by Vi Grim
'Mum, mum, mum, mum, mum,' says Nelly, shaking me. 'Mum, mum, wake up.'
I blink my eyes and return to being a mum.
'Mum, baby want you.'
I jump up and go to see Vinny. He's pooed and smeared it on himself. 'Vincent!' I shout. 'Don't move, don't touch anything.'
He beams up at me, delighted with himself. I pick him up and, trying to hold him at arm's length, carry him to the beach and wash him in the sea. Then he gets hungry, then I clean up the poo on the floor and finally I clean myself. Oh, the joys if motherhood! I don't get a chance to see Mum and Dad until the following afternoon. They look sad. They must feel cheated, after the dramatic display of nature at my funeral and on my first birthday in Camillo and the next year, they must have come to look forward to their visit to my grave. To sense that I'm still there, that there is a little magic out there. Now nothing, it must be a big disappointment. They look good, a little older, but content.
They do better than most. When I peek into the neighbours' houses, I can see how lucky Mum and Dad are. They’re relaxed with each other's company, they touch, they hold hands, they talk lots about all sorts of things and they listen to what each other says. Not many couples do that. They do argue sometimes, but that's not a bad thing either.
Castor arrives. I'm straight up to see him and give him the biggest kiss. He looks glum.
'What's up?' I ask.
'I've been replaced,' he says.
'Replaced?'
'Yes, by Renard.'
'No way, Renard has replaced you?'
'Yes, Renard. It's so they can sell off slices of Heaven without us knowing.'
'Heaven, you mean Camillo.'
'Yes, they-'
'Don't tell me, I don't want to know.'
20
I try to do a little kung fu each day, usually when I'm doing the housework. You can just sweep the floors, or sweep the floors, kung fu. The kids do laugh when I'm folding the laundry and washing the dishes, kung fu. It's a state of mind. I don't get much time for meditation though. I really enjoy it but it's one of those selfish pastimes that young kids won't let their mum do.
I work hard at staying fit and getting my body back in shape. These babies don't half take a toll on it, I've got stretch marks and my tummy wobbles like a jelly, and my boobs, which did their best to defy gravity when they first arrived, have given up the fight.
I've been playing beach soccer. It's right on our doorstep and it's great fun, running on the sand and splashing about in the water. There's usually someone to kick the ball around with and in the evening, when they've knocked off for the day, the zinodes train and play friendly games. Once every few weeks there's a big game at the local soccer pitch at the edge of town on the duney fringes of the desert. Usually a team from Vespa or Panacea come and plays the Zwingly team. Sometimes we go and watch. It's always fun and the local team needs all the support it can get.
'Soccer,' says Azziz. 'There's a big game, do you want to come with me and Jesus.'
'No way!' I say, remembering our last misadventure. 'Anyway, I got kids now. I can't leave them and bobby off half way across the solar system on a boozy soccer trip.'
'I have kids too,' says Azziz. 'It never stopped me.'
'I noticed!' I can be so sarky sometimes.
'You don't have to go anywhere; the stadium is coming to Zwingly. It's Szabo playing Psyche. Play kicks off at sunset on the first of May. It's the cup final so they are playing on neutral territory. I've got tickets for all of us.'
'Cool,' I say, with just a little trepidation. 'But what about the kids?'
'Organised, there's two nannies coming.'
I tell Annie about the last soccer match.
'I must see it,' she says. 'It's a shame we can't take the bus to get there.'
It looks like we are going.
The end of April arrives but there's no sign of the stadium. Jesus says that it's not broken down but is hiding in hyperspace. Apparently the local bars have bribed the Soccer Federation to delay its arrival. The Federation is wonderfully corrupt, openly fixing matches by coercing players, or letting a slimeball in at a critical moment. Zwingly is packed with all manner of aliens and intergalactic riffraff. I can hear the szabo this time. Most of them are totally invisible but there's a few empty jerseys in the szabo colours of navy and maroon vertical stripes playing soccer or lazing under coconut palms. There's zinodes everywhere, hovering just above the ground or playing in the sea, splashing on the surface or diving deep to chase fish. Normally naked, they wear their colours when they play footy; yellow and gold, blue and white, all orange, black and white stripes, and Manchester red, just to name a few.
