Wakers: Sayonara Sleep

by Michaela Hoffman

  ***

  Chapter 18

  Waker Life Day 10

  There has been an unfathomable occurrence in Nightworld. Two Wakers have conceived a child. Such a scenario, I was not prepared for. The mother is carrying in both reality states, appearing at midterm in a matter of two Awakenings. Along with the parents, it seems a joyous fervor has overtaken the Waker community. Many are traveling across territories to deliver gifts for the baby. And to pray for it. Social networks have grown from this event, which is visibly influencing the mental health of the collective. I cannot describe how profound this is to see, not only as a researcher, but as a human being. This dream of mine is coming to fruition.

  My phone started ringing. Why did this always happen at the best parts? I let it go to voicemail, a habit I’d developed lately. With a tinge of guilt, I closed Dad’s journal and listened to the message. It was one of ten I hadn’t heard. Turns out the last caller was Jax.

  “So this is the third time you haven’t answered my call. Hope you’re alive. Ms. Kazuya was waiting for you this afternoon. I’m guessing you planned to meet and didn’t show… not totally surprised. Anyway, stop by Silver Heights soon. We… I mean, she misses you. Later.” I closed my eyes and pressed the phone to my forehead. Yes, it was Wednesday: our lunch date. I totally forgot. Things had just gotten so busy.

  I glanced over at Dad’s journal. It was my last hope now. Every other lead took me nowhere. Which reminded me. If the Druke Waker trail was a dead-end, what good would the document pictures serve? I went back into my phone to delete them. Okay, goodbye pages 1, 2, 3, 4… and lastly, 5. Before I pressed delete, I noticed I hadn’t read the final section: After execution, I agree to have my bodily remains donated to the Falconbridge research team for further study and scientific advancement. Creepy much? There were two signatures below it, beside execution dates. On the third line there was an N/A. Kiki and Leo had their sentences carried out. But apparently not Sylvia Tash. My dead end had turned into a cul-de-sac.

  I found one local Tash residence online. It was in Heirloom, a block away from my old neighborhood. Kind of strange to walk my old stomping grounds. The sidewalk litter and graffiti didn’t change. Nor did the middle finger disappear from one of our stop signs. Funny how these things became nostalgic over time.

  At the Tash mailbox, I started for the driveway. There was nothing to lose, right? If it was the wrong Tash, they’d understand and I’d just go back home. My heart almost stopped at the sight of a six foot tall woman coming out on the porch, gun in hand. She pointed it at me.

  “Get the fuck off my property.” She aimed the gun skywards and fired three times. Oh shiitake mushrooms. Well, what did I expect from a person who survived death row? I slapped my frozen legs, and when they finally woke up, I amscrayed across her yard. In the process, I tripped over a garden gnome. My ankle was bleeding and swollen. So I was done for. The woman came over to me and I cowered from fear. Void of expression, she pocketed the gun and hoisted me up under the shoulder. “We’ll fix you up inside,” she said gruffly. “I can’t afford a lawsuit.”

  “T-thank you,” I said, hobbling at her side.

  She stuck a finger in my face. “And after, you’ll get the fuck off my property.” I gulped and nodded several times.

  She sat me down on a tattered couch by the entrance. Soda cans decorated the floor and a few cats strolled by. The woman sat cross legged by my feet, carrying alcohol disinfectant, cotton balls, and a wrap of gauze. I grimaced as she mended the ankle. “W-would you happen to be Sylvia Tash?” I asked. The woman didn’t look up from my leg. She tossed her dreadlocks behind her back.

  “Syl’s long gone. I’m her sister.” Oh no. I was too late. Without Tash, all I had was Dad’s journal. The woman began wrapping my foot up. Maybe I could still make this trip useful.

  “Okay… well, you wouldn’t happen to know anything about the Waker Trials, would you?” She stopped mid-wrap, and looked up at me with sharp eyes.

  “They fucked people up,” she spat. “Any other questions?” This was not going well. But what else could I do? What else could I say? Aza, how would you reach her? Without a second thought, I pulled back my sleeve. I lowered my wrist so she could see my tattoo.

