Beyond the southern Chommo border and past the murky swamps of Deep Darkness, a tribe of strange creatures called the Tenda made their homes in the upper caves of Lumine Hall.
An experienced traveller would probably take days, if not weeks, crossing the vast expanses of desert, seas and finally largely untraversed bog to finally reach one of many caves on the rocky outcrop that might have housed the Tenda. Assuming you survived the journey.
In the end, even seeing the Tenda might have been the biggest gamble of all. Archaeologists and historians pointed to unmistakable evidence of civilisation in the caves, but not a single explorer had ever seen neither hide nor hair of a Tenda beyond a few murky sketches and ancient photographs of cave paintings.
Considering their isolation, thinking the Tenda were an underdeveloped species would not have been an unfair assumption. The untrained eye would not recognise the architectural and logistical wonder of sculpting enormous living quarters without the cave collapsing, or their diet of truffles from the swamp, the amount of which they were able to amass in such a short amount of time being especially impressive. Even the most inexperienced and untrained Tenda outpace the findings of the sharpest human by a factor of five.
If you ventured deep enough into Tenda Village, you came out the other end to a small plateau atop a cliff. The view was unimpressive, to say the least. There was the occasional break in dark clouds that gave way to spotty patches of pale sunshine, but the sea remained a shade of stormy gray no matter the weather, and the musty rank of Deep Darkness wafted even up to the cliffside. The Tenda were nothing if not resourceful, however, and it didn't take long for them to spot the strange mix of goods that were constantly washing up onto the measly bay just a few hundred feet below the clifftop.
The Tenda didn't quite understand what they were hauling (they were more focussed on sorting and categorizing rather than actually looking) but they knew it could only come from somewhere across the sea; perhaps from Scaraba or even Summers. Most of it was harmless – old TV sets, mouldy furniture, bits and pieces of corrugated metal, the occasional shirt or broken toy – and even more of it was beyond use. Much of the intrigue came from the variety of stuff, and it compelled the Tenda to spend hours organising and taking stock, building piles and heaps that eventually took shape of a junkyard at the edge of the village. A bizarre guardian of sorts.
Regardless, the thought of closely examining the contents of the junkyard had never crossed the minds of the Tenda, at least until yet another group of explorers stumbled upon the caves. The group had followed one of the infant Tenda from the highlands of Deep Darkness straight into the heart of the Village. Many Tenda practically dove into their homes out of crippling anxiety, but a few of the more outgoing types joined the company of the explorers, and found them rather pleasant, if not to chat to, then at least to stand semi-close to. The explorers accepted the hospitality of the Tenda gratefully, and after a small grace period in which they acquainted themselves with their surroundings, found the junkyard and spent the good chunk of an afternoon messing about in it. The Tenda weren't sure what to think of the group making a playground out of what was essentially a landfill, but they knew better than to poke around in situations that had the chance of creating any conversation, uncomfortable or not.
The people in the group seemed to recognise most of the stuff in there. Every few minutes, one of them would let out a little laugh or shriek of delight and drag the others over to the trinket they had found among the piles of refuse, occasionally arguing over who got to keep what or the value of the thing they had just discovered. It was an idle, almost homely kind of chatter, and the Tenda cosied considerably to the group over the course of that afternoon as they listened in.
The newcomers each came away from the junkyard with no more than maybe a backpack's worth of items. It was likely they were experienced travellers who knew better than to pack too heavy. When the group fell asleep that night, the ever-meticulous Tenda crept over to the junkyard and began to take inventory of the souvenirs taken. Slowly, as they accounted for the missing stock, an image of each explorer came to light.
Bunches of old cogs, axels, screws and gears were missing. Even the accordion that must have been at least fifty years old had been deconstructed for parts.
Most of the apparel was picked apart. A select few basketball jerseys and baseball caps were missing. A waterlogged Les Paul was moved from one end of the yard to the other but was ultimately left leaning near the exit. Definitely too bulky to travel with.
Some of the more ornamental goods – statuettes, decorations, and rugs – were shuffled around, but were all neatly replaced in their original positions. The burlap cache of books, all written in a language none of the Tenda could understand, had been opened, with one or two volumes removed.
Some of the stuffed animals had been disturbed, but not taken. Some dresses were checked over. Bits and pieces of jewellery had been examined.
