Earth to Me

It was all giving me flashbacks to that Put’emup, Put’emup concert in Chicago that last December, the one where someone threw me into the mosh pit and expected me to make it out alive. Of course, I did, but it was because Murray was there to yank me out at the right time.

Now, it was a free-for-all. They may have carefully organized the first defense system, but we sure didn’t have a plan for this part, and it definitely showed.

I was a mess, flailing to try and stay afloat above the ruckus of creatures shoving me to the side and trying to shoot their lightning and fire at the crustaceans that squirmed over our heads. I took so many appendages to the face that I lost track of how many claws had scratched up my cheeks, how many wings batted me in the nose. I tasted blood on my lip and that was it – with one fist held out over me, I blasted up above the ruckus with the full intent of at least seeing what was going on.

As soon as I did, though, a squirming crisp of a bug leg landed on my area of the crowd before the psyche leaders got to move it out of the way. It shook some charred exoskeleton onto my skin and gave me a good conk on the head, but after it fell, the psyche guardians got their crap together and didn’t let it happen again.

So I held my hand out and mustered up as much lightning as I could, which was apparently a pretty big chunk, since the whole bug I was aiming at just shot up in light right upon contact. After holding my charge along with a few others who had my idea, I released, and the charred shell drifted through, its dead legs sifting with no gravity to pull it.

Air bearers blew the debris out of the way, sending the shells spiraling into space, and everybody spread out. It was every being for themselves out there, and I found myself face-to-underside of another monumentally huge bug – just so I could prove to myself that I could kill it all on my own, I gathered up all of the excess static and let it out through my arms.

And the beams were messy, and there were some flyaways that would’ve caused some problems if all the other guardians were anywhere near me, but that didn’t matter. What mattered is that we were doing our job, and we were fighting to keep these bugs from doing whatever they wanted to do. If it meant completely frying them in hopes of making sure they could never loom again, well, I was up for it.

This was what I was losing my head over. This was the root reason why I was having nightmares, maybe the reason why me and Murray became so close. These disturbances were the reasons why I was the weirdest normal kid to walk the planet. They had caused so much stress and too many headaches, but in the end, I was better because of it.

It was my main concern for that past year, even after spending such a long time basking in the first aftermath. I deserved to let loose – I had come that far. Somehow I knew it would be a long time before I’d be able to release all of my lightning again.

So I drifted from bug to bug, frying each crustacean the best that I could before the other guardians whisked them away, and I kept on surfing like that. It was nice.

My head was clear. The only thing going on in my hypersensitive mind was endless questions regarding which bug to kill next, and it looked like they were all dwindling. I can’t tell you how great it felt to see the number diminish.

It would’ve went on like that. I’d have coasted along, doing it just so I could sleep again, if it weren’t for someone shouting my name in an unusually happy tone.

“Oshie! Over here, human!”

When that familiar voice was loud, usually, it sounded angry – but this time, it sounded calm. Eager, almost.

I tried to get a grip on where it came from, and then I saw her; Shira was waving her gloved hand at me in an Earthling greeting she must’ve picked up in her visits. She was actually smiling, too, and she drifted towards me as I moved in her direction, her blonde and red hair mussed yet nowhere near damaged. She was a pro and somehow I was in her presence.

“Look at this! Is it not incredible?!” she gushed, holding her strong hands out at the scene in front of us.

It was like fireworks. Countless other guardian leaders were frying the bugs to bits, and as the remains were sent rocketing through space, the area became emptier and emptier. It was seriously a dream come true, and even though Shira still had the power to make me whimper in fear, I even found myself laughing.

“I can’t believe it,” I gasped, my voice strong in the same way my insides felt.

If we were standing on something, her feet would be firmly planted on that ground. Instead, she just put her hands on her hips and proudly said, “This is the same plan they have been using on every other sect of the universe. They will never learn to be unpredictable.”

“I’m not complaining,” I shrugged. My hands were popping with static, but I couldn’t find it in me to care.

“Me neither, Tegan’s friend!” she laughed heartily, kind of like old Vikings always do in the movies. “This is wonderful! Oh, I cannot wait to show my face to my planet after this. Daltia will not be ready for me when I am queen, that is for certain.”

“At least you get to be open about it and not have them lock you up in the loony bin,” I sighed, enjoying the fireworks and looking forward to the great sleep I was bound to get when it was all over with.

Shira reached over and tapped my arm with the back of her hand. “Earth will come around someday. If you eight are any indication, the rest of the planet cannot be too bad.”

“Yeah, well, for some reason the universe decided that eight people all from America were the best people to defend the whole planet.”

“That…that is pretty stupid, I must say.” She stared thoughtfully ahead, her square jaw locked. “But I stand by it. If this happens again, and it is safe to say that it may, then I look forward to fighting alongside you again.”

It was…odd. That was the closest thing to a “moment” me and Shira would probably ever have, but I honestly felt pretty warm on the inside. She was even smiling! And she never smiled when it was just me and her!

Man, for a second I almost forgot that she nearly killed my dad back in 2011.

But she was the one to end it, and she did it in the way she was known for: violence.

She didn’t hit me, oh no. She turned toward the endless horizon, and then she looked around at the remaining bugs. With a powerful thrust of her strong legs, she rocketed over to one of them, and as she drew her fist back, it dawned on me that I never knew just what her elemental power was.