  “I am now what your sister was,” I said, tracing the flower outline with my fingers. “My dad started this mess. He and my sister are missing. Anything you can tell me about Waker World will help me find them. Please.”

  She looked mildly surprised, then returned to taping off the wrap. “Out of all the made up stories I’ve heard, that’s the most creative.” Wait, what? The woman got up and walked to a different room. She returned shortly after with a bag of ice and strapped it to my ankle. “Go home, elevate your foot, and keep ice on it until the swelling goes down.”

  “I’m telling the truth,” I burst, tears welling in my eyes from the frustration. Why was it this hard to find them? It seemed like each step was a battle.

  She was unmoved by my crying. “You’re telling me that Doctor Darkus infected his own daughters?” She pulled me into standing. “I don’t believe it.” While our eyes locked, another person bustled through the front door.

  “Sylvia, help me with the groceries,” she called, noisily removing her shoes. She padded into another room and the cats started meowing. My eyes widened; so it was her. I found Sylvia. But she clearly wasn’t as thrilled about this realization as I was. She pushed me towards the door. Oh, no way.

  “Nestutha, Lathermia, Seawall, Skyplume, and KuKave are the Nightworld territories.” But this wasn’t enough proof. I racked my brain for knowledge that wasn’t so concrete. Things that only a true Waker would know. “The water you can breathe under. And the creepy sea nymph!” At this, Sylvia froze. She spun me around by the shoulders.

  “The Sea Mistress,” she seethed, dropping her gaze. “That mer-bitch.” Sylvia exposed her left arm, sleeved with tattoos down to her wrist. But there was one empty patch of skin. “She killed me there. So my mark disappeared.” I touched her skin curiously, remembering my near-miss encounters with her. The Sea Mistress. Was she trying to kill me too?

  “Why?”

  Sylvia walked back to the couch and sank into it. “Because the law couldn’t kill me off,” she said. “Without an autopsy, I was useless to them.” Right. They had to donate their bodily remains.

  “So that was how they measured brain changes,” I reasoned.

  Sylvia slouched and crossed her legs at the ankles. “Psh. Was?” She laughed and folded her arms. “Whatever you signed gives them rights to every piece of you. Alive and dead.” I thought of Bru and my Falconbridge family. That couldn’t be their fate, could it? Dad, why did you support this? For now, I had to switch gears.

  “And what about my dad? What happened to him in Nightworld?”

  Sylvia fished around her pocket for a lighter. While taking a drag off her cigarette, she patted the cushion next to her so I’d sit down. “It all started with Kiki and Leo’s kid,” she said, elbowing me. “That was hella crazy. Those two had a thing for each other since we got locked up. And man did they play house in Nightworld.” A black cat hopped up on my lap and I stroked her fur. She purred and curled up to stay. Sylvia reached over to pet her too. “Anyway, it was fun at first. For all of us. Then Kiki delivered after a few days. Talk about speed-birthing.” She stopped, and her voice became softer. “Doctor D was just as attached to the baby as Kiki. They taught the boy to walk, talk, you name it.” I couldn’t help but feel a tinge of jealousy. That kind of affection was reserved for me and Aza, his real children. At least it should’ve been.

  “Now, your dad wanted to observe the kid, but his comrades on high wanted to study him their way. They even got Wakers to try to steal him from Kiki.” She stopped thoughtfully while taking another drag. “You know, that baby really changed her. Deep down. During execution… Kiki wanted to be put to sleep before injection. Just so she could hold the kid one last time. Then we all watched her body turn into mist.”
With a sigh, she put out the cigarette in an ashtray. “So Doctor D took over as mom. Because Leo was a useless asshole.” Now this was turning into a soap opera.

  “What did the researchers do to my dad?” After all these years, the answer seemed within reach.

  The cat mosied over towards Sylvia’s thigh. She hesitated before speaking. “Now that I don’t know,” she said. “But if anyone does know, it’d be the kid.” Okay so that was a start on Dad.

  “What about Aza, my sister?” I asked. “She was called Blackout.”