The item that had puzzled them the most, however, was missing. It was a small and misshapen trinket, maybe only two or three inches long, covered mostly in a kind of soft, gray (well, it had probably been gray at first) material; the thing had been through its fair share of water damage. Tufts of the material were missing, revealing a thin wooden rod that probably served as a base. The wooden rod was helmed by a small chain, which itself was adorned with an oval of iron.
If you looked closely at that oval, past the rust and scratches, it was just barely possible to make out the shape of a rabbit's head engraved on the surface of the metal.
Paula looped a finger around the big zipper on her bag as she tried to get comfortable.
She supposed part of the problem was due to the bag still in her lap. There was a semi-conscious part of her brain trying to reason with her (put it down, stretch out your legs a bit) but the window on the other end of the room demanded too much attention.
She'd lost count of how many times her eyes darted to the rectangle of black. Every time her eyes flickered over, no matter how many times she willed them not to, she half expected the darkness to abate, uncovering the mild late summer weather that currently hung over Twoson, less than twenty miles from Ness's house.
But each time she looked, the abyss looked back. So inky black it was, it looked like a spot some higher power just forgot to fill in with appropriate portions of reality, so foreign and invasive it threatened to shatter the glass and slither into the room, splattering the eggshell wallpaper, scratching its way across the carpet, snatching her up by the ankles which normally would have made her scream had she not been so frozen with fright not that the creature about to swallow her whole even knew anything of fright as it sprung into ghastly being and spread its jaws licking its imaginary lips as if starved for a meal for a long time, so very very long -
The doorknob rattled, wrenching Paula from her stupor. She had just enough time to pat down the folds of her dress (she tried to ignore the slick streaks of sweat she left upon the fabric) before Ness walked in.
Not bothering to shoot her a glance, he trudged to the beanbag chair on the opposite end of the room and sank into it with a sigh.
Paula fidgeted, wracking her brain to come up with something, anything, to bring a little levity to the situation. Her eyes scanned, and for the first time, took in the decor of Ness's room.
If the decorations were a point of comparison, the banality of Ness's wardrobe (stripes every day? seriously?) was a total mismatch to his actual personality. It was a modest cube, and the things he filled it with made it feel even more cramped, somehow. On Paula's left was a wall covered from floor to ceiling in an explosion of posters plastered in many a haphazard angle, overlapping and crossing so no single poster was ever displayed in full. She spotted fractions of punk-rock bands and portraits of the odd star shortstop or basketball player. Paula would have liked to look at the wall for much longer, but her eyes grew heavy from exhaustion. A lamp illuminated an equally crowded desk positioned against the wall of the room directly opposite the bed, facing the window (don't look, don't look), with more than a few yo-yos and comic books spilling over the sides. On the right, next to where Ness was slumped, a shoddy guitar stand cradled a crimson electric guitar, which stood in front of another spray of posters and charts – each displaying smatters of pentatonic scales and chord shapes. Sheet music was plastered in a careless puddle all around the beanbag chair, and part of Paula was surprised that even in such trying times, Ness put in the effort of avoiding the piles of paper as if afraid of disturbing the precarious order they lay in.
Most of this Paula understood. But the small, ornate box on Ness's nightstand raised the most questions of all. It was a delicate looking thing, no more than six inches in length and four inches in both height and width. It was covered in navy velvet with a light gold locking clasp at its centre. In a room smothered with posters, toys and sheets of paper, the thing looked almost ethereal.
"What do you keep in the – "
"Poo's really going through it," Ness cut in, his eyes closed. "I think he's stopped diamondizing, but there's still a great big hunk of crystal not coming out of his arm."
Paula bit her lip. "Is it still bad outside?"
"Oh, no doubt. There are probably even more monsters outside now than when we came in."
"Are your mom and sister alright?"
Ness tilted his head upright and opened his eyes. His stare was blank. Unreadable.
"They were inside when it happened, thank God," he said, unblinking, "King too."
Not a definite yes, Paula thought. Then she felt guilty for even asking the question, because they both knew her parents were safe and sound a mere twenty minute trip away, and she supposed she didn't even blame him for wishing, even a little bit, that the meteor had landed in Twoson, and not Onett.
"Where's Jeff?" Paula asked. She didn't care much for the answer to this question. Anything to keep from the honey-thick silence from settling.
Ness shrugged. "After Poo fell asleep, I saw him ask my mom if he use the den. He's either sleeping or he's messing around with his tools."
Paula saw the offer and rose to the occasion. "'More power?'" she asked.
