Whilst committing the remains to the lava the other day, I had seriously considered throwing myself down with them.
Even before Sluuplalgigya, when I was only a murderer.
But now, gazing into the darkness where my daughter had been sent away in tears, I felt so low that I wanted to go back and jump in.
"What was that?" Timmy cried. "What's all that noise?"
The children, I thought. I have to stay alive, so they can stay alive.
As long as I can keep them safe, my life is worth something. "A larva just tried to get in. I sent her away."
"You scared her away?"
"Yes," I stammered. "I scared them." I suppose I did, in a way.
Kumar burst into the room, activating the lights.
"What the hell is going on in here!"
I shrank from him. "We had an invader. I was protecting the children's lives."
Kumar immediately set about nailing and wielding the vent cover closed, so no one could get in.
Pain scampered up beside me, speaking in a low tone. "That larva smells like you."
I didn't answer.
"Why did you give that larva such a terrible name? Why not Mary or Martha or Naomi?"
I did not answer, softly weeping.
"Sh'kassk'dwuissueblik. Why..."
"She belongs to Hissandra."
"What of forgiving your enemies? Why not give her a beautiful name of the faith to shame her into repentance?"
"Do not speak tome about this matter again!" I growled. Then, as an afterthought, "Please."
Pain fell silent.
ACD 11:
The children fund a copy of Charlie and the Great Glass Elevator, which I read to them after lunch. Vermicious Knids...Humans have strange ideas about alien life.
About halfway through the book, the wind outside the base got rough and bent the camera off its bracket, so we went out to fix it.
The awkward silence between I, Pain and the children steadily grew. I'd caused a rift with my comments the previous night, but nothing I could do to bridge the gap, other than exposing myself as a hypocrite.
Outside, as the wind gusted, noisily blowing misty rain, Pain suddenly blurted, "That larva we met last night. It's yours, isn't it?"
I responded with tears and weeping.
She pressed her shell against mine.
I sobbed harder, hugging her as I rubbed my face into her dome. "Christ's ambassador to all Ss'sik'chtokiwij and I betray my Lord and savior by murdering one of his own children to gratify my own fleshly lust."
"When you gave that sermon about your lost sister, you were referring to yourself, weren't you?"
I can't cry tears like a human, but I wept, just the same, the mist condensing and rolling down my face like I'd shed the moisture. "For the sake of human life, I killed my mother and my sisters, but now I've thrown it all away and become what I hate the most. I've done what I've sworn I'd never do. I've sinned before God and man."
"Sh'kassk'dwuissueblik, you should speak to her. You are her mother. Surely you can bring good out from this evil."
I picked her up, shaking her. "Pain! Promise me you will not follow my wicked example! Resist your flesh and do not allow yourself to get ensnared by its shameful desires!"
Pain whimpered and nodded. "I will try, but I am not strong."
"If you become ensnared, pray fervently to the Lord to deliver you. Do not let my wickedness inspire you to further acts of sin!"
She swallowed. "I promise."
I set her down.
"You should talk to her."
I escorted Kumar to the medical lab, to check on his damaged leg.
The results seemed promising, but it didn't seem safe to remove the cast just yet.
The children found a little metal four wheeled tricycle, a quadricycle, if you will. They wanted to play with it, but Kumar said it would make noise and attract other creatures, so they had to leave it where they found it.
A nearby game room, though, offered several quieter diversions, a little stationary bicycle that allowed you to drive through various digital landscapes, from ancient China to a whimsical mushroom forest setting, stations for brain interface devices like Rosedale Square, and more advanced programs of a similar vein.
Also...a strange sort of movie where you controlled the outcome by speaking to the machine. For example, when the children saw a woman reaching for a scary door that a killer hid behind, the children (quietly) shouted no, and the woman backed down the stairs.
The children occupied themselves with these for awhile.
We couldn't find a digital bike Kumar's size, but he wanted to reverse the atrophy in his leg, so he employed a more primitive exercise bike in the corner.
On the way back to Rebecca's home, Sluuplalgigya stepped in front of me.
Kumar tried to shoot her, but I raised a claw, signaling not to fire.
"Mother, why do you not love me?"
I was at a loss for words. How could I say what I had on my heart without making things worse?
