by Quil Carter
“Ah…” I itched the back of my neck. I glanced at Sacario whose eyes had turned down to his feet. I never realized how crappy his shoes were. And… were those laces made out of a headphone cord?
“He was defending me,” Sacario said simply. “I’m how he gets his Skittle fix.”
Nero stared at Sacario, before his brow slowly knitted. I could see the rat that lived inside of his head sniff the wheel it was supposed to run on. “Oh… alrighty then. Never knew Elish was such a fan. He’s always been a peanut butter M&Ms-type. I myself love Fruit Loops.”
No, we weren’t eating two hundred plus-year-old breakfast cereal or candy. Dek’ko now made several brands of cereal and their own version of the candy-coated chocolate. Since trademarks were long extinct, they’re called their pre-Fallocaust names. It worked well since all Skyfallers had access to cable television, and since they all enjoyed watching old time commercials, well, free advertising.
“I’ve never had Fruit Loops before…” Sacario’s eyes glistened. “Do you eat the yellow ones first?”
My brother paused for a second, before he decided to humour my weird new friend. “Yeah, of course I do. Doesn’t everyone?”
Sacario seemed pleased with this answer.
We got off of the elevator and entered the apartment. I saw Garrett and Ellis in the sitting room with a chess board between them, both watching the board intently. Garrett was an avid chess player, or a chess-nut as we called him. I could beat him easily, but I’d decided to let him have his thing since he loved the game so much.
But I mentally beat him in my head before purposely letting him win, just in case he decided to be a sore winner.
Garrett glanced over towards the door and his eyes widened. “Who’s that?” He got up from the table, and when Ellis looked over and spotted Sacario too, she also jumped to her feet.
“He’s my friend, leave him alone,” I said. “Come on. I’ll take you to my room.” I grabbed Sacario’s jacket and began pulling him towards the stairs.
“Hey, you have blood all over your shirt… What the hell happened?” Garrett exclaimed. But then he got to more important matters apparently. “Want to play chess?” he asked my friend.
“Piss off. He’s my friend, get your own,” I snapped.
“You can share. I get him in an hour.”
“No!”
“If anyone’s getting him, it’s me. I saved him. I get him,” Nero butted in. “You can have him after me, shrimp.” He reached over and punched Garrett in the arm, making Garrett jump back and hiss.
Sacario just stared, before reaching into his jacket and pulling out a new bag of Skittles. He looked at me while Garrett and Nero argued, and offered me the bag.
“Purple please,” I said to him. Sacario smiled, a weird lopsided smile that made a few teeth show, and handed me several purple ones. The two of us then turned around and headed, unmolested, towards the stairs.
I breathed a sigh of relief when the lock clicked on the door to my bedroom. “No one has the key but Silas and he’s gone right now.” I probably shouldn’t have told him that. “So the locusts I call my siblings won’t be able to kidnap you.”
“I’ve never gotten so much attention in my life,” Sacario said. He walked over to Hugh who was stretched out in the sunlight my open windows were filling the room with, and offered him the bag of Skittles. I questioned my new friend’s intelligence in that moment, but then I reminded myself that I’d been questioning that for the past two days. “The view up here is incredible. But don’t you worry there’ll be an earthquake? Or a fire? If there was an earthquake, this would go straight down. You’re not worried about that?”
I blinked and walked up behind him to look at Skyfall’s skyline in front of me. “Well… I didn’t. Now I will though, so thanks for that.”
“Skyfall Island is on a fault line, it’s called the Wanda-fuck-ya-straight,” Sacario said very matter-of-factly. “I’m guessing Wanda would’ve been a terrible woman for your family to encounter. No wonder they named something after her.”
I just stared at him, that was all, I just stared at him. What else could I really do? It was Sacario. “It’s called the Juan De Fuca plate, that’s what causes the earthquakes,” I said exasperated. “And there hasn’t been an earthquake in thousands of years…”
“Yeah, we were overdue like hundreds of years ago. You’re immortal, right?” Sacario poured more Skittles into his hand and began picking out the yellow ones.
