Skyglass: Chapter 1

PHOENIX

Today was my first day on Earth.

Before now, I’d never spared a thought for this tragic little dirt clod–it was, after all, the womb of all things wonderful and wretched (in other words, humanity)–but this drab spaceport was especially disappointing.

We landed just beyond Raith, the city I was headed for. From a distance, the metropolis looked like a giant fungus, or some kind of stubby, green phallus. The surrounding landscape was bland–valleys and hills made of powdered ghost. The spaceport was so small it looked more like a landing strip for ladybugs.

But at least my welcome party was nothing to be pissed on.

I stared beyond the bubbleship’s walls, pearly and see-through, to the crowd of poppers just beyond. They were like a sea of candy wrappers, all pastel hair and crinkly bodyzips. I could hear their singsong chatter through the ship’s walls; they were calling to me. I smiled and wiggled my fingers at them. I had no rotting idea what they were saying, but I was sure it had something to do with drinking and orgies–because what else was I supposed to do with my poppers, my most devoted fans?

I twirled, showing off my new anti-g scarves that looped around me like silky tentacles. I’d gotten them specially for this moment; they weren’t just tentacles–they were a pair of high-fashion escape pods. In a couple seconds, they’d help me flee the sticky clutches of my adoring fans.

A hole appeared in the bubbleship for me to exit through, and the crowd pressed forward. My scarves coiled tightly about my legs, from toe-tips to knees. As soon as the hatch was wide enough, I shot out, bounding over the throng with my scarves, then kicking up giant clouds as my feet danced lightly across the Waste beyond.

I felt terrible, leaving all my poppers behind, sweet as fairy dust and cherries. I loved them dearly, but I hadn’t come to Earth to party and make an art-feast for them to eat.

Oh, no no NO. I was here to kill my father.

Well, my second father. The first one I didn’t mind so much–he was an elemental of dark matter, who had mated with my mother, the sun, to make me and all my sisters. But then father number two came along, stole my fire-self from my homely little sun orgy, and stuck me in a human body he’d made specially for me. He’d stuffed me into a flame-strangling sack of meat and bone.

Which was why I’d come here, to my second father’s Earthly hideout–to hunt him down, make him change me back, and then burn him ’til he was dead.

I took another giant leap and crashed into the forest that made Raith so green. I’d never seen so much of the color in my short, sweet life. The city even had green hair–a gnarly shag of canopy that covered it like a dome, leaves and vines so thick that the people here called it their green sky.

After a near collision with a tree, I realized that bounding through a forest with a set of anti-g scarves wasn’t the cleverest thing to do, so I shut them down and plummeted to the dirt. I groaned at myself after a graceless landing and checked to make sure I hadn’t broken anything important, like my spine or skull. My shirt was shredded and sticky with sap, but at least I was hidden, which was all that mattered right then. If I was to hunt my father, I couldn’t have a horde of poppers stalking my every move.

I whipped out a giant buckle-on hood I’d been keeping crumpled up in my pocket, threw its yellow folds over my head to hide my face, and headed toward the city. When the forest started to untangle itself and buildings emerged from the gloom, I paused and told my com to reconfigure my clothes at random. In two minutes, I had a new outfit: vintage wool socks in matching salt-and-pepper threads, tightlings in gray, and a hazy shirt of fragile gauze. I kept the gigantic hood on over it all–they were popular, so no one would take note, and anyway, once I turned it a smoky white, it matched my outfit. I looked like a flake of ash.

I shut off my com to keep irksome needles from hacking into my hub and finding me out. Then I stepped out of the trees, into the rain and into the city.

I looked Raith up and down. Overhead, it was just a mess of green mist and chaotic traffic; I wondered how many layers of city you’d have to climb through before reaching the sky. I leveled my gaze and stared down the street. It was empty here, so close to the forest. The road stretched along into endless fog. My mouth tightened and I glared at the clouds. So much rain–bad for fire. But I was more than fire. My first birth had been a sun-birth; a little rain wouldn’t put me out, and part of me even liked it. It was refreshing and tasted a bit like blood.

But it also made me feel sticky, stuck to my neck in a trench of terrible icy mud, and I wondered–how was I supposed to find anything in a place so alien and wet?

***

All I knew was that father number two was somewhere in the city. That he sold medicine to sick people, and that I wanted to incinerate him until his bones cracked and I could lick out his marrow.

So I checked the clinics first, to see if they knew him, or if they’d seen him. The sixth one I checked was grungier than the others; its sod roof was weedy, and dirty water spilled from the gutters. I had to duck through a curtain of it to reach the front door, which I tried to open gently, but failed; the old hinges screamed as I jerked at the handle, and the door’s spider-cracked windowpane fell out and spun across the floor.

“Don’t worry about it,” said the woman at the front. “Happens all the time. Every time, actually.” She eyed me like she wanted a bite.

I could tell by her sparkly eyes, pointy ears, and the patch of bleached skin over her right eye that she was an elf. A tree talker. They were all over the place in Raith. She had a fall of aqua bangs that blurred her obsidian gaze. Silky.

She brushed past me as she went to the door, then leaned down to pick up the bioplast window. She straightened and stuck out her arm. I went as still as ice in winter. There was a gun in her hand, all oil and grime and death. I knew the bullet inside wouldn’t kill me, but getting shot was terribly unsexy.

“Nice soul-threads,” she told me, flicking her gun briefly at my clothing, which was made of quirky little fibers that changed form whenever I told them to. “Now take them off, nice and slow. Cooperate, and maybe I’ll give you a free checkup,” she added, mouth wide open, teeth shiny.

“Oh, no–I melt without my clothes,” I said, and bolted.

I spat dirty gutter water as I ducked out, splashing through puddles as the shot-crack of her gun fired behind me. I felt a hot sting scrape across my cheek. Night was here and I was glad for its shadows. I found a dark alley and turned down it, thinking, Oh, sweetling, this is some real piss you’re in.

Maybe she couldn’t kill me, but she could certainly expose me–the last thing I needed was gunfire giving me away. I couldn’t stalk my prey if I’d already been revealed.

But as I fled from the sparking mouth of her gun, I realized I’d learned something: I needed a native. Someone who knew the city–the dangerous bits, and the parts where I could find sex, a tasty meal, and a place to hunker down in, to sleep in after a long day’s hunt.

I turned a corner and dropped to my knees. Sometimes, I’d revel in the smoky languor of transformation from human to feline, but tonight I didn’t have the time. A zipping spark split me in two, my flesh went up in vapor, and I bounded down the alley as a fire-furred cat.

Splash splash splash; I heard the woman getting closer, but I’d gained a little on her. I turned another corner, but someone was in my way.

He was a miserable little twig of a guy, wearing big stomper-boots that made his sticklike legs look even skinnier. He was huddled against the wall, trying to either sink in and disappear, or stay dry–though he was failing at both. His hood had started to slip off his head, and I could see his rain-snarly hair sticking all over his face and in his eyes.

His eyes, I thought. I liked them–which was saying something, ’cause the rest of him I didn’t approve of, not at all.

But yes, yessssss, his eyes.

His eyes were orange, fire, and I thought, home.

Proceed to Chapter 1, page 3–>