Eyes Ever to the Sky (A Sci Fi Romance) (The Sky Trilogy) (21 page)

The woman was Aunt Beatriz. She recognized her from pictures she'd seen. Was this…? Was this the man Mama had stolen? Cece stared at the image, feeling faint. Slowly she turned the photo over.

Scrawled in Mama's handwriting was the name Marquez and seven digits.

A phone number. Her father's.

CHAPTER TWEN
TY-SEVEN — HUGH

Thursday 9:22 p.m.

Hugh streaked through the purple star-strewn sky as if in a dream. Flying. He couldn’t believe it.

They soared over a carpet of evergreens, the scent of pine thick in the air. Below, a rippling river sparkled with moonlight as the water tumbled over the rocks. A slash of highway cut through the trees, red taillights blinking as they passed. The cars were black beetles, trundling along below him.
So small from up here,
he thought. It made him feel huge, like a god. Cece would never believe this.

Cece. An image of her face awash in disappointment flashed before him. She was safe with her mother, he told himself. Right now he had to focus on unlocking the secrets of his life.

Nomad flitted eight feet away, bobbing and weaving like an otter through the air currents, the wind rippling his clothes. Every so often he’d flash Hugh an amused grin. Then he’d go back to dipping amongst the treetops, or swooping down into the shadows only to pop back out again in a spray of leaves. Hugh smiled, but didn't attempt any loop-de-loops. His brain had enough trouble processing up and forward.

Nomad swooped in and pointed toward a gleaming metal structure in the distance. Hugh squinted towards it. A large expanse of water shimmered in the moonlight. A bridge, a very long one too from the look of things, stretched across the water. Lights dotted the suspension cables in two giant triangles. Across the water, dark smears of land sat on the horizon. Where were they?

Nomad guided him to the very top of one of the suspension towers. He touched down on a white walkway of about four feet wide and twenty feet across. Hugh followed, grabbing for the metal railing and slamming into the outside with a metal
clang!
He scrambled over and fell on his back onto the platform.

Nomad stood above him, smiling, his hair wind-whipped. “You're missing the view. It's the best part.” He held down a hand and pulled Hugh upright.

Hugh stood and clutched the chest-high white railing that separated him from a 500 foot free-fall into the bridge traffic below. Cars trundled over a metal grating, rumbling loudly. The water below undulated in peaks of moonlight and valleys of wet shadow.  His stomach flipped uneasily. Even though he'd just been soaring through open sky, somehow being stationary made him feel dizzy. He gripped the railing and closed his eyes. “I thought you were going to tell me—”

“
Look up.” Nomad pointed.

Even in the dark, the landscape was amazing. The last trace of orange sunset splashed the west where Hugh could just make out treetops and roof peaks. The water stretched on forever, a few boats dipping in the waves. The tangy, wet smell of lake water filled his nose. Hugh shook his head. “Why'd you bring me all the way out here?”

“I like it here,” Nomad said, draping his arms over the railing. He gazed out and sighed. “The boys upstairs are always, 'Go here. Do this.' This planet has so much beauty. Better than that cramped ship, I tell you what. Sometimes I just need a breather.”

Hugh turned to face him. “What's this about a ship?” The whole bridge vibrated beneath him, a steady shimmy that jangled his nerves.

Nomad glanced at him, the moonlight darkening his features. “What's the rush? You got a hot date?” He smirked, ignoring Hugh's frown, and gestured to the bridge below.  “Mackinaw Island Bridge. Third longest suspension bridge in the world. Makes you think,” Nomad said, staring out at the rippling water, “if humans can make something like this, they gotta be good for something, right?”

“
The way you talk about them makes them seem like... idiots.” Hugh wanted to say
makes
us
seem like idiots
, but he couldn't. Not anymore. That realization sat like a lead weight on his chest. He and Cece weren't even the same species.

Nomad shrugged. “They’ll be alright with our help.”

“What do you mean?” Hugh asked.

