The Arched World

by Davi Cao

  “Hey, you’re constraining her to society’s prison,” a young woman said, joining the group, and pulling the blanket off aWa to reveal her bare body again, “This is how she was born, she’s doing nothing to you, she just wants to be free!”

  “Nonsense! She’s crazy and she needs help! Get out of here!”

  “You prudes, you want to chain us all to decrepit values of your rotten society, and you feel so superior, oh, look at how you look at us, I know what you feel. Well, I’m above it, I’m in this for freedom, and let her have it, she did nothing to deserve your moral judgment.”

  Fighting for the blanket, the old lady again commanded her friend to get the police.

  “They're coming, alright, they're coming, I just called them,” the friend said.

  “You should be ashamed of yourselves!” the old lady said, stomping in front of the three drunk friends who followed aWa. “You leave this poor woman alone, you creeps! You touch one finger on her and I'll tell the police, don't you dare come near her.”

  “Who gave you the ownership of this woman, huh? You're a mean person trying to—” the young woman retorted in rage, interrupted by a drunk guy who entered aWa's misty disc and tried to punch the ou.uo, fueling a wave of laughs from his friends.

  “I guess this is how they’ll sort things out.” Colin swallowed dry, rubbing one hand on the other. “We should have solved this issue when people weren’t around. I feel powerless just watching it.”

  “You were powerless before as well. If you’re afraid for the woman, I’m glad for you. Do something to protect her,” Dalana said.

  “If I do anything, what will they think? They’ll believe it’s a miracle, or an alien, or something like that, and this sort of thing didn’t really happen in Terra. I must keep consistency.”

  “There are other ways, even following your own rules, which you haven’t considered.”

  Using the moment when the young woman took the blanket all for herself and kept the old lady from reaching it, a drunk man patted one of aWa’s buttocks and backed away. His friend gently slapped her shoulder, and the third one took hold of her crown, putting it on his head, and posing for a cellphone picture.

  Honey dripped on his forehead, something odorless and viscous. He licked it and nearly fell over from the impact of infinity in his body. All the flavors, his dreams come true, his whole life opened in front of him by the various tastes he had ever tried and would yet experiment. He drank more of it, he gorged all the honey in the crown.

  His friends got a taste of it too and attacked aWa’s backpack, fighting for the honey and enjoying the best sensation they’d ever felt. Her ou.uo, despaired at having their universal conscience decline so abruptly, watched future and past fade away, puzzled at those humans who were incapable of powering their own ecosystems.

  Before the honey disappeared whole in the stomachs of those three drunk men, sirens wailed behind aWa’s procession. It warned the trouble-makers and scared them away. The old lady shouted at the officers, who stopped the car and left the vehicle with hands on their belts, “Help! Take these boys out of here, they’re assaulting the poor woman, help!”

  The drunks left aWa’s backpack with her and returned the crown, running to get far from the scene, laughing as if their mother had caught them doing naughty stuff.

  The cops had eyes on the naked woman, though, grateful for having to deal, not with crime on that inaugural night, but with public disorder. She had a Native-American look to her, small eyes, square jaw and straight black hair, her brown skin shining under the lampposts, reflecting the few lights still on from the slumbering buildings around. Probably a poor person with mental issues, either running from home or from the hospital.

  “Ma’am, would you please follow us?” the white cop with a wide chest said.

  “We came here to help, we just want to take you to safety,” the black one with a short beard said, nodding at the old ladies to dismiss them from duty.

  AWa ignored both men, used to soulless people in that col.loc since frustration marked all her experiences with native humans.

  “Guys, hey, guys, she's our friend, see, our friend,” a drunk man yelled from afar.

  “We love her!” his peer added.

