A row of levitating coffins wound its way down into the folds of ancient, graffiti-steeped buildings. Accompanied by holographic memorabilia, the procession rivalled the neon glare sizzling on the horizon past the smog.

Joaquim kept hopping in a crowd, catching glimpses of the incoming caskets. His smaller stature, even for one assumed to belong to a teenage girl, made it hard to keep a good view. He lost his brother along the way, but at least he found a static opening to observe the coffins. Joaquim was thankful for the hologram mask every Alkrezian girl had to wear as it hid his tears.

A group of teenaged boys obstructed Joaquim's view once again, murmuring condolences while pouring vodka onto the concrete. Joaquim jumped to dodge a splash, holding onto his broken helmet under his baggy headdress. He also brushed against a malnourished beagle.

"Foo," the beagle whined.

Joaquim could have sworn the beagle made a faint d-sound at the end of her whine. It was difficult to deduce whether she was a talking animal or not, but if she could speak, it was best to pretend to be an ordinary stray.

"I am sorry. I ate what I had on me already," Joaquim said.

The beagle dropped her façade, her unfocused glances changing to human-like glances. Or arak-like.

After a gulp and a clumsy spin, Joaquim returned his attention to the caskets. He shed another tear, but the tears were not for the dead. He did not know any of them. The tears of joy were for the man he had been searching for since he started his pilgrimage.

Behind the last casket, a glint of light followed. While the parade of coffins levitated closer to the crowd and the cemetery, Joaquim kept squinting until he could distinguish the glowing white robe and the flying man wearing it.

Prophet Ameen.

Black smog submerged the sky around the last flare of the resting neon circle, but Prophet Ameen's skin gleamed as if the sky was bare. It was a delicate brown, as delicate as sand on a freshly terraformed beach. With his youthful face, totemic jaw, and imposing presence, his appearance placed him anywhere between his early twenties and early hundreds.

Once the caskets and Prophet Ameen arrived above the crowd, Joaquim peered into the messiah's brown eyes. They were so alluring that they reminded Joaquim of Jupiter's atmosphere, a planet he dreamed all his life to see up close. The irises had the illusion of stretching for miles past the prophet's skull instead of stopping at his eye sockets.

"Naomi! Here you are," Gabe said.

Joaquim had already noticed his brother. Gabe was tall and wore a red fitted hat with a matching biker jacket. His favorite color was red, which also meant that all of Joaquim's dresses would be made from the red fabric Gabe no longer used.

In the right angle Gabe looked like he could pose for the Akira movie poster. Even though each day got harder in No Man's Land, Gabe would find even more resolve to match the apathetic wastelands. Gabe also had no issues with stealing a flying bike - especially if it was red - as it could fly as high as his ambitions. If that did not differentiate him enough, his backpack carried a jar of fireflies that made his backpack glow from dusk onwards.

It irritated Joaquim when white humans and araks could not figure out that he was related to Gabe. It was the only time they did not consider two black people to be related for some wild reason. Their faces gave it away. Sure, Gabriel was light skin while Joaquim was far from it, but they both had the exact same puffy cheeks and vivid eyes.

"He's here. Prophet Ameen is here," Joaquim said.

"Yea, I see him. I wouldn't want to meet him without having my sister by my side," Gabriel said, resting his hand on Joaquim's shoulder.

The speakers in one of the parked magnetic cars got louder, and the crowd surrounding it cheered as a glitch R&B song came on. Joaquim did not recognize the song as listening to secular music was a sin, but he liked the celebration. Celebrating the lives of the fallen rather than giving in to despair was necessary in No Man's Land. Even having a body make it to a funeral was a cause for a celebration. Mortician bots were states apart, and most bodies did not make it to the cemeteries the bots resided in.

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The coffins descended past derelict buildings, and arrived at the vicinity of the cemetery gates. Apartment complexes, a grocery store, and shops had severed walls with bullet holes, while the pristine cemetery would blend in fine if it were sent back to the 21st century. Even in desperate times like this, solidarity was still possible.