  Sylvia shrugged. “Not ringing a bell,” she said. “But like I said, that boy would probably know.”

  “Why’s that?”

  Sylvia tilted her head at me, smirking. “Because he never wakes up,” she said. “He’s trapped inside of that sunless petri dish.” I immediately thought of two men. The answer to my question was already dreaded.

  “Sylvia, what was the boy’s name?” The cat purred loudly in the silence.

  “Sweet Nez,” she said softly. “That’s what Kiki always called him.”

  There was a lot to process. But one thing for certain, when I returned to Nightworld, I had to find Nez. That was the next step. I stopped at the teahouse on my way back home. Just to sit with my thoughts for a while. Sitting on a cushion by the window, I nursed my drink. Dad, you created such a beautiful thing. Even Tash saw that it was changing people for the better. But now it was something you wouldn’t recognize. How can I fix it? On the sidewalk, a piece of broken glass glinted in the sunlight. It brought me back to my Falconbridge memories.

  “Darkus, fix it,” the supervisor commanded, looming over Dad’s workspace. We were in Ganji Lab, and I was dangling from the sink at the eyewash station. My father inspected a few glass flasks containing fluids and scribbled some notes. “Sir, are your specimens still preserved?” When the supervisor nodded, my father passed me on his way to the freezer.

  “The movie starts in thirty minutes,” I huffed. “You promised.” Dad pressed a finger to his lips before entering the ice room. “Dr. Supervisor,” I called across the room. “Why can’t you fix your own problem?” It felt like every worker looked up from their experiments to see his reaction. The supervisor set down his clipboard.

  “Because I need help,” he said, walking towards me. “You know, Lava, that’s never a bad thing.” While I was fuming inside, Dad emerged from the freezer with the specimens. Before any of us could stop him, he slipped in water beside the door. Dad clumsily fell to the floor, reaching out for the nearest stable surface. He managed to grab the temperature dial to the freezer.

  In a half-second, the most shrill alarm rang throughout the lab. Dad attempted to pull himself up using the lab volume gauge. Unfortunately he cranked it towards sound amplification versus dampening. I clapped my hands over my ears while all of the flasks burst in a shower of broken glass. The supervisor rushed over to adjust the gauges. His face was the color of a beet. From the floor, my father looked up at him sheepishly.

  I stood beside both of them with a smirk on my face. “Guess this time help was a bad thing.”

  I smiled at the memory. Some parts of me hadn’t changed all that much, huh? At dusk, Jax caught me passing Silver Heights. He walked me back home, conversing with small talk but I could sense a little awkwardness in the air. Like he wasn’t telling me something.

  My uncles were waiting on the front porch, along with Detective Zatorre. No one looked happy. And somehow everyone knew about my Tash visit. Most of their words flew through one ear and out the other. Yes, I had been irresponsible, impulsive, and unsafe. Yes, a Falconbridge walnut could have kidnapped me through the chimney and so forth.

  “Tash is dead,” Detective Zatorre finally said. “We closed off the crime scene thirty minutes ago.” For a minute I forgot to breathe. What? I had just seen her; that couldn’t be true. “Her mother heard the sound of a gunshot downstairs, and found Sylvia on the floor, pulseless. Here was the note found beside the body.” She unzipped a bag and handed me a sealed piece of scrap paper. In large bold letters, it read: Stop looking. Or you’ll be next. Every arm hair stood on end. So this was because of me? Her death was my fault. If I hadn’t gone to ask about Dad, she’d be alive.

  The collective anger melted away as they offered arms to cry into. Detective Zatorre stroked my hair. “Lava, there’s a line between bravery and foolishness. And you’ve crossed it.” Needless to say, I was under mondo house arrest. Uncle Hugo said Jax would walk me everywhere from now on. And Clover and Mauricio would keep eyes on me at school. Though I understood where they were coming from, a part of me wished they would stop to listen. Because right now, I felt so alone.

