Two Moons of Sera

by Tyler, Pavarti K.

  “What do you mean?”

  “He’s in the Cultural History Building, studying the past wars and such. Supposedly it’s to help us keep from repeating our mistakes.”

  “Yeah, and he’s become a complete Fish-phile since he began his new secret project,” Nalla added.

  “Secret, huh?” I turned to Traz and wondered what kinds of secrets the Erdlanders would keep from each other.

  “I’ll make you a deal. You tell me what secret messages you uncover in Linguistics, and I’ll tell you about my new project.” Traz quirked his eyebrow.

  “You know she can’t do that, Traz. Stop trying to get more intel on the Fish,” teased Nalla.

  “You’d think he was a spy.” Jai threw the small pillow behind her back across the couch at Traz.

  “I wonder if he has fins,” Ash teased.

  I curled my toes inside my slippers.

  “I’m so glad we work in the infirmary.” Nalla nodded toward Jai.

  “It’s not glamorous, but at least there are no war games!” Jai added.

  “Linguistics is actually pretty glamorous,” I joked, desperate to fit in.

  “I’m sure. I hear those headphones do amazing things for the hair.” Jai tossed her brown hair over her shoulder and posed for the group, making us all laugh.

  “Where do you work, Ash?” I asked.

  His focus still trained on my face, despite the group dynamic. “I’m in Science, at the lab,” he said.

  “Oh, what do you do?”

  “Nothing interesting, really. I run the blood work on the recruits, looking for medical Matches and approving natural Matches. It’s really just processing the data. The techs and doctors get to do all the interesting stuff.”

  “Yeah, I heard they had a real Sualwet in the Science lab and that they were doing experiments on it,” Jai whispered.

  My stomach cramped down in a painful knot. A Sualwet? Here?

  Nalla gasped. “No way.”

  “It’s true. They’re testing to see if they have a weakness. You know, like what would happen if they were in salt water versus fresh water and trying to find out how to take them all out at once without killing everything else in the water.”

  I held my breath to keep the tears from rising. Was it possible they were still performing experiments like they had on my mother? Were others suffering here the way she had? The friendliness of the young Erdlanders took on a menacing tone, and I longed for the water.

  It couldn’t be possible, could it? Everyone here seemed friendly. I was comfortable, like I fit in. They couldn’t be doing those kinds of things to my people. But the Sualwet weren’t my people. I’d been more accepted here than by the Sualwet. Why did I feel the need to defend them, to save whomever was trapped in there, experimented on like a lab rat? The idea sent sour bile into my throat; my nausea must have shown on my face.

  “We don’t do that kind of thing,” Ash reassured, placing his hand on my knee.

  “Oh.” I moved my leg, his fingers trailing along my skirt as they fell away.

  Ash leaned back in his chair, his eyes no longer on me but on the ceiling.

  “At least, not anymore,” Traz added before turning back to his book.

  I shivered, aware that I was alone with the enemies I’d been taught to fear.

  When the conversation drifted back to safer territory, I excused myself. In the kitchen, I attempted to remember how to open the compartments.

  A familiar voice came from the doorway. “What are you looking for?”

  “Just a drink.”

  I turned to find Ada. She had changed from when I’d first encountered her on the landing strip and was now in a long, brown skirt and green cotton shirt.

  “Every pod keeps things in different places. You’ll find stuff soon enough.”

  Ada walked past me and opened a high compartment, pulling out a bottle like the one Elle and I had shared earlier. Her short black hair swung across her brow with each step.

  “Can I have one for Tor, too?” I asked as she handed it to me.

  She nodded in response before reaching back up and retrieving another bottle.

  “Thank you. Do you live here, too?”

  “No. I live over in Life Services. I just stopped by to see how you were settling in.” She slipped her hands into the pockets of her skirt and leaned against the wall.

  “I’m doing all right. Everyone has been very nice.”

  “Really?”

  “Well, no, not everyone.” I rolled my eyes and shrugged, not wanting to seem unsettled by my new home.