"'You're darn right more power!'" Ness fired back, offering a half-smile and a much better Tim "The Tool Man" Taylor impression compared to hers.
The pair chuckled, revelling in the joke that was, frankly, very bad. Jeff had laughed maybe the first three times they had thrown the reference in his face, but he didn't even look up when they cracked it in front of him now. Poo was even worse: he had to ask what they were even talking about, which killed the joke even more. Still, when it was just the two of them, it was fair game, even if Jeff didn't even use power tools or any sort of force when he mucked around with his gadgets.
In any case, the aftermath of the joke left the air in the room noticeably lighter, and Paula felt daring enough to ask the question again.
"That box on your nightstand," she said, pointing at it, "What is it for?"
Ness's eyes flickered toward it, and his cheeks reddened. He eased himself out of the beanbag chair and crossed the room, rocking the tiny box against his stomach after scooping it up in his hands.
It was rare for Ness to apply that level of care to any of his personal possessions. On more than one occasion, Paula had seen Ness swing his bat around just for the hell of it, even when there was nothing nearby for them to fight. The visor of his cap was fraying, bits of cotton clinging on for dear life. His backpack had three broken zippers, and the fabric at the bottom was so worn it was starting to take on a shade of dark brown compared to the murky tan of the rest of the bag.
Paula blinked as she felt herself flush, too. It wasn't supposed to be such a private question. She already had a change of topic ready when Ness spoke, his head bent downward, refusing to meet her gaze.
"Promise you won't laugh?" he murmured, still clutching the box as he sat next to her on the bed.
"Promise."
He fiddled with the clasp for a moment, then lifted the lid and placed the box in the space between them. Inside, snuggled in a bed of black velvet, was a thin rectangle of gold, capped with a trapezoid looped through with a white knotted thread. It looked like it was meant to be a keychain, but Paula was having trouble seeing the dainty looking string hook onto any keyring. The rectangle was engraved with two delicate symbols beyond her comprehension.
"Wow," Paula said.
"Do you wanna hold it?"
With utmost care, Ness tipped the box at an angle, and the piece fell out of the box and into the palm of her outstretched hand.
The thing was even lighter than it looked, but it was heavy enough for Paula to deduce it was probably made of real gold. She studied the inscription, but still couldn't make any sense of it.
"It's beautiful," she said, smiling, "What is it?"
Ness frowned in concentration. "I don't remember exactly what it's called. Some sort of talisman – like a good luck charm."
"What does it say?"
"My name. In Japanese, I think."
His voice quavered, but at least he was willing to look at her now.
Paula returned it to Ness.
"Where did you get it?"
"My dad got it for me," Ness said, putting the charm back in the box and locking the clasp, "I think he got it on a business trip or something."
"Does your dad get you something on every business trip?"
"I don't know. He's home maybe three or four times a month, so who knows how many trips he takes in that time."
There was a bitter undertone to his voice now; they were getting into dicey territory again. Just as Paula thought his brow would furrow and he would utter some thinly veiled frustration about his dad, Ness's voice shrank.
"I thought about bringing it with me."
Paula blinked. "On this whole trip thing?"
"Yeah. I thought it might help…"
For a split second, Ness's eyes took on a dreamy look, but he shook his head.
"Sorry, it's stupid, I know."
"No, I don't think it is," Paula replied, "There's nothing wrong with superstition."
"I don't know if that's what it is." Ness kicked his legs up and crossed them on top of the sheets, mirroring her.
"I mean, yeah, I guess, on some level. But I don't know. I figured I'd be alone for a long time after I went out on my own. I didn't want to bring photos of my mom or Tracy or whatever, so you know…it didn't seem like such a bad idea to bring this thing.
"He gave each of us one. Each one had our names on it. He told us about all the good things it was supposed to bring us – money, grades, love, safety, all that. I don't know if I really believed in any of it up until I realized I'd have to go on my own. Then it didn't seem like such a bad idea to have something to hold onto."
Ness blinked furiously, but Paula could still see the tears pooling in his eyes. She took a tissue out of the small zipper in her bag she always kept them in, and he accepted it without a word.
As he wiped his nose, she found herself fiddling again with the collection of keychains she stuck to the primary zipper of her pack. Her fingers weaved between the thick jungle of miniature gemstones, ornate seashells and plastic carvings of Ren and Stimpy before finding one of her more recent acquisitions, the charm she had been poking at since the first time she had stared at the window across the room…
"I got something like that," she said, "But you also have to promise not to laugh. Okay?"
