"Girls Just Wanna Have Fun" is by Cyndi Lauper. I picked it because the girls are running around, doing whatever they want to, and they get into trouble for it. The song Sayen sings is called "Dreams of the Sleeping Birds," and it's written by Amy F. Bernon. I sang it in choir during 8th grade. Enjoy and R&R!
Chapter II: Girls Just Wanna Have Fun
"Her mind is on the verge of splitting," Bela said. "There's going to be more junk floating around than even I can usually manage, and there are 8 of me."
"So? You find you way through the junk. She's probably afraid, Bela, and all alone. You want to talk to her," Varda said. "But I'm gonna warn you…the moment your heads touch, all your memories are going to be available to her and vice versa. You have to be willing to take that risk."
"We'll save the world," Bela said in a surprisingly small voice.
"We'll save the universe," Varda said with a haughty lift of her chin.
Bela sighed and let his forehead make contact with Sayen's. There was the feeling of leaving his body, landing on the ground, yet not actually landing on the ground. Everything had that surreal quality dreams are made of.
"Sayen?" he hollered. There were several hurricanes going on at once. People were screaming, dust was blinding his eyes, and he had to watch his step because there were sporadic bursts of flame from the ground. "Sayen Reid, I will not call you again! Answer me!"
"Yeah?" asked a voice, cool as you please. Sayen stood with a perfectly natural expression. The only part of her showing evidence of what she could see, had seen, and was seeing was the wind-blown look to her hair. Well, and the fact that she was shivering uncontrollably.
"How do we siphon your psychic energy to the Tardis?" Bela asked.
"I need someone who knows how to open their mind to pass the energy on," Sayen shivered. "I'm holding onto it really tight right now," and I can make it go. You just need to put my body near where you want the energy to go," she said slowly.
"I will. Does it hurt?" he had to ask.
"No more than it should," she said. "I don't mind," she shrugged. "I kinda like it, actually. It's new."
Bela got the creeps, standing here talking to a girl who was acting all the wrong ways. "I'm gonna leave. Try not to go insane."
"I'm no more insane than you are," she crossed her arms in front of her chest in a pouty gesture.
Bela smiled at the gesture of normalcy before he turned, ready to join the other women. But he realized he had no way of actually leaving. Usually, there was enough calm and peace to allow himself to think about getting back into his body. This time, there enough noise to make him forcibly aware of his spirit self. He turned back to Sayen, but she was walking off and singing a song.
"She cries at night when the day is done.
She fears what night may bring.
She cries for those who have never loved
And for those who never sing."
The last thing Bela saw was Sayen's spirit self looking at him leave, surprise evident on her face.
"How'd it go?" Callia asked.
"I think I might need to go back. There's more chaos in there than even I can handle," said Bela.
"Repressive Memory Syndrome in the extreme," Varda sighed. "I've hooked her up to an EEG machine and the readings are off the charts. I'm afraid her brain might actually explode."
"Cool," Andres said, putting popcorn in his mouth.
Varda shot him a dirty look. "I'm not even kidding."
"How do we save her?" Andres looked at Bela expectantly.
"We lay her so that her head is touching the Tardis. Then we need someone to tell her to release her knowledge so that she can do it even in her sleep," Bela said.
"That'll be me," Varda nodded sagely. "I may not have known her the longest, but I know her the best."
"I know her best," Callia flew up and in Varda's face.
Varda opened her mouth to let loose some nasty retort when Henry stepped between them and held up his hands in a mature sign of peace.
"Can't we just all get along?" he said, sounding quite petulant.
Varda make mousy sounds of joy as she hugged him. Henry looked around, very surprised and awkwardly aroused. He also put his arms around her, patting her back. Varda let go.
"Now that we've established that the psychologist is right," Henry said, "let's place Sayen's body where it needs to be."
The group left a huffy Callia in the room by herself. ****
Sayen found Varda, Bela, and Henry (although he was there mostly for Varda) talking in hushed tones when she woke. "Hello," she said for lack of anything else to say.
"Hello," the rest of them were equally at a loss.
"How are we on ways to get back home?" she removed the flowery blanket above her and immediately regretted it; the cold air hit her hard.
"Not very far, but we did get this letter," Bela took out the envelope from one of the pockets in his jacket. "It's addressed to you."
Sayen took it with an exhausted sigh like she was tired of life.
"How can I help?" Varda asked immediately.
"I don't know why Callia didn't stay to make sure I was okay. I know it's unfair that she has all this responsibility, but a girl wants to know she's loved every once and a while."
"Read the letter. It might help take your mind off things," Varda said, indicating the piece of paper with her chin.
"Dear Sayen,
I hope you don't think I'm just going to let you kill my daughter and not retaliate. I realized what you must have done the moment I stepped into the bathroom this morning. The banishing curse you placed upon me only works because Nature lets it work. Now that you have utterly screwed Nature over, I can eat eggplant whenever I wish. I believe congratulations are in order. You became like me, using Magick illegally. I must also thank you for giving me hope. I am, after all, only human.