“
Don't you wonder why we're scouting? We're supposed to collect intel to help with the arrival of the rest of our homies.” Nomad threw a fake gang sign and snickered. “Wait. Wrong culture. Sorry.”

Hugh crinkled his brow. “Like an invasion?”

Nomad shook his head. “Nah. Not like the kind of
Invasion of the Body Snatchers
crap you have pumped into your head. No brain sucking parasites. No
War of the Worlds
. We’ll come on down and drop in like old neighbors. Offer our help in exchange for a few things.”

“
What things?” A car honked below making Hugh grip the rail.

“
Like, that they stop mucking up the planet, polluting it, blowing it up, over-populating it. All that dumb shit they should've been doing in the first place. We’ll give them enhancements in technology, medical care, clean energy and all they have to do is frickin recycle. And work with our government. Theirs could use a little 'tweaking'.” He used air quotes, smirking. Nomad pressed a salesman's smile on his face, his teeth gleaming in the dim light. “It's a great
trade, Hugh.”

Hugh drew his eyes away. His brain churned like a virus-riddled computer. He pressed his palms to his eyes. “But, where did we come from? What happened to our planet?”

Nomad gripped the railing and stared out into the night. “Carth…got it bad. Mutant fungus infected the plant life, killing off a lot of the vegetation. There were mass animal die-offs. The air clogged with pollution. We had horrible temperature changes.” Nomad adopted a mock reporter's voice. “The planet became inhospitable.” He gave a weak smile and shifted back to normal. “So, we left. We’ve been living in space for a few generations now. We've tried a couple of planets with limited success, but now we think we've found a place to settle down.” A small smile spread on Nomad's face. A real smile. Maybe the first one Hugh had seen. “It’s a great time for our people, Hugh. You were pretty pumped about it a few days ago.”

“
So…” Hugh said, staring up into the stars, “we're…aliens.”

“
Well, look at it this way. To us, the humans are aliens. We're Carthians.”

Nomad gripped Hugh's shoulder. This time Hugh didn't pull away. They stood there for a moment and Hugh felt that tug of recognition again. Then Nomad dropped his hand, pulled out a Twinkie and took a huge bite. “Mmm. These Twinkies are hard to find, but damn are they worth it.”

Hugh felt like a tangle of threads. None of this sounded as easy as Nomad made it out to be. An alien race telling humans how to live, what to do? Somehow he didn't see it going down so easily. “What happens if the humans say no?”

Nomad stared across the shimmering lake, licking the white frosting from the middle of the Twinkie. “They won’t.” He waggled his eyebrows. “We’re
very
convincing.”

Hugh thought about what it would mean for lots of super-powered beings to suddenly crash land on earth. The humans would have no choice but to comply. Yet, if all of the beings were as peaceful as he felt, it would be against their nature to harm humans. Yet, Nomad didn’t seem to share his love for humanity. His thoughts raced to the other creature who had crash-landed on earth. The thing in the woods. He could see its red slitted eyes in the dark even now.

Hugh stiffened. “What about the thing in the woods? The beast. Is that one of ours, too?” 

“
That was,” Nomad paused and swallowed, “a mistake. We didn’t mean for him to end up here.”

Hugh got the distinct impression that Nomad was hiding something from him. “Yeah, but you sure aren’t doing much to stop it, are you?”

“We haven’t had time to get the extraction team here yet, but we will. Don't worry. In forty-eight hours everything will change, anyway. Now, just chill out.” The smile had fallen off Nomad’s face. “By Turin’s claw, you’re nothing like the guy I knew on Carth.”

The thing in the woods was still out there and now Hugh knew that Nomad had no intention of stopping it. It had been lurking around Cece's work; it had killed only miles from her home. What was he doing here taking in the sights? He had to get back. Hugh pushed off the bridge into the air, wobbling a little. The wind battered him, but he managed to keep his eyes locked on Nomad. “I have to go.”

From the bridge railing, Nomad's hair billowed around his head like an angry rain cloud. “Go? You can't just go. The higher-ups want you taken in. Fixed. You have to come with me. We gotta get your brain back.”