As is tradition, the supporters play a football tournament while they wait for the missing stadium. Everyone takes part. Me, Annie, Jesus and Azziz put on green and red shirts and play for Zwingly, while Janice helps the nannies look after the kids. The zinodes are kind to us, keeping the ball relatively close to the ground so we have half a chance of getting a foot to it. We invented the game so it's only fair that they play by our rules when we're playing. The tournament goes on for weeks. One of the wonderful things about living here is that time doesn't matter. No one wears a watch and time is usually indicated by breakfast, morning, lunch, tea, sunset, dinner and night. People are quite happy to wait and just chill until things happen, which most of the time they do.
Azziz has arranged security. Two burly guards arrive at the house wearing body armour and carrying assault canons.
'Why?' I ask. 'It's odd to protect stuff; aliens normally have no interest in things.'
'It's to protect the kids,' he says. 'With all these people around they could easily go missing.'
'Missing! What do you mean missing?'
'Stolen,' he says. 'Kids are one of the most valuable commodities in the Universe.'
Stolen! Commodities! I want to go back to the safety of Camillo. Now; before my kids are stolen and sold to slavery. I can't though; I'd probably be burned at the stake for being a witch.
I go to see Castor, 'Please, please Castor, guard our kids. We've got security, but can you keep an eye out too?'
'No problem. I always do. I'll station myself directly over the house. It's those guards you really have to watch.'
'The guards,' I screech. This is going from bad to worse.
'We've had problems with them in the past. Don't worry, I'm here, I'm watching.'
'Thank you, Castor. I don't know what I'd do without you,' I give him a big kiss and with a click of my fingers are back with my kids.
I keep a careful eye on the guards, who stand impassive, hiding behind their dark glasses.
The stadium arrives with such a noise that I drag the kids down into the hurricane shelter. Even there, it's loud and we wait until the ground stops shaking before we venture out. The stadium has landed in the desert and kicked up a huge cloud of dust, which coats everything in yellow as it settles. I'm looking forward to being up in the grandstand with Annie and Janice. We head out to the stadium late in the afternoon, fooling around with a football as we run across the dunes to reach it. It's wonderful being in the desert. There's no clutter, just a vast expanse of sand, like an ocean hiding unknown secrets in its depths.
The stadium is jammed packed. There's even people sitting around the rim of the roof, dangling their feet over the edge. The warm up game, the final of the local kids’ league kicks things off at sunset.
A vender carrying a portable barbecue taps me on the shoulder. I get myself and the girls a spit roasted guinea pig each and buy some flaming freshly lasered slimeball for the boys. They love it and can't comprehend that I just don't like it. I don't want to like it.
After the Zwingly game is over there's a break and the Rolling Stones bash out a few classics. While they are big on Zwingly, they have yet to break into the galactic music scene and no one has heard of them. They get a few claps and cheers of encouragement from the crowd who's keen to see a new act, even if their music is
a bit weird.
The stadium lights dim and go out, leaving us sitting in darkness. A feeling of hushed expectation hangs over the stadium. A search light knives through the darkness and picks out a sentry moon high above the stadium. It slowly descends until it's hovering in the middle of the stadium, high above the pitch.
'Great, it's Arcturus,' says Azziz. 'I'm glad we've got him, he's the best referee in the Galaxy!'
I'm not; last time he let a slimeball in just for the sport of it.
The stadium lights come back on and we can see the players, Szabo in maroon and navy and Psyche in blue and white, in position on the pitch.
Poooop!
Arcturus blows his whistle and the szabo kick off. The players take to the air, rapidly spreading out to fill the stadium. The game is fast with the zinodes kicking the ball in crisp, accurate passes with a flick of their powerful tails.
A Psyche player makes a rough tackle.
Boooop!
The game restarts with a second ball coming into play.
Peep!
There's another foul and another ball appears. Soon there's half a dozen balls in play and it's hard to keep up with the action.
Pooooooop!
