure which of the two would be easier to fix.”

  I WOKE the next morning after a few hours of troubled sleep to find Ray looking down at me, concerned and adorable.

  The blue glass in the window blocked the sunlight, casting a blue tint on both of us and keeping the room dark and cool. Ivory’s sleeping bag was already rolled up. The cabin was silent.

  “Where is everyone?” I asked as I crawled out of my sleeping bag.

  “They’re prepping Ivory’s training jet. Your mom has been filled in on what’s happened and the TSTA approved our plan to move forward. There isn’t enough time to repair the TSTA vehicle or get a replacement.”

  I nodded. “No one told Mom about the possibility of finding my father, did they?”

  Ray shook his head. “No, we didn’t want to worry her and also, at least Ivory and I—we didn’t think it was any of our business. Right now, our main mission objective is to protect you so we told her that you are alive and well, and left it at that.”

  Relieved, and now more awake, I looked up at Ray. Today he had on a long-sleeved denim shirt worn open over a T-shirt and a pair of cargo shorts. His red earring sparkled purple when mixed with the blue light. The light had no effect on his already deeply blue eyes, though.

  He held out a hand to help me up off the dirt floor.

  “Thanks.” I smiled. “Thanks for everything—for being here and helping to keep me safe during the Uproar’s attack on the jet.”

  “My pleasure. There’s some leftover breakfast waiting for you outside. We’ll be leaving as soon as you’re ready to go. I’ll see you in the jet.”

  I changed quickly and brushed my hair, which was still damp from having bathed in the river after last night’s conversation with Valcas. Facing him today would be awkward but unavoidable. I hadn’t wanted to hurt or belittle him, especially when I knew he was trying to protect me and help me find my father. If only he were more like Ray, I thought, it would be so much easier to like him.