Hugh shook his head, bobbing down in the air. “I'm not going to be
fixed
.”

Nomad frowned. “They know where you are and what you're doing. They won't be happy campers when they find out you're trying to put the bone to some human girl. And if she finds out what you are, they'll take care of her.”

Hugh tightened his fists at his side. “What do you mean?”

“
You've seen what that thing can do, right? How it rips them from here,” Nomad touched underneath one ear, “to here.” He drew his finger across his throat, down his neck to his collarbone. “You don't want that to happen to her.”

An image of Cece, bloody and shredded, flashed into Hugh's head before he could stop it. He shuddered, the constant wind stinging his face. He couldn't think straight. He needed to get back. Why had he left?

Nomad pushed off the bridge and bobbed in the air before Hugh. “So, I've got to report our coordinates and then we can catch a ride up. They'll know what to do about your brain wipe. Maybe it was the atmospheric pressure on landing?” He pushed his hand through his rippling hair. “They'll probably send some—”

Hugh turned and shot away from Nomad into the moonlit sky. He pushed through the air, eyes streaming, clothes slapping against his chest. Faster. A hand cinched around his ankle and pulled. Hugh whirled in a circle, the landscape spinning into a blur. The pines below became a smear of dark green as he spun end over end.

When the rotation stopped, he found Nomad clutching his leg with both hands. “What're you doing? We have to go back!” he shouted over the wind.

Hugh shook his head. Back to where they would change him, manipulate him, make him forget Cece? No, he couldn't go back.

Hugh drew both legs to his body and kicked hard with his free leg. His foot connected with Nomad's chest and the force sent him whirling like a trapeze artist. Nomad smashed into a tall pine below them, a spray of needles filling the air. He scrambled out of the branches and flew up. Now his glare was angry. “You shouldn't have done that,” he shouted.

“You shouldn't have threatened my girlfriend!” Hugh shouted. “Tell whoever
they
are that I plan on protecting that girl with my life.” Hugh flexed his arms. He could feel power surging through his body. “I'll kill you if I have to.”

Nomad, picking pine needles from his clothes, shook his head. “It's not me you have to worry about.”

CHAPTER TWENT
Y-EIGHT — CECE

Thursday 10:32 p.m.

A knock tore Cece out of sleep. She sat up, wiping drool from her chin. The TV flickered in front of her on some late night news. She blinked and shook the sleep from her head. The knock sounded again, a quiet tapping on her bedroom window. Was it Hugh? She pulled herself off the couch and stumbled down the hallway, nearly tripping on some junk splayed across the floor. When she got to her bedroom, she could see Fer’s face pressed onto the window pane.

“
Come to the front!” Cece yelled, miming to the front door. “My mom’s not here.”

Fer nodded and disappeared. Moments later she was letting herself in. Cece slumped on the couch and Fer joined her.

“Where’s your
mamacita
?” Fer asked, scanning the trailer. “She run out again?”

Cece nodded. She muted the TV and dropped her head back on the tattered cushion.

“Sorry, dude. I know she is acting all crazy-like right now.” Fer offered a sympathetic shrug.

“
You have no idea.”

Fer’s eyes flicked to the news. Then she straightened, her eyebrows popping up. “Oh, man, did the cops come here, too?”

“Yeah. I kinda freaked on Mama because of it.” She pressed her palms to her forehead. “I can't take this anymore, Fer.” She squeezed her eyes shut, holding back tears. She'd driven Mama out into the night with a killer on the loose for Christ's sake.

Fer rubbed a hand on Cece's back. “Sorry, dude. She'll be back. She always comes back, right?” Cece nodded, her head down. They sat in silence for a minute. Fer leaned back and propped her feet on the cigarette-strewn coffee table. “You wanna hear something funny? Shaun freaked when the cops showed up. He flushed two dime bags before he heard why they were really there. He was so pissed. He should be happy they weren't there to cart his ass back to lock-up.”