Szabo score. Play restarts back on the pitch with a single ball. Psyche quickly equalise. It's clear who's the crowd's favourite, they jump out of their seats with a roar, going meters up in to the air then drifting slowly back down again, hooting and hollering as they wave their Psyche scarves. Once the stadium is quiet again, Arcturus restarts again.
Poooop!
Bam! Wham!
A sleek fighter comes out of nowhere and blasts Arcturus's moon. It explodes sending flaming wreckage crashing to the ground. It's the Baron, the scumbag who shot down Castor. A slimeball evades the stadium's defences and crashes to ground. It gobbles up a couple of players and smashes into the crowd. It's coming straight for us, cutting a broad swath through the panicked crowd. I take a deep breath and think Zen.
Blip!
I'm in my fighter in the middle of the stadium. The slimeball explodes and we spin around and take out another before it touches ground. My fighter lurches sideways to avoid a torpedo then takes off at full speed after the Baron. He's heading straight for Castor's moon. Dodging Castor's torpedoes he fires a pulse of blue light which scores a direct hit, causing the moon to pulse a couple of times and go out.
'Fart knockers,' curses Castor. 'A thermo-magnetic pulse, I'm out of action.'
The Baron stops next to Castor's moon and turns to finish him off, 'This time it's adios for you my slug.'
Big mistake buddy, you may have the finest spaceship in the galaxy but you've given me two seconds! My fighter flips him sideways, sending his missiles astray then blasts and blasts and blasts him, again and again. I've had enough of this space scum. Even as his spaceship is falling from the sky, I keep shooting and shooting. It's adios for you, scumbag.
'Stop Emily,' shouts Castor. 'Save your kids, the guards are taking them.'
In the fighter's daylight display I can see the guards dragging the kids along the beach to an angular stealth spaceship. Each has a baby tucked under his arm and is struggling to keep a grip on the other ones. They're so greedy; they're taking them all.
My fighter jimmies to the right and picks off a slimeball that's charging up the beach towards them, fries another that's smashing through the beach houses, then swivels to the left and torpedoes the stealth spaceship.
I click my fingers and I'm on the beach about five meters from the closest guard. Seeing me, he lets go of River and raises his rifle. He never gets a shot in. I cartwheel across the beach and he gets a 'don't mess with my kids' kick to the throat. I catch his rifle as it falls and take the other guard's head off.
A slimeball smashes to ground in the shallows beside us covering us with water and slime. I'm back in the fighter.
Blam!
Jesus, Azziz and the two girls appear on the beach, grab the babies and teleport off somewhere safe, probably Camillo.
I blast a few slimeballs then patrol above the stadium. It's pandemonium on the ground. A hundred thousand people, and I use that term people loosely, all trying to get out of the stadium and off Zwingly. Spaceships shoot in all directions, while slimeballs crash to ground amongst the fleeing crowd. Pollux gets his moon operational again and between us we get on top of things.
Then it's quiet, no people, no spaceships, no slimeballs. I thank my fighter and teleport across to see Castor. He looks embarrassed.
'Castor,' I say, giving him a big kiss. 'Thank you so much. You saved my babies.'
Reddening up, Castor says, 'No, you saved the people at the match, well most of them anyway, you saved me, defeated the Baron and rescued your babies.'
'Thanks anyway,' I say, giving him another kiss. 'Thank you for being you.'
I click my fingers and arrive on the beach. I sit there in the dark, savouring the coolness of the night air and feeling happy to be alive.
Jesus and Azziz teleport in with the others right on sunrise and we have a long swim before starting the big clean-up. There's a deafening roar that makes my nose bleed and I watch as the dew drop stadium takes off and disappears into space. Much as I like football, I think that it'll be a while before Jesus and Azziz get me along to see another match.