“N-no… Silas doesn’t know how to make immortals yet…”
“Well, once you are… that means you’re going to eventually live during an earthquake that will like… level everything. One day, it’ll be a normal day and then…” Sacario began making a rumbling crashing noise, and then the motion of a tower falling down... complete with whistle.
I gave him a flat look and plucked the two purple Skittles from his hand. “Like I needed more nightmares, thanks.” I popped them into my mouth. “Why do you eat Skittles all the time? That’s all I’ve ever seen you eat.”
Sacario stopped chewing for a second, then began chewing really slowly, almost deliberately slowly. I didn’t take my eyes off of him, curious as to why he was delaying answering, and watched him swallow down the candy.
“It’s the lowest on the vending machine rack… and the one right by the flap you reach into to get your candy.” Sacario extended his hand then curled it up and twittled his fingers. “So I can reach up and grab two without having to pay. Every few days the vending machine dude restocks and pulls them ahead… hasn’t caught on what I’m doing yet. Free lunch, yo.”
I laughed but then I remembered something that Tiberius said. He’d been calling Sacario gutter trash and rat, which were derogatory terms for Morosians. But this was a Skyland High school, which is where the sons and daughters of elites go to school, certainly not the lower class.
I didn’t know how to ask him if he was Morosian. But the more I looked at his clothing, his shoes, and that binder, no knapsack at all just a binder, the more I realized that he must be.
And didn’t Tiberius also say… he slept under the bleachers? Surely that can’t be true.
I decided to probe gently. I didn’t want to be rude, but I was too curious not to get to the bottom of this. “But you get regular lunch though, yes?” I asked politely.
Sacario shook his head back and forth quickly. “Nah, Skittles has all your vitamins and minerals. Vitamin red 40, vitamin yellow 5, vitamin hydrogenated palm oil…”
He looked at me as he continued to chew, probably looking for laugher. But I was too bothered with what I was hearing to laugh at his odd manner. “Where do you live? You’re only… you’re my age, right?”
“Nah, I’m fifteen.” Sacario rubbed his nose and scrunched half of his face, giving me a crooked look. “All this talk is going to wind me up in shit. Let’s talk about other things. Penguins maybe. Or global economics.”
“How did you end up here…? Why aren’t you going to school in Moros?”
“School sucks in Moros.”
“Well… I know that. But isn’t that where you’re supposed to go?”
“Probably… but I’m not going there,” Sacario answered simply.
I threw my hands up into the air. “Just tell me! You’re dancing around it and it’s annoying. If it’s illegal I don’t really care. I’m above the damn law and since you’re my friend… if you’re with me, you are too.”
My new friend’s eyes shone with wonder, his grey eyes looking distant yet fixed on the wall he was staring at. “Above the law?” he whispered. Then those eyes narrowed, as if seeing something most intriguing in his head. “I could be one amazing super villain.”
“And since you have nothing to fear with me… tell me why you’re attending a Skyland high school.”
My friend sighed and turned around. When I caught him looking around for a place to sit I directed him to my bed. I picked up Hugh and sat on the edge of it, and Sacario sat diagona
l with his back to the wall.
“I bought an ID,” he said. He glanced at me and I raised my eyebrows. “Some dude was defecting to the greywastes with his parents. I think the dad got into some trouble and Silas was about to catch on. So I bought the kid’s ID and used it to apply… wasn’t expecting much but I got an acceptance letter. I stalked their old mailbox for a month waiting for it. I squatted in their old house until Crown workers came and took it back and… yeah, I’ve just been… sleepin’ outside since then. It’s warm out so I’m alright.”
“How do you survive?” I asked. I couldn’t help but look around my bedroom. It was a huge bedroom with windows taking up the entire north and east side, and bookshelves that lined my walk-in closet. I had a Rembrandt above my bed and a king sized bed I drowned into every night. I could even sleep horizontal on it with my feet barely touching the end. My bedroom was something from the movies and my siblings were no better. Hell, King Silas’s bedroom had crown moulding and a persian rug on the floor!