-Cailean."
"Jerk," Sayen crumpled the letter and threw it at the wall.
"Why would he emphasize eggplant so much? It seems deliberate. It's very out of character for him," Varda said, lifting her head.
"It probably was. Who do we know who grows eggplants?" Sayen asked. "Or maybe it's their favorite food."
"Doesn't Jaunie have a garden in her backyard? Let's go visit her," Varda said. She walked to what she thought was the front door to the Tardis, opened it, and stepped into a steaming shower. Slim, trim Emily and Varda screamed at the same time. Then a man yawned and opened the door. Yadid Tennant.
Callia smacked her own forehead. She didn't want to be around when the chaos would break loose. ****
"Okay, so we've established that we are not insane stalkers like that one woman, Nancy Something-or-Other. Anyway, Emily, I'm Varda, this is Sayen, that's Bela, he's Andres, she's Lauren, Miss Frown-Face is Callia, Computer Geek is Henry, and Guitar Boy is Ben. Mr. Tennant, keep your eyes off Emily for five seconds and tell me if either of you have gotten a letter in the last two days."
"Are we looking for a specific letter, because you can have all the fan mail I've gotten within the last year and a half, if you want," said Yadid.
"That'd be a waste of my time. I meant a letter from this address," Varda picked it up.
"What if we could go to that address and there's a garden behind it. I know it sounds farfetched, but what if there are eggplants in that garden?" Sayen jumped up.
"I don't know," Bela frowned. "There's a lot of ifs in that sentence, and I don't know if the Tardis can take us-"
"Call her Belinda. The Tardis sounds like some supercomputer that there are 70 of. Belinda's different," Sayen patted the wall affectionately and received a blast of ticklish air. She giggled.
"She likes it," Callia smiled.
Sayen was startled. She had never seen Callia smile like that before. As a matter of fact, she had never seen Callia smile before. No, wait, yes she had.
"Aaron?" Callie opened the window and smiled widely at the boy in front of her. "What are you doing here?"
"Is a boy not allowed to give a girl flowers at any time?"
"Come in!" she opened the window as wide as it could go and a boy climbed in. When they started kissing, Pearlie pulled away from the door.
"What, red roses? You've never given me red ones before," Callie inhaled. "Mm, but I like them a lot, though."
"Calanthe, I have something to say," Aaron had picked this time specifically because she couldn't make a scene. He hated scenes. "I wanted to come clean. I saw Hayley this weekend."
"How far did it go?" Callie's voice was small.
"We went all the way. She's pregnant."
Five seconds later, Aaron had been whipped repeatedly with his own rose bouquet and pushed out the window.
Sayen decided quickly that Callia smiling meant she shouldn't have to be hurt again for the next 24 hours. "I'm surprised you like it," oops, she shouldn't have just blurted it out.
If Callia was hurt, she didn't show it. Instead, she leaned against the pillar and whispered, "Belinda, can you take us to 3724, Arbuckle Drive, San Jose, 95124?"
A series of beeps followed and there were the groaning sounds of a dying cow. When they subsided, Varda opened the door. "Bingo," she cheered under her breath. And after Bela unlocked the gate to the backyard, there was a single ripe eggplant.
"There appears to be a piece of paper under it," Varda pointed. Sayen reached down while Callia and Ben lifted the eggplant to make it easier. Sayen stood up, brushed the remains of the sandy soil away from the paper, unfolded the paper, and began to read it.
"Excuse me," said Yadid. "I'm no gardener and I know all the miracles a green thumb can make, but isn't it rather difficult to grow something in soil this dry?"
"Yadid, you just took a ride on a time machine that isn't supposed to exist. You think soil can't be manipulated?" Sayen's tart tongue actually made Yadid recoil.
Emily patted his shoulder. "I'm sure she's just stressed." Yadid moved in closer to her hand without thinking.
"What the hell is any of this?" Sayen scowled as she passed the letter to Varda.
"I know who have the codes you are going to need to seal the doors to the universes. There is one for each universe you have violated. Mine is Cui. Each person has one code. Get to them before I do. Good luck, you'll need it."
"Cui? Coralie Cui?" Sayen recalled the sassy flute player she had sat next to in middle school "We better get to her." ****
With her wealth of dark hair pulled back from her young face, Coralie looked anything but like she had one of the keys to saving the entire Multiverse, or at least one universe.
"I got a letter yesterday. Do any of you want red tea? I won't put in milk if you're allergic," she said from the kitchen.
"No thanks. I'm a coffee/cocoa person. Just tell me what the letter said, please," Sayen raised a glass bottle of Starbucks to her lips.
"You are the last person who should be having coffee," Varda shook her head. "You're short and hyper when you've had brandy."
Next time on Tesseraction:
"Okay," said Hermione. "I have 12-1-8-13, and we all know what that means."
"No we don't," said Ginny.