The Paranoid

Once the gossip and media of Explosion of Ends had finally calmed some, the sections went on with life and forgot all about the possibility of our own suicidal deaths. The Extremes and Leaders had held a huge SeeScreen broadcast for about two hours from the LM section, explaining all the reasons why the public shouldn’t get Explosion of Ends stuck in their brains. They said that an idea was just an idea, and only The Leaders had control of the Earth and System of Stars, not some mad scientists thoughts. The Leaders obviously thought that this was going to cause a sense of relief and peace to go through their people. But it just made me want to throw up. It made Hani throw a hand full of chip crumbs at my Screen, which I don’t think is any better.

A day later, and those damn chip crumbs are still on my floor. I turned towards Hani and his dimming air, intending to give one hell of a ‘Mother Speech’, as he likes to call them. But when I look over at him laying on my blue comforter, my mind gives a quick tug, before popping an old memory in front of my eyes.

The blue comforter. The one my mother gave me before she shipped me to Sky School Center for the Gifted and Talent. Or Hell, for short.

And then the popping memory starts to run pictures from that day before my eyes. But when it gets to my mom, holding her handmade blanket, it stops. I look at mother from then, with her bright smiles and beginnings of winkles from smiling so much, and feel a slight drop in my stomach. When I last saw her on Waker’s Morning, the new ‘recreational’ name for Christmas, she had more frown lines than smiles, and she looked a bit too thin, even for her small frame. When I was younger, my mom had a light yellow mist around her. Over the years, the light yellow that I had grown so use to had turned to a dark golden, before turning a light shade of brown, and then fully turning to a color brown that resembled dying tree leaves. I probably should’ve told my father, but every time I remember trying, all I could see was black marble eyes and his quick fading, always cold feeling, blue blanket of air. Now looking back on it, I can tell he noticed. His air may had always been a deeper shade of blue, but when my mother’s had started to turn, his had started to gain rough edges, and the colors seemed to always swim so violent next to his head, making a kind of infinite pushing motion.

The memory finally starts to move from my mothers face and her small outstretched arms holding the comforter for me to take, to drop me back in my Center room. Back to my final year in Hell.

Because all children, ages 8 to 17, had to spend those 9 years of their life in one of their sections many centers, living in a dorm or walking to school depending on how far they lived from the center. In AAE, there were only four schools. Which makes sense, I guess, because we aren’t as big as the VVA section, who covered the majority of the northern hemisphere. But, c’mon, only four freaking schools? Even the WOH section had more than us. And that just wasn’t fair.

The first school center choice around here is Air Rocketed Boarding School. A good choice if you wanted to party every day. The second is Center 88, so generic that it only had numbers as a name. This school is in the poorer parts of AAE, where the building was caved in and molded at the edges. The last choice is my favorite, and was the center I had begged to go to. I would’ve succeeded in my 24/7 embarrassing pleads, but the elders thought that the tradition of Izeek children going to Sky was one to keep, and you don’t argue with the elders in my family.

The school was called Aqua’s Fossil Center. Founded in the early 1900s, the building was one of the oldest standing in our section. It was added and redone over the years of course, but even through that, it had maintained it’s older looking ways. The education there was pretty sweet too. Most masters being older than my elders, and having long tales of fighting in System of Stars’ only war in 2019, only two years into the rebellion. I would kill to even be in the same room as one of the masters there.

A bright green shoe hits the leg that was resting on the little wooden table in front of the SeeScreen. I focus back on Hina, who was now rolling his eyes at me. “What?” I play victim and grunt, rubbing at my now sore leg. “You tryna kill me?”

Hani proceeds to throw his other shoe, a bright yellow instead of green. “Dude. You were staring.” He sits up, so his long legs, covered by my extra pair of extinct Batman pajamas given by my brother, can reach the floor. Needless to say we weren’t really expecting a sleepover last night. “What’s up?”

I shrug and turn back to my cushion, tilting my head back and closing my eyes. ‘Relax.’ It was a whisper surrounding me, and for a second I could just feel myself turning into my father. There were days when I used to like that idea. Almost hoped for it. For the power of just giving up and resting my body, letting the different airs from all kinds of different people come and cover me. But then, I would think of my parents. I would think of how sad my mothers color is now, and how emotionally ignorant my fathers is, and I would push the thought far away, temporally locking it in the back of my mind.