I’d never been in the presence of extreme poverty before. I found it uncomfortable and I disliked feeling guilty for my status. My life had been one traumatic experience to the next until my mind collapsed on itself and Sacario was making me feel guilty for the life I’d been leading.
“Lots of little rich high school snobs throw away good food,” he said plainly. He was staring at his socked feet, filthy socks with holes in the toes and the bottoms so worn I could see skin. “I have a stash so I don’t go hungry. I eat once school’s over and when it rains I know of some abandoned buildings. It sucks but, well, if I have a Skyland ID already, once I have an education and can get a job… I don’t have to go back to Moros, right? Sounds like a good deal to me.”
“But… it’s dangerous out on the streets,” I said. “Especially for a fifteen-year-old.”
Sacario laughed dryly and popped the last Skittle into his mouth. “You’ve never been to Moros, have you? The streets of Skyland are paved heaven compared to the inner city hell that is the Moros slums. I’ve never slept better. Oh, and everyone at school thinks I’m thirteen, so just play along.”
“Is your real name Sacario?”
Surprisingly, he nodded. “Yeah, I just told ‘em all it was my nickname. They didn’t care. The name on the ID I bought is like Joshua Venetti or some shit.”
There was a light knock on my door. I was confused at first, especially since my siblings always banged on the door like they were swinging the hammer of Thor, but then I remembered the reason I had Sacario here in the first place. My nose and my head were two alternating throbs of pain and I couldn’t breathe out of one nostril; I doubt Sacario was any better.
I opened the door and was greeted by Dr. Liam. Dr. Liam hadn’t changed much, except his black hair was starting to get threads of silver through it. He was a good doctor and I was familiar with him, but being so close to the family meant he’d probably be telling Silas that I had a strange guy in my room… that might lead to an interesting conversation.
“Nero tells me you got punched in the nose.” Dr. Liam adjusted his glasses as he walked in. He put his briefcase down on my desk and clicked it open. “And the other one…” He glanced over at Sacario who was sitting on my bed and looked him up and down. “Scrawny build, patchy clothes, grey gaunt appearance… you picked up a stray Morosian? Silas will love that.”
I shifted my feet. My brain exploded with a thousand lies and half-explanations… but I decided to pick my lies and go with the truth. “He’s just a friend of mine,” I said casually. “We both got into some trouble and the healthcare in Moros, I’m assuming, is lacking.”
Dr. Liam considered this and seemed to accept my answer. “It’s not my job to pry in social lives, only to patch up the injuries acquired. Stay still.” He raised a hand and began touching and wiggling my nose, I tried not to flinch from the jolts of pain but he certainly wasn’t helping. “Cracked not broken. It’s going to bruise and swell but you’ll be fine. I’d avoid school for a week or the media is going to be on it. Silas won’t like that once he returns.”
Avoid school? “They’d think I was hiding,” I said, shaking my head. “I’m not above covering it up with makeup. God knows Silas has covered…” I let my words trail. I really did have to start watching what I said around my new friend. I was too used to being around only family members, and people close enough to the family to know how we operated. Sacario didn’t, and I didn’t want him to know about the more darker facets of being a Dekker. “We’ll be fine.”
Dr. Liam brought out his flashlight and checked my pupils. “No concussion… I wouldn’t be surprised if the man Nero punched repeatedly in the head does. You, however, will be okay with some rest. Alright, onto the Morosian. Where did the bad man touch you, son?”
Sacario pulled up his shirt, revealing a bulging welt that was deep red with a shade of grey-blue around the edges.
Dr. Liam sucked in a breath. “I’m going to take him to the hospital floor and do an ultrasound. You lay down and rest your head, I’ll return your little friend once I can confirm there’s no internal bleeding. He’s scrawny, which means there’s no fat to shield blows. I’d rather be safe than sorry.”
Sacario seemed unfazed by this, so I let Dr. Liam leave with him. I didn’t want to lay my head down so I ended up doing my homework.
It was several hours before my friend was returned to me. We’d just got dinner delivered, chinese food, and Garrett was sorting out the containers of food and gathering our plates. Chinese food was a free-for-all, we got a bunch of containers and just went nuts. I assumed Sacario would like it since, well, he’d been eating out of the trash and all.
