BV13 We Cool

I'm stuck.

Nah man, I can try, but nothin's happenin'.

I can't move.

I can't do anything to help.

Things look bad—and I'm talkin' mo' bad than the time me an' my homie Chris got caught for cuttin' class bad. Mo' bad than the time we jus' about sent each other to the hospital 'cuz he was ackin' a fool tryna get me t'help him hack into th'school records an' change his D to a B.

My mom was right, that dude is a bad influence. Not that I was ever influenced by him, but I can definitely see how he could—oh shoot, that just happened. And what is he—wait—Ran?

A'ight, a'ight, lemme back up some.

So you remember what happened on—what was that place—Geonra? Let's go with that. Me an' Ri'lar, like a coupla OG bosses, went up an' took on what he called the Dozjekents. Basically a group of illegal, immoral kinda somethin's that have bases an' groups throughout various parts of the galaxies. The ones we ran into were those snake alien dudes that could turn invisible an' move really, really fast.

We took 'em out, but in the middle of all the action an' junk I got poisoned. Ri'lar told me that those snake dudes have somethin' that comes out of their claws that make you paralyzed when they scratch you. I got scratched all up an' down my back an' legs. It was slow acting, so he tells me the sooner we get it treated, the sooner I'll be able to get back to normal.

I asked why he didn't get poisoned, an' he gave me some mess like,

"I've been bitten, scratched, poked, and prodded by every type of tooth, nail, blade, and sharp object this side of the universe. I'm probably immune to diseases doctors don't even have names for yet, but aside from that—and this is something you desperately need to learn to do—I use my aura as a personal shield, something like a coating for my whole body, a second skin. Takes a while to master, but once you do, you can go to any planet, moon, or asteroid without having to worry about foreign pathogens or poisonous gases, or even the temperature to some degree. I was told it was how the Old Ones managed to travel among the stars if you buy into the myth."

So I'm thinkin' if it works for him, there's gotta be some truth to it. I remember Ran made fun of the whole "aura" thing with how "old an' archaic" it was.

Ri'lar told me we was headin' back to the only doc' in the cosmos he could trust, an' that's back home—his home of course. Took me a while to place the scene to the place, but when we got there, it all came back: the wide array of different species walkin' the streets. The not too advanced, but still well to do general level of tech. That old Western feeling. The 2 blue and 1 white suns in the sky all day and all night long. Yeah, that place.

Time was runnin' short. By then, I think just about everything from my shoulders on down was useless. I had that numb feeling too, which was, and still is, super scary. Man, I'm tellin' you—it's a wonder I'm still keepin' at it.

We met with this doctor dude Ri'lar was talkin' about, an' he looked just like Ri'lar by the way. They could be twins. Maybe that's just that outsider view that I see, but other than him being light green, exactly the same.

The place we met in was hardly worth bragging about, but it seemed clean enough to be called a doctor's office. When he examined me on the examining table, the tools he was usin' was so—foreign. I felt like I was being poked and prodded and examined like that kid in that movie who got abducted. I felt like that guy. Some weird object that he held one end to my chest and the other to his—I guess ears—an' then he had me stick my tongue out and put some stick in it. I don't even wanna know what that was about. I don't know whether to call it strange or old. Hardly any familiar tech, whatsoever. No rays, no screens, just cave man tools.

I was real worried that with him never seein' a human before that he'd be completely at a loss, but that really didn't bother him. He said that the paralysis that those creatures induce works the same on pretty much everyone, which is why it's such a good defensive tool for them. If you're not immune to it, you're going to get it the same exact way. And only people who've been exposed to it multiple times are actually immune, so it's a pretty good deal for them.

This was all Ri'lar translating for me by the way. I haven't seen him this cooperative before. He was especially helpful, which wasn't a trait that woulda came to mind if someone asked me to describe the dude before. It could've been him feeling guilty.

Or, maybe—jus' maybe—he was startin' to open up. We've been at this for a while now. Don't have any sense of time, but it's been a long time since Earth, an' we're pretty much all we got. I may still hold a grudge against him for gettin' me involved in this crud, but with everything that's happened, in our own ways, we've kinda been there for each other, an' lookin' back on it all, I'm alright with that. We cool. We cool.

So I'm all checked out. Bein' walked out in some strange chair with wheels. Still couldn't move an inch, but some of the feeling was coming back. I was all ready to head back to the ship with Ri'lar, but he had plans to pretty much just chill for the day. That's another side of Ri'lar I didn't know existed. Here I'm thinkin' ol' whale-face is all business this an' business that, but this dude's a real dude.

We ended up back at what I always thought of as his HQ—some ol' warehouse in town. Place was huge by the way. I'm talkin' streched out for what seems like miles. Never got what the people inside did there, but I knew his boss when I saw him. Another snake dude. I had to wonder if he remembered me. Last time I was here, he an' the big guy got into it. This meeting seemed a lil' less hostile, which I took as a good sign. He an' Ri'lar talkin' like civilized adults. The snake dude handed him a slip of paper with some symbols on it. Then I start hearin' somethin' in the background.