  “Lace has a way about her, I know, but you’ll get used to it. She really is very smart.”

  I bobbed my head in response and opened my bottle after placing Tor’s in the large pocket on the side of my skirt.

  “And Tor?” Ada’s voice was soft as she tilted her head.

  “He’s okay. Having Elgon with him has been good.”

  “I’m sure. The reassurance of someone who loves you can go a long way.”

  I lowered my head, feeling sadder than I expected. The only person who had loved me, even in her strange and distant way, was gone.

  Ada studied me for a moment longer before pushing herself off the wall. “Tomorrow, if you’re up for it, you’ll go to Linguistics with Lock. He’ll help you get acquainted with anything that’s changed since you were last at a camp, but I think you’ll find it’s pretty much the same. Oh, and I brought you some clothes.”

  She walked past me into the main room. Most everyone had left, I assumed to go to their own rooms to get ready for the night. Jai headed toward the pod bathroom, and Traz was still sitting where I left him, reading his book.

  Next to the blue door, which separated what little space was mine from the commons, sat two duffel bags.

  “This one is for you.” Ada knelt down and unzipped the long blue bag to reveal piles of clothing in monotone colors and two pairs of shoes. “We can get you anything else you need, but I thought you’d at least want this to start with. There’s a pair of boots for if it rains, and I threw a skirt in, too. I didn’t know what you liked to wear. I got you everything in my size. You’re a little taller than me, but I think it should fit.”

  “Thank you,” I mumbled, awkward in the face of her thoughtfulness. It hadn’t even occurred to me that I had nothing to wear other than what was on my back. The dress I’d worn when Lock and Lace found us was long gone, too dirty to salvage. I’d lost so much. Everything other than what I’d stuffed into my small bag was destroyed or washed into the sea. Even if anything had survived, I could never go back to retrieve it.

  After unzipping the second bag, Ada revealed stacks of long pants and cotton shirts.

  “Tor will be working in Agro, so he doesn’t need special clothes. Just boots and whatever he’s comfortable in. I placed him there so he could take Elgon along, instead of leaving it here.”

  “Him,” I corrected. “Elgon’s a he.”

  “Oh, right. I had a dog as a kid. It’s just the idea of a mountain hound loose in the pod without one of you here....”

  “It’s okay. They’ll be happier together.”

  She zipped up the bags and stood.

  “This is really nice of you,” I said.

  “Don’t worry. I know it’s been a long time since you were someplace you didn’t have to do everything for yourself. I’m happy to help with whatever you need.”

  “Thank you.” My raw emotions urged the tears behind my eyes to jump.

  The people here were so relatable, so much like me but so dangerous. I thought back to the story of the Sualwet in the Science lab, held for experiments. Only the hair on my head kept me from lying on an examination table next to it. No matter how kind Ada might be, the Erdlanders were still the enemy.

  “I’ll come back in the morning and make sure you’re all set for work.” Ada nodded and turned away.

  “Ada?” I called after her.

  “What is it, Sera?”

  “M
y mother, she died. I’m all alone, except for Tor.” The words tumbled out, needing to be said aloud. Ada was kind, and while not much older than me, she made me feel safe and cared for.

  “I’m sorry to hear that.” Her smile twitched, becoming sad and full of empathy.

  “I just... I just wanted you to know how much all this means to me.”

  “We’re family here. You aren’t alone anymore. You’re home.”

  The words intended to soothe me broke the barrier, allowing my sorrow to show.

  “I’m s-sorry,” I sputtered, expecting another unwelcome touch.

  Instead, Ada stayed where she was with a small smile. “It’s fine. I’ll see you in the morning.”

  With a silent nod, I turned from her and opened the blue door behind me.

  16

  Inside, the room was dark, but the light from the common area fell onto Elgon, who was sleeping on the bed. His head was on the pillow, making him a parody of what I had expected Erdlanders to look like. To my left, Tor sat crouched in the corner. He faced away from me, sitting still.