  Chapter 19

  ***

  The steady lull of waterfalls kept my tear ducts unlatched. I was one with them, streams channeling down my cheeks and into the creases of my neck. With legs drawn to my chest, I rested my head on my knees. Just for tonight, I needed a place to hide. Was that such a terrible thing? One minute I’m too cowardly, and the next I’m too bold. Why couldn’t they make up their minds? But then again, why couldn’t I make up mine: was I returning to Nightworld for my family, or for myself?

  Somewhere along the way, my Waker self had become very real to me. More so, even, than my Real self. Here, in Nightworld, I had strength, purpose, and people who believed in me. Reality just couldn’t compare. I examined my flowery hands. This body, these powers, weren’t truly real though. They were just a manifest of Dad’s dream, nonexistent and transient.

  A black cloak brushed against my bare ankles. I pretended not to notice, still quietly crying. The Czar’s voice rose above the falls. “You’re in good company here,” he said, nodding towards the view. “They’re crying with you.”

  I sniffled self consciously, turning my face away. “The best company ever.” The Czar lowered beside me with one knee bent. He then asked why I was crying. A very simple question, an invitation to listen. In my gratitude, my waterworks intensified. Every sound was profoundly ugly.

  He gently placed his hand on my hair, drawing my cheek to his shoulder. We stayed like this, silent, aside from my emotional purge. The waterfalls behind us were soothing and rhythmic. In the shade of the gazebo, I clung to him a little tighter than I would have in the light. But feeling the lift and fall of his chest was comforting. The sound of his heartbeat almost put me to sleep. It was then I realized how much I needed this. Not a place to hide per se, but rather a place to be me: a fusion of both my Real and Waker selves.

  I wound up telling the Czar about everything that was happening on the Other Side. Excluding the parts about Nez. He listened patiently, responded at times without judgment, and pulled me closer when I recounted painful things. After I said all that I wanted to, I asked him what he thought. The Czar waited before speaking. “Your whole heart is in this.”

  I pressed my palm firmly to his chest and looked up at him, eyes set at low-light simmer. “Every beat,” I confessed, tapping his breastbone. “It almost burns. Like my dad and sister are prodding me forward.” I paused, remembering them: The way my father slouched at his desk, or how he lazily strolled around the yard at dusk. Aza, leaning against her car while waiting in the driveway, her full-bodied hugs. “I’ve hidden for so long because of the pain. But it’s not about me anymore. This is something I have to do for them.”

  At this time I became acutely aware of how close we had become. I was basically in the Czar’s lap, his arm resting on the small of my back. Inhibitions splintered any further conclusions and I was left speechless. Renezen didn’t seem to notice. He instead appeared conflicted, which I understood. I mean, our original agreement was that I’d get Aza information after fulfilling a certain duty. And to my knowledge, that hadn’t happened yet. He then helped me to my feet, my hands in his.

  “I have an idea,” he finally said, turning me towards the waterfalls; they were gleaming in slits of phosphorescent color. Standing from behind, Renezen whispered into my ear: “Project your light to the
water.” He gently raised my arms. An inner resonance surfaced in warmth and light as he unfolded my fingers. The memory I chose to linger in was this one. Right here, feeling powerful, senses heightened by the Czar’s touch. Turning my head to the side for a moment, I felt like he was smiling back at me.

  A swath of sunbeam shot out from my hands to the falls across the ocean, arching at the halfway point. Within moments, the beam was coated in bright color, transforming the lightbow into a rainbow bridge. I whirled around to face him.

  “I made a rainbow,” I breathed. “Can we cross it?” He gestured for me to move forward. Under our feet and far away, the sea and its marine life were aglow. When geese flew through the rainbow, it repaired itself in seconds. This was so incredible. Like a dream. A dream that felt so real.

  Renezen walked into the cascades with a swipe of his cloak. When he reached back for my hand, I took it. We were in the underside of the waterfalls. Damp and shimmering with vapor, it looked like a liquid-crystal cavern. Below our feet were rock cutouts, spiraling into a heavenward staircase. When I got closer to the liquid-crystals, I realized they were water fragments, separated into distinct glassy tiles. Each one held a moving image inside of them. Every moment, a random tile flipped and captured a new set of liquid characters, evocative and in motion. In response to my unspoken curiosities, Renezen stood beside me.