I felt, more than saw Hani stand and sit next to me on the little loveseat the center had given to all their kids when they first moved in. All of them looked exactly the same, but had different colors. Mine was a deep red and black. It was like they color coordinated to moods, giving the happiest students the violet and pink ones, while the quiet, withdrawn students got the darker blues and browns. But I wasn’t withdrawn. Not anymore. Not since I met Hani.

“We should dye your hair.”

I snort and slap away the pale hand that was nearing the top of my head. “Like hell. My father would kill me, you know that.”

He makes a disapproving noise and tries to reach for my hair again. I sigh and let him, putting up a fight would just do nothing. He always got what he wanted, no matter what. “I know he would, but at least it would be for a cause, Ciro. You’d die for a cause.”

I laugh at the unneeded emphasize he had put in his sentences, “Seriously, Hans? What the fuck kind of cause is that?”

He tugs at my hair for a moment, before returning to his gentle rubbing. “Don’t curse so much, it’s not attractive.”

“Your mom isn’t attractive.”

“Hey.” His hands stop moving and he swats at the head he was caressing. “What would you do, exactly, if my mother had heard what you said, huh?” He crosses his arms and huffs. “Asshoe.”

I just grin and continue to lean my head back, eyes closed. He begins to hum a song from when we were younger, before The Leaders decided that music was going too mainstream and banned all kinds other than classical. Back when we were allowed to be happy.

I frown and stand. Hani stops humming, looking at me with wide eyes from the sudden movements I caused. “Ciro?” He runs a hand through his hair, a habit that’s suppose to be calming. It just makes me more agitated. Makes me want to jump off LMs highest mountain tops and straight onto their egotistical pavements.

“Hani.” I move to the window behind my bed. I was one of the lucky ones to even get a window, especially one as big as this. Most students only got a square little one when they first moved in. “Hani,” I repeat his name. It’s verbal comfort to me, making my head release some tension from earlier thoughts. I hurry and close the shades to my window, letting the only light come from the dim, standing lamp by the loveseat, and his bright orange. When I turn back to face my friend, he’s frowning.

He stands, right hand touching bright blue dyed hair. “What’s wrong?” Eyes wide with concern. “Headache?” His frown goes down even more, the air around him shifting slightly, and he goes to stand in front of me. “I’m sorry, I just thought. I thought they were going away.” He makes a clicking sound and reaches for the top of my head again, only to stop himself midair and drop his arm uselessly to his side. “Do you, do you like, need to lie down or something?”

He starts to move with his words. Something he’s always done, even before I knew him. “Hani,” I say, grabbing a flying hand, “I have an idea.” He stills, hand going limp in my grasp. I can’t read his face from this poor light, but I can already picture the concerned, confused look clear in my head. “I have an idea, Hani.”

His air comes to wrap around my leg before returning back to his batman covered ones. He pulls his hand away, returning it to his hair, before trying to return to the calm state he usually always has. He clicks his tongue against the roof of his mouth and turns from me, going to lay back on my blue comforter, resting his arm over his eyes. “Do tell, my little Aadi, do tell.”

I roll my eyes at the use of my middle name, and go to kneel at the side of my bed. I grab his hand again and say, “You have to promise not to think I’m insane, Hans. You have to promise, and you have to mean it.”

He peeks from under his forearm, making the same clicking noise with his mouth as before. “You belong to WOH. You’re just too dramatic sometimes.”

I squeeze his hand until he makes a slight pull at it. Not trying to pull back, but just trying to get my attention from his currently white fingers. “You have to promise.” I return the previous pressure I was giving, but only for a second.

He looks at me from under some strands of blue that fell into his eyes. I can‘t see his eyes from here, I can‘t see what he‘s thinking. But I can feel the air around us shifting even more. “Ciro Aadi Izeek, I promise that I will not think of you as crazy, loony, insane, or mental, not more than I already do, from your ‘idea’.” By now he was leaning on the arm that was just covering his eyes. Leaning and raising his upper half to look at me correctly. “And I promise to take back that promise if you don’t tell me what the hell it is, right fucking now.”

“Hans,” I say, eyes fixed on the shadows my light make on his neck, “I want to start a Raid.”