Ness sniffled. "Sure."
Paula unhooked the charm from the forest of keychains and held it out in her palm.
Ness smiled. "What is it supposed to be? I feel like I've seen something like this but with all of its hair still attached…"
"Alright, you can laugh," Paula said, feeling warm spots return to her cheeks. "It's a rabbit's foot. Or what's left of it, anyway."
Ness held it by the chain. "I kinda see it. They sell these at those tourist-y type places on the side of highways, right?"
"Yeah."
"Looks like you found this one on the highway."
"Idiot."
She shoved him without any real force, and he laughed.
"I got this from the dump by Tenda Village."
"Really?" Ness handed it back to her. "You didn't show it to us."
"Yeah, 'cause I was afraid you guys would laugh at me!"
"Well, I just showed you my pretty, gold, good luck charm, so we're square on that one."
She laughed and shoved him again, and they shared a comfortable sort of silence.
"Do you really believe in that stuff?" Ness asked after a beat, his expression solemn.
"What, like totems and charms? That kind of thing?"
"Luck in general."
Ness bent his head down again. He was picking at his shoelaces in an idle sort of way, but Paula wasn't fooled. Ness had dozens of similar tells, when he asked a question trying to play it off cool but also not really, among which included rubbing the nape of his neck, adjusting the length of his sleeves and messing with the band on his wristwatch. If she called him out on it, he'd get all defeated and force her to drop the subject, leaving everyone feeling a little strung along. It was even a little annoying sometimes.
This wasn't one of those times. Paula chose her words carefully.
"I guess I do, and I don't."
Ness cocked his head in confusion.
"I think everything has power," she elaborated, "Like when you try to use your PSI, you try and summon energy from every part of your brain, right?
"That's also how I feel whenever I pray. It's hard to explain. I try and suck up all that energy I have and ball it up in one place in my mind. Like a sponge sucking up water.
"I think luck is kind of the same way. Saying it doesn't exist feels like a really big stretch but saying it's the only thing that matters is just stupid."
"Like how Jeff shoots his bottle rockets."
Paula laughed. "Yeah, right? He does all his prep, and he calculates whatever he needs to calculate, but there's at least a part of it that just comes to pure dumb luck, right? He even said it himself."
"Alright," Ness said, "So you do believe in luck. What do you mean when you say you also don't?"
He had her stuck on this one, for at least a bit. She leaned back against the wall next to the bed, her eyes glued to the ceiling as she tried to unjumble the strong (albeit very scrambled) thoughts swirling in her brain.
Then Paula looked to her side and saw Ness mirroring her posture. They stared at each other, and the ideas bubbled carefully to the surface.
"I feel like people always talk about luck like it just comes from nowhere, fully formed. Like, they didn't really choose for things to happen that way, but they just did, and there was nothing they could have done about it.
"That doesn't really sound right to me. If so many good things happen to us without us even planning them, why even bother putting in the effort to make good things happen by ourselves? And if bad things happen, why bother trying to stop them from happening again, if it all comes down to chance?
"I don't know, part of what I'm saying just sounds crazy. I don't blame you if you don't believe me. I think we make our own luck."
It looked like Ness was still trying to absorb what she was trying to say. To his credit, Paula supposed she was trying to do the same. She had only an inkling of an idea of where exactly this was all coming from, but it sounded like she was about on the right track. The more she looked at him, the more the pieces seemed to fall into place.
"If we do enough good in the world," she said, "And if we're around the right kind of people, there's probably something or someone out there noticing.
"Whoever, or whatever it is, it knows. It knows we're doing something good, with good people. And then it sends us something equally good. Something…"
It was a bit of a lame finish, but it felt good to get off her chest. Ness was frowning, tracing a line with his index finger along a section of his neck.
Then the origin of her spiel was suddenly very clear to Paula, and she wasn't in Ness's room anymore.
The four of them were deep underground, where the walls were as dark as the sky visible through the window across. The four of them were beaten, bruised and battered to all hell, struggling just to stand up and face the Starman Deluxe.
Paula was nearly face down on the hard metal ground of Stonehenge Base. Jeff was maybe fifty feet away from her, propped up against a wall, his eyes barely open. Poo was in an even worse state, passed out cold at the base of the generator. Only Ness was still half-standing, kneeling in front of Paula and using his bat as a makeshift cane.