  “Leave her alone, let her come with us! We'll take her home, promise,”

  “Shut up, you three!” the young radical woman intervened. “Go home, you drunks, you do nothing but put others in danger. They're nagging her,” she said, looking for the officers' consent. “And that lady there was also trying to force her, forbidding her to be free, she was trying to dress her with bed sheets, you should—”

  “We’re in charge of things here, ok?” the black cop said, interrupting. “If you could please step back, all of you, please give us some room, we’re trying to make a peaceful approach here and you’re all making things harder for us.”

  “Yes, we’re asking you for some space, just let us take care of her,” the white one said.

  “Where are you taking her?” The young woman stayed near aWa, not trusting the cops.

  “To safety, until we can find those responsible for her, then we’ll return her to her own place, ok? Don’t worry, it will be fine. Now, step back.”

  So, the young woman did, watching the cops follow aWa in her mindless walk, speaking gentle words in her ear, trying to reason with her. The black cop placed a kind hand on her back, while the other held her hand, and all suddenly, she stopped. Her ou.uo dodged the men’s presence in their orbits, blind in the desert of a strange world, hurrying to make dust then honey to get help in making sense of it all.

  AWa accepted the white man’s hand, clenching her fingers on his palm, and she extended her other hand in an offer to the black cop, who took his hand off her back and accepted her invitation, seeing how she got calmer with that.

  The crowd who followed aWa took a deep breath of relief when the policemen turned around, leading her, smiling at everyone to signal their success. AWa, used to walking in groups, followed them as the most natural thing to do, glimpsing their future together in the horizons ahead.

  “They’ll take her to the police station, oh my, that won’t end nicely,” Colin said, a hand on his forehead, eyes widened with deep concern. “I should remove everybody and think of what to do with people like this woman first, it was a mistake to create them all now.”

  “Wouldn’t that be like destroying your world and killing all creations?” Dalana brought him back to reason with a simple question.

  “It would... You’re right, of course. I wasn’t serious. If it weren’t for that woman, everything would be almost perfect!”

  “You’re in Ai.iA’s world, not yours, remember that. You must adapt, you’ll always have to adapt. And let’s watch things unfold here, it might be fun.”

  To get aWa into their car, the police officers had to struggle with her. She didn’t release their hands without a fight, and she didn’t stop walking even in front of the door. Squatting, lowering her head, those actions made no sense for her, she who moved besides walking only to escape traps, not to get into them.

  The black cop had to enter with her, pulling her on the back seat, pushing her chest and grabbing her shins to make her sit in place. Constrained in such a strange position, aWa tried to walk the same way she did when standing, but at the car's start, her mind came to a halt. She moved, and yet she didn't. For her ou.uo, which orbited in eccentric curves, now crossing the car’s matter, now avoiding it, honey became an urgent necessity. That world made no sense!

  The passing landscape on the car windows did nothing for her. Sight served small purpose for her, a person who feared no geography, no need. Her mind sensed movement from inertia, the vehicle’s acceleration, and the curves it made screaming through her semicircular ducts.

  Movement contaminated her guts, it said that she walked, her whole body sensitive to changes in speed. Her puzzled mind wondered at that human bonded with her, the one who still held her hand, it should be h
e who walked without legs, and now took her along, making her a part of him, wandering through the valley of square mounds in a different rhythm. During her entire journey to the police station, aWa stayed calm and obedient.

  Dalana and Colin rode with them on the car’s hood. They watched the world flow by their sides in its silent sleep. It was past midnight, and the few people still up either worked their night shifts or celebrated life or insomnia. In a few hours, the cylindrical sun would shine for the first time on those people’s faces.

  “I can’t believe I did this... All this, these things I didn’t even plan, and which are here anyway. How’s that possible?” Colin said.

  “It’s wonderful, isn’t it?” Dalana said, eyes fixed on the road ahead. “Wait until you get to create something original, something never conceived. Then you’ll be at peace.”

  “Am I not at peace?”

  “Of course not.” She laughed.

  “Hm, I’ve never been better since Terra’s demise.” He gave her a lopsided grin.