My friend walked back into the apartment holding a cloth bag. When he saw me he held it up with a perplexed look. “I got loaded with bottles of vitamins. Real ones, not the ones in Skittles. He made me promise I’d take them.” As he walked to me he looked in the bag, then shook it several times to make it rattle. “But they’re in candy form. I didn’t know they made such things.”
“Master Silas has us taking the same,” I chuckled. I took the bag for him and put it by the door so he wouldn’t forget it once he did leave. “We have dinner here. You can eat as much as you like. They know to give us enough for leftovers the next day, lunch or… I guess breakfast since Silas is gone.”
“King Silas is gone? Oh thank god.” Sacario looked relieved. “I’m terrified of that guy.”
My knee-jerk reaction was to assure him that he had nothing to worry about, but before the words could even make it up my throat they slid back down and died. Silas was terrifying, I knew that as well as my siblings, and the sengils, the workers, fuck it, everyone knew it. Sacario had every right to not want to see Master Silas, especially since he was the first friend I’d ever brought home that wasn’t some friend of the family’s kid. I’m sure he’d have nothing to worry about though…
I think.
“Holy shit… is that chinese food? Like on the movies?” Sacario’s eyes glistened like grey diamonds and I even heard his heartbeat jump. “Oh man… I ate half a stepped-on sandwich last night. Fuck, fate is funny.”
“Half a…” Nero appeared behind him with a turkey platter, that was the plate he used because… because he was Nero. “Why…?” He cocked his head to the side.
Sacario shrugged. “Cause that’s all I could find?”
“Your friend eats garbage?” Nero’s voice rose several octaves as his confusion grew. He picked up a plate and handed it to Sacario. “Is this like the time Garrett brought home that disgusting mangy dog? Silas won’t let you keep him if he has fleas.”
“He’s my friend now,” I said. It surprised me that I was feeling defensive of Sacario. Yesterday I would’ve been right there with Nero making those comments, but now I felt the need to defend him. That was a strange thing to feel, I guess he really was my friend? “We have lots of clothes he can wear and food he can eat.”
“And when Master Silas comes home?” Nero asked. H
e started dishing up food onto his turkey platter. “What are you going to tell him?”
“The truth. I have nothing to hide,” I said. I also began dishing up my food, but when I saw Sacario standing a few feet away looking lost and unsure of what to do, I decided to just make him a plate. “Am I not allowed to bring home friends?”
“He’s pretty protective of you, so probably not. Me, Gare, and Ellis? Sure. You? I think Silas wants to be your only friend until the end-times.” Nero popped a sweet and sour boneless pork ball into his mouth. Or well, it was arian meat, but we just called them by their traditional names. “And husband of course, eventually.”
Sacario suddenly choked and started to cough. Nero guffawed at this and walked to the couch with his plate. “Unless he gets to you first.”
Even the mere notion had me feeling embarrassed. Sacario? I looked over at my friend who was still coughing. He was attractive for a Morosian, I kind of liked that gaunt I’m-about-to-die look for some reason. But well… my heart had been flip-flopping over Professor Britain. Though, of course, I could never tell anyone that.
“What’s his name?” Garrett, who had been quiet up until this moment, asked. “He looks so out of place and scared. You don’t have to be scared of us. We won’t… well, all of us but Nero won’t bite.” Behind Garrett Nero clipped his teeth together, Sacario just continued with that blank stare.
“I need to get high,” Sacario finally stated. “I’m too sober for this.”
The entire room went quiet, and all eyes turned to my friend standing awkwardly by the food. When he saw the widespread reaction he raised his eyebrows. “No? I guess the royal children would be all primp and uppity.”
“We’re not primp and… what the fuck!? We’re not uppity,” Nero said with his mouth full. “We do drugs all the time. Fucking day and night.”
The first natural reaction I’d gotten from Sacario since he stepped foot in Alegria, was a scoff and a wave of his hand. “Lies. All lies. I bet you’ve never even stolen a puff from King Silas’s cigarette.”