  “Tor? Ada brought us clothes.”

  I pulled the first of the two bags into the room and then the other. I was tired, and my muscles strained from the weight of the bags.

  When both duffel bags were in the room, I closed the door, shutting out the light. Instead of our room falling into darkness, a familiar, eerie glow permeated the space.

  “Tor?”

  The light flickered, but he didn’t move.

  I sat on the floor against the end of the bed. Its low frame supported my exhausted body. Quietly, I watched the light against the wall. It threw color and shadow art all around me. The room shifted from bright and cheerful to dark and ominous as Tor’s orb changed under his command.

  I laid my head back on the bed. Elgon shifted so his body stretched along the bottom of the mattress, his head resting next to mine.

  “Tor, what are you doing?” I asked.

  His response was silence and a flare of orange light.

  “The people out there, the Erdlanders, they have been nice to me all night, but I don’t think they’d be very understanding if you set the pod on fire. Can you put it out?”

  “Not yet.” His low voice sounded strained.

  I lifted my head and moved until I was sitting against the wall across from him. He was still facing the corner and didn’t look at me, but the orb floating over his hand outlined his dark profile.

  Its magic was vibrant: red, yellow, and orange laced together to create the ball of fire before me. Tor’s face tightened as he focused on the orb. Warmth emitted from the flames, but it wasn’t hot or unpleasant. Just a soothing heat, like lying on the beach in the noonday sun.

  Keeping my voice as gentle as I could, I asked again, “What are you doing?”

  “Huh. I’m... I’m burning off energy, I guess.”

  “I don’t understand.”

  The orb sparked then shrank in size until Tor could wrap his fist around it, pulling its essence back within his flesh. We were thrown into blackness. Without his light, the shadows reached out, laying claim to every inch of space. My eyes tried to make out the shapes around me, but my other senses oriented me.

  We sat in the silent dark. Tor shifted so he was leaning against the wall next to me, still nestled against the corner.

  “I miss home,” he admitted.

  I didn’t turn to him. I didn’t have to. The pain in his words mirrored my own. “Me too. I miss the stars.”

  “Do you think we can go back?”

  “They’re already looking there. It won’t be long before your cave is found.”

  “I don’t want to be here, Sera. I... it feels like I’m drowning.”

  His admission was so raw it broke me. I hadn’t just kept us alive: I’d thrown us into the nexus of everything both of us had spent so many years avoiding. Exile had been imposed on me, an accident of birth, but he had run away from people just like these, and now I had forced him back.

  “I’m sorry,” I said.

  “No, you did the right thing. You probably saved our lives.”

  “I hope so.”

  Elgon stretched and climbed off the bed, coming to lie in front of us. He rested his head between our hips. Simultaneously, Tor and I reached out to pet him. Our hands touched, and the tingling sensation ignited within me, flowing through my body. A spark flashed in the air.

  “I’m sorry.” Tor jerked his hand back from mine, holding it close to his body.

  “You said in the cave that you could control the fire. Can you really?”

  “Yes. I... I could when I was alone.”

  “You were burning off energy in here?”

  “Yes,” he breathed without voice.

  “It’s the fire, isn’t it? You have to use it? It’s not just convenient?”

  “No. I mean, yes.” He pulled his hands up to his face. “Huh.”

  I watched as he struggled to find the words, pulling on the roots of his ropy hair in frustration. He hadn’t done that since the beach, since he had started speaking again. It wasn’t the words that wouldn’t come, but understanding.

  “Stop.” I turned, folding my legs so I could face him.

  “I don’t have to use it.”

  “Okay.”

  “But when I’m upset or, I don’t know, emotional, it flares and—”

  “It flared when you touched me, though.”

  “I know.”

  “It’s all right.” I reached to him and took his hands in mine, lowering them.

  A small ember of light burned behind his eyes as he stared back at me. “Sera, I’m so afraid it will happen again. That I won’t be able to control it, and someone will get hurt.”