Well, sparks were flicking out from her arms, and the punch she dealt to crack that crustacean in half was definitely a lightning-infused blow.

I couldn’t believe my eyes. She had the same power I had all this time, and I didn’t know it?

I…I guess it explained why she hardly had a scratch on her when I zapped the life out of her after she crashed into my backyard…

And I didn’t know if the others knew it, but I would still make sure to tell them. I’m sure they’ve heard weirder things, especially through the course of this whole episode. In fact, when it all came down to it, it wasn’t so weird to see Shira throw sparks just like me, only in a more professional way. It had been there all along. I just didn’t see it, and she just didn’t show it.

She threw a few more shock punches to the other bugs that hadn’t been blasted out of the way by the other guardians, and when they were all sent swirling into the vast expanse of space, there was a brief moment of cheering from all corners of the spread-out crowd.

Then, behind me, the portal began to close.

Everybody’s first instinct was to race towards it as quickly as they could, so even though I was practically horizontal to ensure I would get through in time, it still wasn’t enough – there were aliens in front of me that were faster and stronger, and I just was no match for them. I started planning out ways to ask one of them how to get back to Earth just in case it closed, working out every way to avoid having a panic attack in the endless void of space, when someone grabbed my hand and yanked me above the crowd.

It was Shira, so in-the-zone that she didn’t even say a word to me. She just picked me up and zoomed me out of the portal before it even threatened to close, and after we slowed down on the other side of space, I felt my arm settle back into its socket.

Shira let go of me and leaned back, but with a solemn smile and a nod, she said, “I will be seeing you soon. Tell Tegan I said hello, and let the other Earth guardians know that I respect all of them. Good day, Oshie.”

“Uh, you too,” I nodded back, saluting her and kicking myself immediately afterward for such a dumb reaction.

But she sped off, rocketing away to Daltia, wherever that was, and she was bound to christen her planet like the eventual queen she was definitely meant to be.

And I, still with a bloody nose and scratches on my face and arms that were just starting to hurt again, was standing stagnant among the rush of lead guardians emerging from the portal. Alien cheers were different from human cheers in that there was no particular language that I recognized, but all of them sounded distinctly joyful. I guess that’s what kept us together.

If I wasn’t alone in a crowded room, I’d have cheered right along with them.

On that thought, a small portal had ripped in front of me, two hands clawing at the sides to hold it open – Mom!

Quicker than I even processed the action, I jumped through, careful not to hit my mom since she was right in front of me, and right after she let the portal seal, she took me in her arms and spun me around in space, just like she used to when I was barely old enough to walk.

And I was in Heaven, but not literally, even though she truly felt like an angel sent to grace my life in a different way than she had intended all along. She was the reason why Earth was once again included in an intergalactic fight, and even if we probably could’ve gone without knowing and still ended up fine, the risk ended up amounting to nothing.

I was holding her tightly around her shoulders for a long time, my eyes closed once I realized I was crying and laughing simultaneously. Beyond my eyelids, I saw stars blink a little brighter, gleaming through the thin skin, and right next to my ear, Mom was giggling.

“You did it, mijo!” she cried. “It was nothing! You all did so well!”

I couldn’t say anything back, so I just kept on smiling like the world was never going to end.

She gasped something incoherent and stopped spinning, taking a moment to peel away and press a big motherly kiss to my forehead. I whined, “Stop it, Mamá,” without skipping a beat for my teenage years, and all she did was laugh again, caressing my scratched-up cheeks.

“You will feel that when you wake up, Oshie,” she whispered. “These wounds are real. But they are nothing compared to what they could have been, and they are nothing that will not heal up soon. You are not lucky – you are courageous, you are strong, and you have done what you did not think you could do. For that, and for so many other things I cannot even begin to explain, I am so proud of you, mijo.”

“I didn’t do it all on my own, Mom,” I mumbled back. “I had everyone else with me.”

“That does not make your accomplishments any less amazing, sweetheart.” She brushed the hair from my forehead, kissing it again and holding my calloused, sparking hands with her own soft ones.

“I’m still surprised I’m alive,” I choked out, gulping down some dried blood from my nose and the inside of my lip.

Mom’s hereditary eyes gleamed in the sunlight, her long eyelashes collecting stardust that fell from the crown of stars in her hair. She was as beautiful as she ever was, the same in pictures, the same youthful glow that never left her, even when she was in the hospital. My mother was in the stars – she was the whole world.

“I will say goodbye for now, but this is not permanent. No, I will see you in dreams much more often from now on, mijo,” she smiled, her thumbs tracing around the tender skin of my wounded face. “I love you, Oshie. Go home, check in with your team, and get some rest, mi cariño.”

I nodded and whispered, “I love you too, Mamá. Thank you.”

And she held me tight against her celestial body, her arms protective against my back and arms as I felt myself slip away from the space I was just getting to know. Everything was heavy and exhausting as stars gave way to darkness, a warm dark that was tinted only slightly differently than the blue tint of the universe.

I ran through endless folds of time to get back to my home and end up in my bed. I was tired, so tired, and there was nothing I wanted more than a good twelve-hour sleep, but before I granted myself that wish, I had to pry my eyelids open and let my teammates know that my heart was still beating.