21
Annie's baby is almost a year old. Cosmo is a good choice of name because he has superpowers. All babies have the superpower of charm. Cosmo has oodles of it; it oozes from his every pore. His bright green eyes catch you when you enter the room, lock on, and won't let go. Since he first sat up, he's had a second power of attraction too; if he wants an object, it just floats across the room and into his hot little hands. Before I lost the plot over a chewed remote control, which had the tele tuning into Arab soap operas at odd hours of the night, he sat in the middle of the room like King Quanoot summoning objects. He sat there, happy as Larry surrounded by books, ornaments, the salt and pepper grinders, the remote controls and whatever other small object had caught his eye, like a kid in a lolly shop, wondering which thing to gum to death next. I glued the ornaments down and put everything else away in drawers; that foxed him. He doesn't need his superpowers anymore; he's walking. He does the rounds of the house with his mate Vince, causing havoc.
Annie's pregnant again, really pregnant. Not all of a sudden like, it's been sneaking up on her for a while, but now she's there, ready to pop. Because her last birth went so smoothly, we decide to do this one ourselves. It's just too hard being good when Dr Florence is here. We've grown to really like Florence, but she’s hard work. If it all turns to custard, we'll bring her in, give her a strong cup of tea, and I'm sure she'll be happy to sort things out.
When Annie's labour starts, Azziz promptly heads out to shoot pool. He loves making babies, but is not really into the whole fatherhood thing. He'll carry his kids around, swing then about and throw them in the air, but as soon as there's a pooey bottom or a blood and guts birthing, he's off like a scolded cagoon.
Idris slides out without giving too much of a fight and is soon sucking on Annie's boob while Janice, Jesus and me cut the cord and inspect the afterbirth. Idris is a bit of a funny shape to start with but once he's a few weeks old and started filling out, we can see that we have another demigod in the house. He's exactly the same as Cosmo, as if Annie's been cloning them.
Castor calls me up to his moon. 'Emily, this might interest you,' he says. 'Petra is getting married.'
I'm up there in a flash. I love a good wedding. It's great to see Petra too. Since she killed Ariella and activated the power of The Book, it hasn't been possible to watch over her. She looks about sixteen and with her wild red hair and tanned, freckly skin, looks absolutely gorgeous. I'm so jealous. She glows with the radiance of an expectant mum.
'She's left The Book on Mulo. That's why we can see her. She's marrying Angelo, who she fell in love with on her travels.'
Castor flicks up an image of a handsome dark haired boy wit
h a shy smile. 'He's a fisherman's son from the little island of Salina, just north of Sicily. They sailed down from Mulo with Mario and Jasmina, her foster dad and mum, and her twin brother and sister on this tiny sailing boat.' He flashes up an image of the little cutter; similar to the one I saw her sailing on years ago, but a meter or so longer.
'The tradition is to get married where the bride lives but it's easier for the six residents of Mulo to travel than the eight hundred and eighteen from Salina.'
The girls would love this. Jesus agrees reluctantly to look after the six kids. It's just that time of day when they're tired and hungry and need feeding and bathing, but we can't wait, the ceremony is about to start. I'm sure he'll cope.
We arrive in Castor's cockpit in a tangle of legs and arms and have to sit on top of each other to fit in. Castor has a radar image of the town on his cockpit screen.
Angelo, looking dashing in a smart suit, is escorting Petra through the streets of Santa Marina to the church, up on the hill.
'She's pregas,' says Annie.
'It's going to be a boy,' says Castor.
'Shut up,' I say. 'You always spoil it.'
'Sorry,' says Castor. 'I just love information.'
'You should have a gossip column,' says Janice.
'I do,' replies Castor. 'I contribute to People, US Weekly, Hello, Voici and Chi. I wrote that article about you and Peter Tork-'
'You didn't!' says Janice, giving Castor a slap. 'I was trying to keep that quiet.'
The ceremony is in a beautiful old church. It's packed. Us girls go all gooey watching. After the wedding they release doves outside the church and are showered with confetti as they walk to the reception.
I wonder if I'll ever get married, I doubt it.
We decide we've been nosey enough for one day and leave them to it.
Well, almost nosey enough, while I'm up here, I have a look at Ijju. I haven't seen her for ages. As always, she's looking great. She's been busy, there's a toddler, a little girl hanging onto her leg as she prepares dinner. I look for her boy, who must be nearly four now, and find him kicking a football around outside with Zula. It's such a lovely sight. I'm so lucky to have him as father of my kids.