  “Like when you were younger.”

  “Yes.”

  “What happened?”

  He shook his head in the darkness, his long hair moving in waves. “I don’t want you to get hurt,” he mumbled.

  His words worked along my skin, and my breath caught. I couldn’t see anything but his eyes—the blackness around us was too dense—but I heard the slow beating of his heart and felt the heat pulsing from him, to me, and back again.

  An eternal loop.

  My fingers lingered on his hand. The rough skin of his knuckles played beneath my fingers, and I followed the curve of his bones until I found the softness of his palm.

  “Why are you doing this?” He pulled his hand away. His tone was sharp, and something snapped back into place, returning the barrier between us.

  “What?”

  “You don’t like to be touched. Why are you touching me?”

  “I... I don’t know.”

  “Then don’t do it.” He pulled his legs up against his chest and wrapped his arms around them. He stared ahead, refusing to turn to me.

  The room was thick with things unsaid. I didn’t know the words. I didn’t know why his eyes scared me or why I longed to touch his skin. If I thought about it for too long, I would disappear in the mystery.

  “Tomorrow, Ada wants us to try working with the others,” I began.

  “I don’t like them.”

  “Tough.”

  “Huh,” he grunted.

  “We have to. I know it’s hard. It’s hard for me, too, but we have to blend in. At least until we know what we should do next.”

  “I still don’t like them.”

  “Look, I’ll go with Lock to Linguistics, and you’ll go to Agro. I don’t know what that is, but Ada said she’d come back in the morning to tell you more. Oh, and you can take Elgon.”

  At the sound of his name, Elgon lifted his head and laid it in my lap. I reached out and scratched his jaw, eliciting a contented sigh. His breathing slowed as he relaxed into me, fading into the silence.

  “I’m just not used to being touched,” I offered.

  “Oh.” Tor exhaled, making me question his concern.

  “It’s not that I don’t like it, it’s just... Sualwets don’t touch muc
h, and my mother, she was very Sualwet.”

  “Sera—” he hissed.

  “What?”

  “Someone might hear you or, I don’t know, be listening.”

  “I really doubt it, Tor. Everyone is asleep.” I rolled my eyes.

  “Still....”

  “Okay. Well, she wasn’t much for touching, and it’s just so strange the way they all hold hands and sit so close and....”

  “Kiss,” Tor finished with a word I’d never given much thought to before today. It sounded strange, hanging in the air between us.

  “Yeah,” I whispered into the black.

  Tor’s body relaxed, stretching his legs. He exhaled a loud breath but didn’t speak. I continued to scratch Elgon’s ears and leaned back against the wall. The sweet warmth of the mountain hound’s body was enough to lull me to sleep, so I settled back and closed my eyes.

  17

  Sleep resisted the return of my consciousness. Dreams of the ocean, open and unending, clung to my mind, not wanting to disappear into the abyss. Asleep, I had moved in three dimensions, swimming out and down to the Domed City of the Sualwet. It was a place I’d never been in real life. In my dream, my mother stood inside the ancient temple, a pale dress fanning out behind her in the water, her arms open with love.

  Warmth spread all around me, like I was wrapped in a blanket, but the stiffness of my muscles reminded me that I hadn’t gotten into bed last night. Opening my eyes, I was greeted by the sparkling green of Elgon’s gaze.

  “Thhhhhrrrrr.” He nuzzled his oversized head against my chest.

  ~Morning, Elgon.~

  His tail thumped as I scratched his head and attempted to rise.

  My head was resting on something soft, so I lifted it and rolled over. Tor was asleep on his back, his arm stretched out beneath me, and I was tucked up against him. We had slept in the corner of the room together. The stubble on his face had returned, leaving a dark dusting around his jaw. I wanted to touch it, see if it was as soft as Elgon.

  Facing him, the warmth of his body burned against my chest. I breathed in his scent and was reminded of the sea and the wildness of the forest. He smelled like freedom.