"Share with me your secret tongue."
"No," I answered. Then, seeking to justify myself, I showed her my severed Wooby Worms. "I can't."
If she saw what I did, she would think it was okay to kill humans if you were in lust. I couldn't do that.
"Yours are damaged." Was that a tone of awe?
"Yes. They cannot be used."
Sluuplalgigya came closer to me. "You lie."
Yes, I thought. And I'm getting too much practice at it. I quickly retracted my worms.
"What is this?" Kumar asked.
"This is the sister I spoke of," I said. "The one who killed Robert."
Kumar aimed the gun at her, drawing back the hammer.
Part of me wanted to let him do it, let him kill her, but no. I loved my daughter.
I hated myself, I hated the mistake I made, but that is the only reason why I hated her.
"Please don't kill her! She is only a lost sinner who does not know the way!"
I crept closer to her, speaking in my own tongue. "Daughter, I am sorry..."
I tried to say something more, but faltered.
"Oh, so I'm your daughter now!" she shouted indignantly. "How very odd, because last night you said you had no daughters!"
I wept. "I'm sorry. I killed a human to give you life. What I did was a great evil!"
"You're saying I'm a great evil."
"No..." I tried to be as diplomatic as possible. "I just mean it is wrong for me to kill humans, and I did this."
I took a deep breath. "I wish to give you another name. One which is..." Kinder? More Christian? More loving? I couldn't find an appropriate word. "Better. I shall call you Esther, who was—"
"No. You were right the first time. My name is Sluuplalgigya! I'm just an evil mistake!" My daughter ran away crying.
"What was that about?" Kumar asked.
I fumbled for the words. "A...family quarrel."
[0000]
ACD 12:
No rescue ships.
Some time in the afternoon, Kumar suddenly got the idea to recast his own leg. He had spent the earlier part of the day studying the matter, checking supplies, to the point where he felt confident enough to go ahead and experiment.
Since this would be a long laborious process, and Kumar felt confident he'd be fine on his own, the children and I returned to the simulation room.
I rode the exercise bike a little, tried to read Valis by Philip K Dick, but I lost interest in Dick's muddled theology.
As I started on Tunnels by Roderick Gordon, I heard a scream from the other room.
Thinking it only Kumar discovering his bones had not healed all the way, I didn't hurry until I heard gunshots.
I wish I had come sooner.
Slumped in a chair, with his exposed half casted leg propped up on a stool, the man's body had been torn open down the front, bloody rib cage, liver and kidneys exposed to the elements, blood pooling around his chair legs.
The only scent I could find there, other than the human's: My own.
The fruit of my own flesh.
Not just another Ss'sik'chtokiwij attack. Not a mere Ss'sik'chtokiwij on a hunt, another senseless tragedy in a long string of tragedies. This was a discipline problem.
At long last, I unburdened my guilt upon Rebecca and Timmy.
"Children, I have a confession to make. This man's death was more than partially my fault."
The children shuddered, nervously backing away from me.
"You saw me. You know I did not do this personally. But..." I swallowed. "I killed Robert."
They retreated further, so I crept forward, trying to keep within their hearing. "Please understand that I would never do anything to hurt you, or any human. What I did to Robert, it was an accident."
They just stared at me warily.
"It wasn't out of hunger. It had to do with sex."
Timmy grimaced in disgust. "That thing in the hallway...That was your baby, wasn't it?"
I bowed my head low. "Her name is Esther."
I sat down and wept.
I considered taking the man away immediately for burial, but the children were too shaken up, and I feared my daughter would return to kill someone else if we didn't leave there.
Mind you, I didn't fear my daughter, I feared having to kill her, to stop her from killing someone else.
Better to let her enjoy her victim, and stay out of the way.
I decided to check back the next day for a proper burial.
We returned to the hideout. The children seemed to be more comfortable there, perhaps due to not having so many bad memories about it. Of course, bad memories stay with you, no matter where you go.
I had better sleep, due to finally getting the truth off my chest, but the accusing faces of Robert and Kumar haunted my dreams. Faces that glowered at me from the bodies of dream Ss'sik'chtokiwij passing me in corridors, faces that hatched from dream socmavaj eggs, silently saying "You did this" as the flaps opened.
