Rising Shards

I heard waves crashing near me and felt water hitting my ankles. I rolled onto my back and slowly opened my eyes. Seagulls were flying above me. I sat up. I was on a beach, but it wasn’t like the one outside the school. I looked out at the ocean, watching the waves reach out to the sand like a paint brush on a tropical paradise. It wasn’t the deep blood red of whatever the terrifying wave was that crashed down onto us to bring us here.

It hit me as I came to how terrifying it was to travel through the void that way. And then after that realization, it hit me even harder how much more terrifying it was to hear Jeans’ voice again.

I seemed to be alone. My backpack was near me, and after a frantic search, everything in it seemed undamaged, and not at all drenched from the blood wave. My bloodsaber Minty wasn’t anywhere nearby, which was concerning.

Despite the weight of all that, I couldn’t just sit there. I got up and looked around. The trees near me were too thick to see far through, so I couldn’t tell if there were any buildings or anything. In the distant horizon of the vast ocean on the other side, I could see strange outlines that looked like wreckage. It was too far away to see clearly, but some of them had almost the shape of giant bodies.

“Definitely the void,” I said. “No place back home is as weird as whatever’s out there.”

“Definitely the what?” Someone said behind me. I screamed and fell over, but after a few seconds of cowering I wasn’t murdered, so it was safe to turn around.

Standing at a bit taller than my waist height was a blue armored being with glowing pale green eyes.

“Wait. You’re a…?” I blurted out. “What are you?”

“What a strange question,” the being said. “I could ask the same to you, but I’ve seen a few of your kind before.”

“Oh!” I said. “One second.”

I got out my four-page Fang Moon Web trip worksheet, the big assignment. There was a question about people living in the new void place we were going to, so I had the sudden thought to take some notes down.

“A funky little…robot dude…” I said, squinting at the being.

“A what little what what?” She asked.

“Sorry, I’m doing an assignment and I have to note my surroundings. There’s a part here about inhabitants in the place I’m going to, and…yeah.”

I sighed, remembering getting reprimanded in a language class when I had to give a speech and was told not to end a speech with “And…yeah,” which I promptly did on accident immediately after. The armored being thought my answer over.

“I am an Exumi.” She said. “My name is Kiki, thank you for asking.”

“An Exumi…is that…like a robot? A little robot dude?” I asked.

“It’s like what mostly everyone is around here,” Kiki said, holding her arm out. She flipped open a section of her forearm’s metal plate. Inside was a mix of gears and what looked like muscle tissue. I restrained myself from saying “ew,” but the thought did cross my mind. “Exumi are a mix of organic and mechanic. So then, what are you, stranger? All organic and no armor?”

“I’m a Cani,” I said. “I think I’m still like a human, but I’m different.”

“A human…so some kind of funky big organic weirdo?”

“Well, maybe not funky,” I said. “Maybe more…jazzy?”

“You’re lucky I know some of your kind,” Kiki said. “As I stated before. Otherwise, I’d chastise you on your descriptive skills.”

“S-sorry,” I said. “And I’m Zeta. Oh!”

I remembered my rule and got up and held my hand out for Kiki to shake. She looked confused at the gesture.

“Are you…offering me air?” Kiki asked.

“No, it’s…has no one shaken your hand before?” I asked.

Kiki’s eyes narrowed. “Hold on…”

“What? What is it?” I asked, immediately sensing danger.

“I think a Terina squad is close,” Kiki said. “I don’t want to leave you alone, but it’d be best if we move separately.”

“R-right,” I said. “Wait, what do you mean a Terina squad? What’s a Terina squad?”

I heard clanking in the trees behind them that grew louder each second. A platoon of black and orange armored robots stepped out. There were two kinds among them. One walked on four legs and looked bug-like. That kind had cannons on their back and glowing red eyes. The other had translucent orange masks over their glossy black armor. They walked on two legs and carried blaster rifles, which they pointed at us. Worse yet, they all seemed to be leaking a familiar ooze—the oily substance I’d learned in class was called Elka, and was used by evil beings in the void.

“Uhhh,” I said. “W-where’s my…bloodsaber…”

I looked around for anything I could use to defend myself. Unless I could throw a lot of sand quickly, I was out of luck. Kiki didn’t seem to have any weapons either.

“Run, stranger!” Kiki said as the robots began to fire on us. A burning blast landed close to me, forcing me to run as I saw lava sizzle on the sand. As a volley of shots fired from the robot soldiers, we darted along the beachline as the robots continued to fire at them. A small opening let us run into the trees. While I’d faced some dangers in the void, I’d faced nothing like dodging lava blasts, explosions, trees, and rocks. I sprinted until we reached a large crevice. Even though she said she was going to run off on her own, Kiki had stuck with me. Either that or I’d completely blown her plan by following her. I stupidly made the choice to look down the crevice, instantly feeling woozy. There was sparkling water below me, but also jagged rocks. It looked far enough down that I knew landing on the rocks would probably kill me, and also far enough that I wasn’t sure landing on the water would do the same.

Kiki dove off into the sea without hesitation, landing with a big splash. I whirled to the sound of clanking again, as the troopers had caught up with me. They stopped firing for a moment, with all their blasters and cannons aimed at me.

“Maybe we can…talk this out?” I said.

They didn’t react to that.

I didn’t want to jump.

I definitely totally couldn’t jump off this thing. I could maybe use my weather powers on them, but I didn’t know if it’d be of any use. I knew I’d have to do something and would only have a second or two before they started shooting again.

Somehow, instinct took over as soon as the robots fired again, and I found myself soaring down towards the water, gracefully diving in. Alternatively, I was screaming and crying and flailing my arms as I tumbled off the ledge, luckily swerving away from rocks but already feeling my face drenched with tears and snot as I sobbed and plummeted.