And I think it was right there when everything—and I mean everything—just came crashing down.

None of us in the warehouse saw it coming. There was no warning at all. It just went BOOM. We saw a huge flash of white light, an' then BOOM. I was practically blinded. Left me feelin' all dizzy like an' junk.

I don't know how or what happened, don't know if I passed out or what, but I was on the ground, outta my wheel chair, lotsa loud blaring noises so high pitched, so shrill like, it almost made me feel like throwing up. Then the noises sorta calmed down, an' it's like I'm in a rave with all the flashing lights an' heavy vibrations. Couldn't focus on much of anything, not even hearin' myself think.

Next thing I know, I'm seein' Ri'lar an' his boss an' really everyone in the factory pullin' out all sortsa heavy duty artillery weapons. I didn't know why until I finally saw that the walls were crushed an' the ceiling had collapsed. My head was still thumpin', still outta it, but I eventually put it all together.

We was under attack.

And that's where we are now. Fire's rainin' from the sky, the ground is pounding with every single stray shot. I'm seein' giant mechs comin' in from all four corners. I'm seein' scores of aliens decked out in some high tech, battle armor from head to toe pour in from the dozen or so huge carrier ships hoverin' ova head. It's like they sealed off this entire part of town just to bomb the place. Don't see no one one the streets walkin' by, no bystanders, no curious cats—they've literally turned this spot—just this particular spot—into a battle ground.

I got my sword with me, but I can't join in to help my peeps out—look at me callin' 'em my people now—nah man. Well, they are my people. As twisted an' messed up as it is, these guys are Ri'lar's folks, an' Ri'lar's been tha only dude who's given a care about me, so yeah, for today, these are my people—an' darn me for bein' a deadweight around 'em.

I see Ri'lar maneuver through the wreckage an' through the fires that rage on, aiding his comrades in arms. He's totin' the big guns, firin' plasma cannons on the aggressors. He's takin' down a coupla big guys one by one. It puts a smile on my face. Can't nobody stop this dude when he gets goin'. Like a tank.

I feel myself getting picked up and dragged away by something. I look up to see that it's Ri'lar's snake boss dude. He saw me laying out in the open and decided it best I get out of the way. Makes sense, but I don't wanna move. I need to be in this. I need to help out. I really do, and I don't know if it was just timing or me wanting it bad enough—honestly, it was probably a rush of adrenaline—but in any case, the poison starts to wear off. Not much of a change though. Still can't make myself mobile, but I do start getting some feeling back.

I'm pretty much left dumbfounded over alla dis. Who would bomb a place like this? What kinda beef do these cats have with my dawgs? How'd I manage to get caught up in the madness, again? Then I start to realize that now isn't the best time to be askin' these questions.

Gotta focus on the here an' now, an' the here says move right now.

Still can't though. I can feel myself slouch along the wall that snake dude left me by. I can feel the paved over, concrete texture of the floor I'm sittin' on. With a little strainin', I can see myself pick up my right arm. Then my left. But nothin' above shoulder level. And forget about actually standin' up. Still stuck here watchin' as all manner of mayhem breaks lose around me.

On the plus side, if this were a movie, I'd have front row seats. An' with me bein' the only one sittin' here, it's like I got the theater all to myself. Love it when that happens, cuz I can laugh an' holla as loud as I want. This ain't a comedy, though. So why am I still laughin'?

Why am I laughing at the sight of Ri'lar lunging head first at the two guys in those giant mech suits from behind? Why am I laughin' at the sight of those factory workers getting ran over by some ugly tailed ogre lookin' thing? Why am I laughin' at the snake dude goin' invisible, an' clawin' his way through the troops at super speed like those snakes on Geonra? Why am I laughin' at those ships overhead droppin' bombs over the whole joint like terrorists?

I'm laughin' cuz it's funny, that's why.

An' don't think I'm jus' out here crackin' up like a maniac. Nah, it's nothin' like that. This is just a really funny, really silly, really stupid situation to be in. Some of the things happenin' here jus' don't make no sense, an' I'm chucklin' over it because that's just me tryna work through it. I'm not crazy. I think I know me well enough to know that. Violence is wrong. War is bad. This is a catastrophe, come on now, this whole—everything—is jus' too silly to be real. I gotta take a break to laugh over that. You may look at me like some crazy lil' hoodrat gettin' all hype an' junk like them lil' kids when a fight breaks out on the playground, but I'm tellin' you, it's not like that. I don't even care if you believe me, I'm jus' sayin'.

"I know you're not enjoying this. Are you?"

Ha ha, okay, I guess I'm a lil' crazy. Hearin' things. Sounded like Lynn for a moment. No, that's not true. It sounded like Ran. Lynn was just the first thing that came to mind. Either way, I doubt I'll ever actually hear either of those voices agai—

"What the crud?"

It was a reflex. You hear a sound, you turn to it. Came from the left. There it is. There she is. Silver, slender, weird lookin' alien lady that looks a lot like,

"Ran?"