And then my daughter comes toward me.
I get scared and run, but when I do, I pass a mirror and see Mother in my reflection.
I turn around, see the dead bodies of Timmy and Rebecca, my mouth dripping with gore.
My larva keeps coming closer.
"Go away!" I scream. "Stay away from me!"
"I must understand," Esther says.
Suddenly I feel a tingling in the roof of my mouth, and I stand in a familiar alleyway between brownstone buildings.
Memories come unbidden to my mind, my capture, my conversion, my struggle to save humans from my mother and sisters, and then the very thing I refused to face within myself, that horrible moment when my self control faltered and I took a life.
Through all of it, Esther is there, witnessing every event from the shadows.
When I finally realized it wasn't a dream, it was too late.
"No!" I screamed, pushing away my dream daughter, hoping it would also dislodge the real one.
I shrieked, kicked and pushed, and at long last I awoke, shoving the larva to the floor of the hideout.
When her worms retracted, she only had one word for me: "Hypocrite!"
She left me crying in the gloom.
Beside me, Pain seemed unusually calm and still.
I tapped her gently, reluctant to disturb her peaceful slumber.
"Pain?"
That's when I noticed her head faced the wrong direction.
Pain slept...with the dead.
Despair faced me with its yawning cavernous mouth, beckoning me to join my mother in the burning magma.
I didn't have to guess who killed my little aunt. Only one individual had enough strength, enough motive to do this.
Esther saw Pain as her rival, as the daughter I clung to instead of her.
And just like that, I was alone, left with nothing but the children.
Rebecca and Timmy awoke at the sounds I made, but didn't ask what happened. They just cowered beneath the bed.
I wrapped Pain in a blanket, allowing the two to resume sleeping.
ACD 13:
With the children in tow, I wrapped up Kumar's body, carrying him to Hydroponics. The children needed food anyway.
For once, I actually hoped and prayed that his killer would devour Kumar, to justify this act of cold blooded murder, but the body remained as it had been the day previous, untouched.
It had been done out of spite, nothing more.
I found no sign of Celarent in the greenhouse, and I searched everywhere.
I had to dig the grave myself, unfortunate because I uncovered someone's hirsute hand when I excavated, which wouldn't have happened if we had someone telling us the locations of all the plots.
I carefully dug around the hand, placing Kumar in alongside...whoever it was, filled in the hole. "He was a man of sincere faith. It saddens me to lose such a great, brave companion in the faith, but I am sure he is now with the Lord."
"Is mommy with the Lord?" Rebecca asked.
"I sincerely hope so. But it is the Lord who judges people's hearts, tests their faith, to see if it is genuine. I am not familiar with your mother's faith life."
"I remember when she saved us from the big monster. It was right here in this farm. It stabbed her, but she tripped it and made it fall down the stairs."
Rebecca's memory was a false distortion of me, but no good could be accomplished by trying to correct her. Furthermore, I figured she would be happier this way, relatively speaking.
I wanted to bury Robert too, but didn't dare retrieve him. Not only did his carcass lay a far distance away, my daughter might also lurk there, feeding or who knows what else.
Our next stop: The geothermal plant, to lay poor Pain to rest.
The volcano, although cooling, still appeared live enough to melt a few things.
Pain had never written up a will, the burial instructions anyone's guess. I just knew I didn't want anyone disturbing her remains, so cremation seemed the way to go.
"I have lost a friend and sister in the faith. She was my last hope for a Ss'sik'chtokiwij mission." I dropped her over the edge of the catwalk. "May she go to heaven, even if I do not."
As the dead larva descended between the dynamos to her resting place, I entertained a desperate fantasy.
I turned to face my companions. "Children, would you be saddened if I joined my friend in the lava?"
"Please don't!" Timmy cried. "You're all we've got left!"
"That's how I feel about you," I sobbed. "May I hug you?"
He agreed, so we did. Even Rebecca joined in, making it sort of a group hug.
While this transpired, I noticed a small shadow moving around the machines.
As stated previously, the place made eerie shadows, and I found myself prone to imagining phantoms, or possibly seeing real ones.
Of course, I found the possibility of a non-ghostly watcher twice as chilling. I did not tarry there for long.