"Lil' Morti, are you awake?" Prophet Ameen asked.

Prophet Ameen was talking to a robot sitting atop the cemetery gate, and the messiah floated higher to Lil Morti's level. He resembled a copper child with its stature and skinny limbs. His large googly eyes sparked and he nodded. He opened his scalp and threw in his solar-paneled hat, and he pushed down the tiny windmills on his shoulders into his body. He skated down the steel fence, causing the scalpels, forceps, clamps, and saws to rustle in his torso. A make-up kit fell out of the broken clear lid on his torso, but he picked it up right away.

"Suhayb, don't be stupid!" a woman yelled from the crowd.

Joaquim turned to see a woman holding back a stampeding man's arm. With enough force into her sliding sneakers, she stopped him. He rattled her pull at first, but then he stopped walking. Her eyes widened, she lost her hold of him, and she plummeted into the crowd's arms. The man marched beneath Prophet Ameen.

"I refuse to let you minister this funeral. My Muslim sister is in one of the coffins," the man said.

"I am glad to hear that she was a religious woman," Prophet Ameen said. "Hopefully she is in the afterlife with Yahweh."

"Get another person to host the funerals. You are no prophet. You are only just an influx user just like the white people in the sky. You are the anti-Christ!" the man yelled while pointing at him. "Prophet Mohammed is the final prophet and there shall be none after him. Peace be upon him."

Prophet Ameen closed his eyes. He descended from the air, landing on the concrete with his bare feet. "So instead of coming here to mourn for the loss of your sister, you came here to blaspheme?"

The man flared his teeth. "Eat shit. Give me her coffin. I refuse to let this happen."

"Young man, I do believe in second chances," Prophet Ameen said. "I'll give you one more chance to stop this nonsense before I arrange your meeting with God. I suggest choosing to stay among the living for a bit longer."

"You are nothing. Give my sister back," the man said.

"Nothing? The Lord once said you shall know them by their fruits," Prophet Ameen said. "I have brought back humans from the dead, cured man-made plagues, and made Babylon's descendants take refuge in flying cities. The miracles I have performed should be more than convincing. Bow down to me and apologize."

Joaquim thought about the beagle dog. Now that Prophet Ameen was here, the beagle needed to leave immediately. After squinting towards the left into the horizon, Joaquim found the beagle running into the folds of the desert exhausting her residual muscle. There was a time Joaquim would do his best to denounce talking animals as encouraged in The Alkrezian Odyssey, but he had a soft spot for them. Some of them were born that way.

The man that confronted the prophet was quiet the whole time, going back and forth between a shaky step back and leaning forward.

"I - I don't care. I don't want my sister to be part of this funeral," the man said.

"I guess you have made your choice," Prophet Ameen said. "I would have given you the coffin if you apologized."

The man's body from the neck downwards flickered. Joaquim stopped blinking, and he saw the body reappearing less and less. The body stopped returning, leaving behind a floating head with a severed spine sticking out. Blood and spinal fluid dripped onto the concrete, the puddle it created raising grains of gravel to the surface. A radiant sphere appeared above Prophet Ameen, and the decapitated head flew inside it.

One by one, the humans in the crowd bowed down to Prophet Ameen. Joaquim shoved through bystanders, holding Gabe's hand as he strode towards the glowing man.

This was Joaquim's chance. He never changed his appearance to reflect what he felt inside, that was a sin after all, but Prophet Ameen could exorcize those thoughts out of him. Prophet Ameen was omnipotent.

What a lie, Joaquim thought. I tell myself the helmet under my headdress is just for protection... but I know that's not true. It would look more masculine if I didn't cover it at all... but then I'd break the Alkrezian dress code.

The brothers exited the crowd, and walked within arm's length of Prophet Ameen.

"I have been waiting for you two, Naomi and Gabe," Prophet Ameen said.