  “That’s for sure, I agree. But instead of just enjoying this place here, you’re still thinking about what you don’t have.”

  “Aren’t you too? Wouldn’t you prefer a Utopia of your own instead of my world?”

  “We can have our Utopia right here, right now. It’s just a matter of wishing.” Dalana looked back to check on aWa through the windshield.

  The vehicle arrived at the police station. To get out of the car, the black cop dragged aWa with him. She became restless with the end in motion, trying to wander in the car with her free hand and her knees.

  After a failed attempt of trying to get to the front seat, she responded to her company’s pulling and followed him out of that tiny space. Back to where she could see the sky, she walked, following the man’s direction. The white cop refused to hold her free hand, despite her offer, letting the black one take care of her until they went inside.

  They took pictures of her after walking with her along the corridor, they searched their data banks for any clue as to her identity.

  “I think I know what to do. An institution, yes, a special place to take care of people like her.” Colin poked Dalana's arm to get her attention from aWa's imprisonment.

  “You think so? A cage?” Dalana murmured against his intention.

  “Not a cage, of course not. Just somewhere to take care of her, allow her to live in safety and away from society. And we can make all her records available to all, so that nobody gets scared at people like her.”

  “Hm, is that so?” Dalana stepped ahead of him, her mouth gone in the blackness of her face, worried about aWa.

  “These little things flying around her, though... That's another mystery. I think I'll let them deal with it, because I don't know what this is either. Should I be worried, do you think?”

  Dalana didn't listen, watching aWa take the black cop on a tour around the police station, walking to the end of a long aisle then returning to walk again. The cop laughed at first, and soon lost his patience, disentangling himself from her grip with brute force, contorting his arm.

  Tired and out of patience, the police officers in the building decided to lock aWa in a cell. They’d discovered nothing of her history thus far, and they couldn't make her stop walking, no matter what they said or threatened to do to her. The black cop helped the others push her to a cell. AWa made a few circles in the tiny space then pressed her head against the wall, forcing herself into it with her legs.

  Her backpack and crown lacked honey, all lost to the drunk men who obsessed with its flavor and finished it all in less than a minute. Her ou.uo worked full-time on dust-raising and honey production, so that they could have glimpses into time and have an idea of what to do to escape that eerie trap.

  Colin sat on the cell’s bench, watching aWa insist on doing the only thing she wished to do. Dalana, passing through the bars to join him, shook her head.

  “Prisons are a poor idea,” she said.

  “Oh, yeah? Tell that to Mae, not me... But whatever, say what you will, I’m in no mood to defend myself.” Colin looked down.

  “What happened? A while ago you said you’d never been better, and now you’re fitful. I told you, prisons are a bad idea, they pull our mood down, at least for people like us, who don’t like suffering. OOOO would have a blast in here, though.”

  “The prison’s got nothing to do with it. I don’t care about it. It’s just that... Well, is that it? Is this all there is to do in this world while I wait for Mae?”

  “What do you mean? Wasn’t it what you wanted?”

  “I want to get Terra back, that’s all. Meanwhile, what do I do? New Terra will live its life, and what about me? Just watch it until I get an answer? That’s it?”

  “Oh, I get it. See, that’s the Creator’s drama, you’re finally catching up to it. What to do when you’ve got to wait through life forever?”

  “Yeah, so, what do you do?”

  “We create!” Dalana jumped in front of him, widening the whites of his eyes, showing her teeth.

  “I created already. It’s the best I can do.”

  “Let’s create more, a better place, why not? And then play with their lives, and see what our creations do. Or we can talk and play games, and dance, and travel, and love—”

  Dalana interrupted her own speech when aWa’s ou.uo put honey on the wall. She remembered that technique, the same thing that disintegrated the maze Colin and she had created for the woman.

  The little things poured dust on the wall then honey, and after spinning in unison, they hit it. A big circle of empty space opened in the concrete, releasing aWa on the outside world.