The Starman readied its two limbs, and between them, a ball of glowing light metastasised. Goosebumps erupted up and down Paula's arms. A violent buzzing filled her ears.
The cascade of psychic energy was imminent – maybe half a minute away. And the two of them would shoulder the brunt of the attack.
Light swallowed the room, coursing along the floor and walls, wrapping around them like a weighted blanket. Ness glanced back at Paula. She expected only fear on his face, but the ghost of a smile was etched on his lips.
Under the cloud of her injuries, it took Paula longer than it might have under normal circumstances, but she got the message soon enough. Her stomach churned, and she grabbed at the bat, hoping in vain she had the strength to knock it aside and send it flying, with him in tow, away from the forthcoming blast -
But Ness's grip was iron clad. He balled up his fists in concentration. Still looking at her, he licked his lips, wetting the blood that was caking them ever-so-slightly, and shouted:
"Hope this works!"
Paula wanted to shout back at him, but the last inch of her strength escaped her. She closed her eyes and braced for the torrent of pain…that didn't come. The vision under her shut eyelids grew red-hot for a split second. There was a great pinging sound that threatened to split her eardrums in half, followed by a crash, then silence as the light and heat were both expunged as quickly as they had arrived.
It took a few moments for her eyes to adjust after she opened them. The chamber had regressed to darkness. Ness was still kneeling in front of her, but the Starman that had been facing them just moments ago was gone, replaced by a smoking pile of molten steel. The acrid smell she associated with the industrial complexes of Fourside filled her nostrils.
"How did you –?"
Ness grinned, reaching in his bag for his thermos. He took a long swig, splashed some on his face, then handed it to Paula.
"Divine intervention, maybe?"
"Really?" Paula asked, stupid from fatigue but taking the flask all the same.
"No." Ness laughed. "I made a shield and it bounced back at him. He probably wasn't expecting it."
"You should've just done that from the start…"
"If I knew I could've done it, I would've. It was a last resort on my part. Lucky guess in the end."
Lucky guess…
Lingering on that phrase brought Paula back to the present.
They didn't win because they were stronger than the Starman Deluxe down there. The thing's strength, PSI and intelligence far outclassed theirs. Every move they made, every attack they co-ordinated – the Deluxe had it down pat seconds in advance, swatting them aside like flies and striking just the right parts of their bodies to capitalise on their existing injuries. Poo's sword couldn't break through the armor of the Deluxe; nor could any of Jeff's explosives.
Ness was righter than he could ever have known. It was luck that had saved them. But there was no way it was luck that came from nowhere. She had the feeling he had earned it, like any other reward after enough hard work. By staring his fate dead in the eye, and daring it to change, and in doing so forcing it to its knees. By staying by her side when he could have easily left her to bear the attack alone.
"Good people…" Ness's voice trailed off. "Any good people in mind?"
He was looking at her too thoughtfully. But she thought too – of all the things she still had left to say but couldn't quite articulate when they still had time to have conversations like this.
If she had more time, she might've gotten those things out too, had the door not crashed open and scared them both half to death.
Poo backed up and leaned against the door frame furthest from them. There was a slight catch in his gait, and a spot of grisly orange lustre just below the crook of his arm, glinting from the glow of the ceiling light. But it didn't look too bad. In fact, the more Paula looked at it, the smaller it seemed to get.
"Feeling alright?" Ness asked, leaning away from her.
Poo looked grim. "Yeah, much better."
A strained silence clung to the end of the sentence. They all knew what was coming next, but did any of them really want to say it?
A sliver of Paula wanted to stay in the moment, but she knew better. It had passed. Spending time in Ness's room was an oddity; a rare break. Lucky, you would call it.
Then again, wasn't 'running out of luck' was just one of those things people said?
"We should get going," she said, "The sooner we leave and get the thing, the sooner we can be done with it all."
Poo nodded. "I'll get Jeff."
He left the room without another word. Ness rose from the bed and started toward the door of his bedroom. Just before he passed through the frame, he looked back at Paula, who was still sitting stationary on the edge of the bed.
"Coming?"
Paula looked at him, then one more time at the window. The rectangle was as impenetrable of a black as ever. Ness being in the room helped, but the sight of it still scared her a little.
But the rational part of her knew that the sky was still somewhere beyond that deadly curtain. The hard part was pulling it aside.
Anyway, it wasn't like she had to go about it alone.
Paula shouldered the straps of her bag.
"Yeah."