"When's Christmas?" Rebecca asked as we returned to the hideout.
Timmy frowned. "I...I'm not sure, but I think it's coming up."
Rebecca's face reflected a desperate hope, wilted by tragic loss. "Ernie, are we going to celebrate?"
"I don't know. What do you want?"
"A family."
I cried.
[0001]
Trying to put our minds off such subjects, I dug up some movies in a neighboring unit.
Certain films that you despise because you see too much of yourself in them. That is what I discovered when I watched Godfather 2. The broken families, the betrayal, the hypocrisy, the tragic deaths...
The children lost patience with the film during that long subtitled segment at the beginning, but I could not withstand much more than that.
It was what my mind associated with what I saw on the screen.
Since the children hadn't bathed that day, I led them to their parents' dwelling to clean up.
A foot from their door, I heard a noise.
I froze, spun around, and caught a sight that made my insides churn and my heart die within me.
In the distance I spotted Hissandra, giving someone's little larva a piggyback ride.
My little larva.
The noise I'd heard: The purr of laughter.
Having fun. The type of harmless, mother-daughter activities I should have been doing, carrying her up walls, bouncing her, showing her around the base...
When they noticed me, the two froze, looking like I had just taken the wind out of their sails.
They muttered to one another, pointing at me.
Hissandra muttered something back, and the two scampered down an adjoining corridor.
Esther had done exactly what I'd told her: She'd found another mother.
She might as well have stabbed me in the chest.
The children bathed, and I did their laundry. Many of the operation instructions to the machine had been worn off, but I'd seen others operating it, and I gleaned the rest from the remaining labels.
As the clothing tumbled and rolled past the glass, I thought about my daughter and wept.
ACD 14:
The refrigerators had been out for some time. We hadn't noticed it for awhile due to the layers of ice and well insulated compartments, but now the machines had caught fire.
Being refrigeration units, the damage hadn't spread that far, but the entire storage room smelled of burnt plastic, the molten inedible compounds adulterating large quantities of cold goods.
Even the backup freezers hadn't been functioning for awhile. We opened the doors to an overpowering smell of rot.
The emergency sprayers had come on, but you don't spray water on an electrical fire. I ended up having to shut off the fuses to the room to stop the backs of appliances from burning. (In case you're wondering, I learned that one from Gretchen Goose).
The power came back on, and the fires died, my synthetic meats turned into a mushy blackened soup at the bottom of the bin. As an experiment, I tried eating some, but only ended up vomiting.
I tried other foods, including some canned meat substitutes, attempting to replace that element of my diet, but only ended up vomiting again. Not sure if the food was bad, or my body simply rejected it the way a grown up human body rejects milk, but...not holding anything down.
We didn't think of storing backup cold goods in the Jorden home. Kumar tended to cook those up right away. It seemed I would be on an involuntary hunger fast. Guess I deserved it anyway.
Rebecca and Timmy would be fine. They had plenty of dry goods stored up, bread, cereal, canned beans and soups, plus stuff from Hydroponics. Only I would have a problem.
And still no sign of a rescue party.
Alexandre Dumas once wrote, "Sleep is a poor man's dinner." I hoped for a feast.
ACD 15:
It got colder, that giant fan thing not great for the children's health. I acquired extra sleeping bags and coats in hopes they would be better insulated. It's sad they so stubbornly insisted on going back to this hole in the wall.
As you may have already seen, I have just finished writing a large piece of my memoirs, all the way up to the death of S'Caizlixadac, my vision of heaven, and escape from DAMBALLAH.
I tried eating chicken noodle soup and some canned chili. I held it down for a little while, but then I had to excuse myself from the children for a few moments due to diarrhea. It definitely looks like I'll be fasting for awhile.
Other Ss'sik'chtokiwij have become larger and stronger, and I progressively weaker. I had to fight several away from the hideout, some I even had to kill.
Not easy, converting Ss'sik'chtokiwij to the faith. As described previously, I've always found the verbal method of evangelism is ineffective, and now, handicapped by my own hypocrisy, and threatened by my daughter, I risked either making more enemies of the cross, or dead friends.
That is, if I could even find Ss'sik'chtokiwij bold enough to risk mind to mind communication.