  The misty disc around her buzzed with activity, all her tiny fellows occupied in a race to craft dust and turn it into honey. They only knew what to do because of honey, and they needed the honey to make the walls disappear. She walked ahead, meeting another barrier, pressing her head against it in the wait for is dissolution. Her ou.uo struck again, making her free. No cell would hold her any longer.

  “It’s time to use this chance to get her somewhere else, while nobody noticed her escape yet,” Colin said, running after aWa.

  “Don’t you want to see what will happen? If you’re here to watch things unfold, this is the sort of thing you should wish to see!”

  “What if she gets hurt? You’re sounding too much like OOOO.”

  “I’m sounding like a Creator, that’s what! It’s the clash of two worlds, it’s an amazing thing to see. If nobody gets hurt, that’s what gives meaning to my existence.” Dalana stepped softly on the floor, swinging her arms in slow arcs, mimicking aWa’s steps. “I’m betting this woman is going to turn your world upside down!”

  “Oh yeah? We’ll see. I bet she’ll just end up locked and interned somewhere.”

  “Let’s hope you’re wrong.”

  When the police came again, they didn’t come quietly.

  “She's a crazy bum, Earl,” a policeman said with a hand on his holster.

  “So what? Call the medics? It's up to us, man,” the black cop said, pressing fingers on his tired eyes.

  “Get her back, calm her down, wait for morning. It's not our business after that.”

  “Suit yourself. She broke through two walls, you know? She's got something in her, I won't get close anymore.”

  The skinny cop detached from Earl, taking a deep breath. He stood with aWa, and whispered “Ma'am, please, it's not safe out here. Stay with us until dawn. We won't lock you again, we promise,” he said, hovering a hand over his gun, just as a precaution.

  Before he could speak more to her, aWa got to the wider valley, to the avenue where a few cars raced through red lights and stop signs. People in cars had work later in the day, they were late and they had to sleep. For aWa, those machines weren’t animals, they weren’t moving mounds, they weren’t a state of matter. They were moving things in the world where only humans walked, and, like the ous, they didn’t exist for her.

  In
the middle of the avenue, aWa walked her way, and the car that didn’t exist for her, showed its reality against her body, hitting her fast. The impact cracked aWa’s bones and launched her along the road like a bag of potatoes.

  ∙ 8 ∙ Enough blood

  Unlike her Terran counterparts, aWa had no bellybutton. Her breasts and genitalia served stabilizing and energizing purposes, not reproductive ones. Differences ended there, however, and despite her perseverance, she was mortal.

  When the car hit her, she swirled in the air and rolled on the sidewalk, landing on the cement with a crushed body. She tried to get up and keep walking, but the fractures in her bones and internal organs kept her grounded. A deep cut made her head bleed, a concussion that made her dizzy and unable to process the information coming to her brain.

  The car accelerated after running her over, its hood damaged and blood covering its windshield. The police officer who followed aWa with a hand on his gun screwed up his eyes to catch the driver’s license plate.

  “Hey, hey, stop! Stop!” he yelled. “God damn it, Jesus...” He picked up his radio and spoke to central. “Black Mercedes going downtown on Heather Lelache Avenue, it's got blood on it, I need help.”

  He then took a deep breath, stepping toward the dead woman lying on the sidewalk. While he moved to the scene, people left their homes and got out of their cars to help aWa. Her nakedness puzzled them, they turned their heads to every newcomer, asking whether they knew her or where she lived.

  “Can somebody ask the Gonzalez’? Their lights are off, but she has their look.”

  “She’s not one of them, I’m sure. And they’re out of town. This person doesn’t come from this area, I’m sure.”

  “Is she still alive? Hey, did you check her already?”

  “Doesn’t look dead yet, she’s moving her leg. Can somebody call the ambulance? We gotta hurry.”

  “I can take her to the hospital, let’s take her to my car, I can help.”