The clacking of horseshoes against wood woke Aygylaana up, but the cool water felt so nice on her body, so she decided to stay there until she absolutely needed to stretch her muscles, an urge that soon presented itself due to her… odd-to-say-the-least sleeping position.
“Damn, that hurts,” Aygylaana muttered in Egnadian.
Breathing water out of her lungs when she made the transition from sea to land was always an odd experience for her, even though she enjoyed it.
Going the other way around, however, was a completely different story, thanks to air pockets that would often hide in unpleasant spaces, but this was a minor inconvenience at best.
Eventually drying herself off, she started to the kitchen, but was stopped at the foot of the stairs by Evelyn.
“What do you want?” she said in Egnadian, holding her head.
“I don’t care, whatever you said,” Evelyn said, holding the brick, “Did you or Sasha throw this out the window?”
Aygylaana held her hands up, facing her, and went around the tiger, holding the gesture until she was out of sight.
“What was that?” Sasha said, leaning back on the couch as Aygylaana sat down next to him, drinking a bottle of vodka.
“An ‘obscene’ gesture.”
“Alright,” Evelyn said, “You guys are just unbelievable.”
“I was originally gonna call Yarelli today and have her meet us at the garage to make Aygylaana a US citizen. At least the ibuprofen is working.”
“Think about this for a minute,” Evelyn said, “You’re wanting Special Agent Yarelli Wolf, our near-incompetent handler from Homeland, to make her a person?”
“I could do it with just my laptop,” Sasha said, remembering the trip to the mall, “Shit! Where’d we put your stuff?”
“I think it is in the garage,” Aygylaana said, fuzzily remembering something, “Don’t worry, the next time we do the crystal dust, you can remember things.”
Sasha hurried out to the garage as Evelyn confronted Aygylaana.
“What does Blanashan do?” Evelyn said.
“The Cygnian must have told you the name. Phla’naghsian is turbo fuel for your brain, so all of our neurons were firing all day yesterday. That is why we fell asleep.”
“What about the vomiting? Diarrhea? Fever?”
“It only causes your brain to fire wide open. The rest was from Slim Jims, soda, and hugging a radiator. For your analogous brain, caffeine on steroids. The information from Melanie was… distorted.”
“You haven’t tried to huff paint yet, so I guess I believe you,” Evelyn said as Sasha came back in with a cardboard box of new stuff, still in the packaging.
“What is that?”
“Your phone and laptop,” Sasha said, plugging the laptop into a network jack on the living room side of the counter that separated the kitchen from living room, “I’m gonna go ahead and get them ready to use.”
“As with many things, it is only its worst for the first times.”
“That brings me to my next question,” Evelyn said, “Why are you wet?”
“I slept in the bath.”
“That’s weird.”
“Eve,” Sasha asked, “Are you serious about wanting to move out of your mom’s house?”
“Sort of,” she said, “I don’t know if I could keep up the place or if I could get furniture moved into it.”
“I’ll be back,” Sasha said, grabbing his keys and heading into the garage.
Neither Evelyn or Aygylaana said anything until after they heard the engine running.
“When we were in high school, I would’ve thought this was weird,” Evelyn said, “Now I know he’s just crazy.”
“Are you serious?”
Evelyn rolled her eyes as she got up, “Do you need anything?”
Meanwhile, Sasha was already speeding down the roads back to Oakview Complex.
“She’ll either love me or hate me for this,” he said as the car’s engine began begging for mercy, “Those burgers were actually pretty good.”
A few minutes later, he cut into the parking lot at the apartment complex dangerously fast before plowing into his parking space.
«This brings back memories,» Sasha said in Russian.
Opting to use the elevator instead of going up five flights of stairs felt somewhat odd, but ultimately didn’t faze him too much, though living in a building that provided housing to several other people on a permanent basis never suited him, not only because of the parking, but everything else was shared as well. Water, internet access, power, everything. On paper, 100 megabits was pretty damn fast, but when that one line was spread across a building with twenty families… completely different story.
All of the scripts that plagued the modern internet didn’t exactly help matters, either, as far as speed was concerned.
Eventually, he made it to his old bedroom, still untouched from before he moved out, the only differences being that the clear tub labeled CLOTHES was empty, as they were all at his house in the suburbs, and the eerie stillness that plagued the room.