I wished I had a Christian mentor, an adviser to tell me what to do, but I really didn't have anyone. Well, except for the Ultimate Mentor, but it is so difficult to imagine closeness with a being you cannot see.
Still, few options left.
I folded my claws and prayed, but answers were not forthcoming.
ACD 16:
Fasting and prayer does have a way of focusing one's mind. After devoting my energies for this for the majority of the day, I realized that even my story of spiritual backsliding, my failures as a Christian, could possibly help others understand Jesus' grace and forgiveness for all his creations.
When the Ss'sik'chtokiwij arrived at the hideout later on, I preached to them, admitting my faults and sharing the message of grace.
A tough sell. I asked them to share minds, but even after confessing the sin of murdering Ss'sik'chtokiwij, they feared my severed worms, so fled from me right away.
Oh well, at least I felt secure in the Lord. If grace were possible for me, anything was.
I tried eating pancakes, but my stomach couldn't tolerate them, even without syrup.
The children had beans for dinner for the third night in a row. I had the Alexandre Dumas special.
ACD 17:
No rescue ships.
I only killed one Ss'sik'chtokiwij today. The others I frightened off with my preaching. They still think I'm sick. It felt good to do what was right.
A Ss'sik'chtokiwij approached me, one with cauliflower texturing to her shell. "You're a hypocrite. Sluuplalgigya showed me the contradiction when we connected minds."
"Her name is Esther, which is a name of a beautiful queen. But yes, I am a moral failure. What's amazing is that Jesus still forgives me. You see, he died for sinners, just like you and I..."
The stranger purred in derision. "So you can do whatever you want, and you'll be forgiven."
"No. But if you're sorry for what you did, and want to change, you will be."
My accuser's companions didn't understand the importance, since they both hadn't considered the existence of God, or contemplated getting into heaven that much.
She herself didn't seem that convinced.
"Think what you want, but my heart is at peace."
"It was real Christian, the way you disowned your own daughter."
I swallowed a lump in my throat. "Can you tell her that I still love her?"
The stranger shook her head scornfully and went away.
ACD 19:
How did she even know what a Christian is? I wondered as I lay awake that night.
I thought about it again as I went about the burials.
I've committed to burying one human victim per day. I go during the early part of the day, taking the children along, out of necessity.
Sure, I could have spared them from this constant exposure to violent death, but it was death education, sensitizing them to the dignity and uniqueness of each of these sad victims.
They had families.
Names.
Occupations.
Hobbies.
One man had an origami cat in his pocket, and when I unfolded it, I discovered lipstick and a woman's perfume on it.
Another man carried a picture of a schnauzer.
It's sad that you can find out more from a dead man's pockets than you can from a conversation, but that's how it is.
ACD 21:
A loud earthquake-like noise awakened us. Upon investigation, I discovered that an entire section of ceiling had collapsed upon Devon's stronghold, the upper story units and sections of flooring crushing the units beneath.
Sadly, the section included Food Storage. We'd have to make do with whatever we'd squirreled away, and whatever we could find elsewhere.
Around the debris, I found a single small can of meat. It only took the edge off my hunger, resetting my stomach's bank account from the negative digits to zero, in other words, only counteracting the losses inflicted by accidental regurgitation and other stomach upsets. I could find no more.
Also, several pipes had burst during the night, filling the Jorden home with more than a foot of water.
The building always did groan and creak more than other homes, despite its secure looking position near the concrete rear portion of the base. Now the place made sounds like those decaying submarines in films I'd seen, the visual prompting comparisons to that submerged riverboat scene from Huck Finn.
We fished out what goods we could, but found others ruined.
No sign that our distress message has been received. We probably should have fixed the transmitter to receive return messages, but I didn't know how to do that. Also, the camera got knocked loose again.
Considering how the viewer had been set up in a flooded home, and I knew little about electronics...no idea how to repair the device. Not something simple like fixing a bracket.
I assumed I could survive for at least forty days without food, maybe longer due to my alien physiology, but I really didn't want to test my limits. Still, what else could I do?
[0002]
ACD 23:
The floor in the Jorden dwelling collapsed during the night, sending the whole mess into the sewer.