He had always been seen as somewhat crazy for getting a desk designed to run the length of one wall and partway down the other, but it had its purpose. His computer and printer weren’t next to the door and he had a long workspace for repairing technology at.
“Pretty good craftsmanship,” he muttered, turning on the old LCD monitor and cobbled-together computer.
As the fans inside the beige case from 1998 spun up and the drives powered on, there was a sense of nostalgia that came to him as the screen blanked and read SYSTEM IS STARTING. Granted, he knew that, for what he needed now, this was old junk, but he didn’t get the name WC in cyberspace for nothing.
As the screen blanked once again before showing a splash screen that read kOS, he let his mind drift back to the first time he called himself “wildcard”.
Tuesday, April 16, 2013, 10:45a EDT, Sasha’s Bedroom at Evelyn’s House
Sasha had opted not to go to school today, instead taking the opportunity to sleep in, much to Evelyn’s parents’ protests, but he wasn’t technically enrolled in any classes:- he just went and audited them whenever the feeling hit him. Most of the time, he was at home with Evelyn’s grandmother.
Today, however, he had other plans as he headed to the kitchen for his morning coffee, passing through the living room on the way where an elderly tiger was laughing at a black-and-white episode of The Andy Griffith Show.
“Good to see you’re up,” Sasha said, just as disheveled as ever.
“You won’ go have some fun today?” she said.
“Later, if I have time. I’m busy with something right now. Can you drive me to the post 0ffice later?”
“Come get me when yer ready!”
“Uh-huh,” he said, making his coffee and heading back upstairs.
Sasha had been given several names in the cyberworld, both by him and others. “PUZZLE” was given to him because of his ability to take a box of junk parts and, within a few hours, have a usable piece of technology. “WRITER” was a hidden thumbprint he embedded into code he wrote, quickly taking on the handle as it seemed fitting enough. “CIPHER” was his name when he started hacking things that were protected by heavy encryption, and “LOOSE CANNON” because of his tenancy to, according to others, lose his shit when he gets pissed.
His bedroom was average for any tech-inclined middle-schooler, save for the cot in the room instead of a bed, which took a bit of convincing and manipulating on his part.
“The cot can fold up and the bed can’t,” he muttered to himself as he sat down to his desk and started up a computer that was made from a box of literal garbage and a tiny, non-standard motherboard.
Soon, the desktop loaded, complete with all of the lines, boxes, and creepy fun house colors of software from the late 1980s and early 1990s.
“You’d better have my DL ready,” he said, opening his encrypted chat program and scanning for a name, “Gotcha.”
PUZZ13: u hav t3h patch rdy?
M3MPH15: tstng now
M3MPH15: nvr seen dat crd b4
PUZZ13: eta?
M3MPH15: 15 min mabe?
PUZZ13: gud
M3MPH15: u shud git writer nxt tme
M3MPH15: hes rly gr8 @ dis
Sasha looked at the screen for a few moments as he turned on one of the external server drives sitting next to the computer, eventually replying.
PUZZ13: t3h damn code
PUZZ13: NOW
M3MPH15: ok! snding it now!
M3MPH15: dont flp shit u wc
M3MPH15: 1200.usb
PUZZ13: ty
Without anymore hesitation or words being exchanged, Sasha downloaded the file to a floppy disk and loaded it onto a laptop, clearly built from literal garbage, hoping it would take.
After several minutes of freezing and protest, the thing would finally read a USB stick.
“I’ll wait until her show is over,” he said, closing out the chat program on his computer and shutting down the laptop.
Present Day
Eventually, the desktop loaded and became usable, albeit painfully so, seeing as how, despite the hardware in the computer being less than a decade old, it was still sourced from wherever and Sasha had never bothered to properly cleanup the reams of old code that remained on one of the system’s drives, causing the system to constantly make calls to things that were no longer part of the build until it gave up trying to access them.
“Where are you?” Sasha said, going through the scores of files in his Documents folder until he found the ones he was looking for: the forms that would have put him in a house in a gated community, paid in full by the US Government with no strings attached.
If it hadn’t been for the fact that he had actual things to do, he would’ve stayed and worked with the files in his apartment, but he had the trailer park’s computer in his car, Aygylaana didn’t legally exist yet, Evelyn was in his house without him, and this Frankenstein of a computer had over a thousand updates to download, so he just copied the files to a USB stick and headed to the garage across town.