The structure had been rusting for some time, and the deluge simply exposed weaknesses in the surrounding structure to more oxidation. The ceiling also bowed slightly, due to the added stress.
On the way back from this catastrophe, I suddenly felt the lust again, compounded by hunger, my body distorting the images of friends into mere pieces of egg bearing meat.
I immediately dropped down on all fours, folding my claws in prayer.
I prayed so long that the children tapped my exoskeleton and asked me questions.
"Leave me!" I shrieked. "I love you both, which is why you must leave if you value your lives! I'm not feeling myself."
They didn't move.
"Go! You will not be more victims of my selfishness!"
The two flinched, but only moved a step back.
"You're supposed to protect us," Timmy said.
"I am. From me! Now go! Return to the hideout! I need to...regain my self control!"
Timmy and his sister quickly fled from me, darting into the maintenance tunnels.
"Help me, Lord!" I prayed. "Help me please! Sin is crouching at my door, eager to control me! Deliver me from this temptation!"
I must have prayed for an hour.
I returned to the hideout feeling weak and shaky, but in my right mind.
The children shrank from me when I entered, but I didn't care, I just felt glad to see that they made it there on their own, alive.
"Are you feeling better?" Rebecca asked.
Her brother frowned. "When does your time of the month end?"
I just regarded the two sadly, enfolding them both in a hug. "I am facing great temptation. So I am going to be praying a lot. Please understand that I am not angry with you when I send you away, I just..."
"You just don't want to kill us like you killed Robert," Timmy finished.
I sighed. "Yes. I am sorry, but that is exactly the truth."
"Then don't stop praying. Please don't. I'll build you a little church if you need one, just...keep being a good alien. We need you."
I smiled, chuckling a little at the idea of his proposed construction project. "Thank you. I don't need a building, but I do ask that you not be scared if I disappear. Just guard yourself carefully. I'll always be nearby."
That night, as the children slept, the lust seized me. I crawled outside the hideout to pray.
The lights flickered and went out. Typical of this poorly maintained facility.
The prayer and meditation seemed to be working. My body appeared to reabsorb the eggs filling my egg sac.
I must have fallen asleep at some point, for the lights flickered back on, and I found myself momentarily disoriented.
When my visual receptors focused, the first thing I saw: Hissandra depositing a small human body before me.
Timmy. He must have slipped out during my prayer session to go to the bathroom, and Hissandra, more than likely, had covered his mouth before he could scream.
As I gazed at those small lifeless limbs, emotions roiled within me.
Hatred.
The guilt from yet another failure.
Sadness.
Depression.
And worse of all, bitter unbelief in God.
I clenched my fists so tightly that I thought my claws would burst through my palms and come out the other side. "What is this!"
I knew full well, but I refused to accept it.
Hissandra pushed the boy's body up to me. "Eat, sister. You are weak and malnourished."
"Do you think this is what I want!" I yelled. "To feed on my closest dearest friend?"
She just stared like that was exactly what she thought.
"Have you not learned anything? You share minds with me, presumably with my daughter as well, and you still don't know the lengths I'll go to in order to save a single human life? That I'd rather starve than kill one for food? What of all the times we've fought each other, all for the sake of these children? I killed Kiarsshkoy! Sydjea! Even mother! And you bring me a dead child like that is something I want to eat!"
"You are not well, sister. This food will nourish you, bring you back to your senses."
"No! This is murder! You just killed the last of my two remaining friends!"
Hissandra flinched a little, opening her mouth to argue.
"Get out of my sight! And do not condescend to bring me such so-called `food' again!"
Looking more annoyed than frightened, Hissandra departed from me.
Esther, who had been hiding within Timmy's body this whole time, abruptly popped out of the boy's rib cage, giving me this final parting comment: "Eat up, mother. You need your strength."
Was that genuine concern for my well being? A sob rose in my throat.
She left me to rejoin her surrogate mother.
I cried as I held the dead child, brushing his hair, straightening his tattered clothes.
I laid Timmy on the floor, hugging him as I grieved, face pressed against his neck.
I didn't realize how bad this made me look until Rebecca let out a terrified scream, running away from me as fast as her legs could carry her.
When I at last caught up with her, I found her sprawled on the carpeting of a nearby corridor, convulsing and foaming at the mouth.