Back at Sasha’s place, Evelyn and Aygylaana were streaming a show on Netflix, though it had clearly failed to hold either one’s interest.
“I would like to hear of Sasha’s past from your perspective,” Aygylaana said, sharing a drink with Evelyn, who was unsure of how to answer the Egnadian’s query.
“He’s brash, insensitive, has literally zero fucks to give, he’s probably a psychopath, and he has made me question my own existence a number of times. If I’m being completely honest with myself and you, and don’t take this the wrong way, but I don’t know why he fell for you. He’s literally incapable of feeling feelings. Unless he’s a horny Soviet bastard now… I’m outta ideas.”
“During our intercourse, it was made extremely clear that neither of us care for each others’ physical appearances in any real amount.”
“Don’t go into details,” Evelyn said, “I don’t wanna know who probed who.”
“It was nothing like that,” Aygylaana explained, “He finds my brain attractive and I likewise.”
“Then… why did you two have sex if you don’t care about that sorta thing?”
“I was sexually aroused and he was sexually aroused. We both wanted to see how it would play out, so we did an experiment while we were both ready for each other. The experiment was a success.”
“Are you done?” Evelyn said, “I just wanna make sure there’s not gonna be any intricate details.”
“Of course I am,” Aygylaana said, “The details are not worth sharing with an external party.”
“Never woulda thought Sasha was into chubby girls,” Evelyn said, “Probably for the best.”
“Oh, this is not just fat deposits,” Aygylaana said, getting up and lifting the side of the couch over her head with relative ease, much to Evelyn’s surprise, “I did acquire muscle from some of the stupidity.”
Unauthorized use of content: if you find this story on Amazon, report the violation.
“Please put it back down.”
Aygylaana lowered the couch back to the floor and sat back down, “It was not all negative effects.”
“My God, you’re strong!” Evelyn said as Aygylaana walked over to the basement door.
“Is this solid?”
“I get it!” Evelyn said.
“If you are worried about Sasha dying because of me, then your fears are completely unfounded.”
“What do you mean?” Evelyn asked.
“The only reason I am tolerating you at the moment is because Sasha, by a miracle, tolerates you.”
“Okay, normally, I would punch you, but I’m pretty sure you could throw me across the room.”
Sasha eventually stopped at a brick warehouse in the messy part of town, parking just past an open loading door before walking inside.
“I almost wanna say I was robbed,” Sasha said, getting a handtruck and bringing it out to his car as he called someone.
“Go for Wolfy,” a slightly-drunk woman said.
“Homeland Agent Yarelli Wolf,” Sasha said, unloading the computer onto the cart before wheeling it inside, “I’m at the warehouse right now and I need you to make someone exist. Why the hell am I hearing Flyday Chinatown in the background?”
“I’m in Japantown,” she asked as someone with a Japanese accent said something, taking her glass for a refill, “Who do you need documentation on?”
“It’s a matter that I’d rather discuss with you in private. Also, I need to discuss the housing documentation with you.”
“I can be there in twenty minutes,” Yarelli said, ending the call.
Sarah’s station wagon was nowhere to be found, so that was, for better or worse, a sign.
The interior of the warehouse was separated into different “rooms” with chain-link fencing and, occasionally, a piece of wood attached onto a section. In the front area, there was a well-used couch sitting against the window with a rug and coffee table in front of it. Two cluttered desks, one belonging to Sasha and the other being Evelyn’s, were a few feet past the couch setup. Close to the stairs was a kitchenette, if it could be called such, with the counter and refrigerator against a section of fencing and plywood. Heading further, there was a large “room” where an old blue minivan sat with the hood up, parts strewn, and the sliding door opened, as well as a smaller burgundy car that was an easy fifteen years newer, if still having that same boxy design, sans the sliding doors. A monitor stand was sitting at the fencing separating the work “room” from the “kitchenette” facing Sasha’s and Evelyn’s desks. Despite the general interior being… a warehouse, the computers were relatively new, not showing more than two or three years of age at the very most.
“That should do it,” Sasha said, unloading the computer at a test area and letting it boot up with the warehouse’s high-speed internet connection plugged into the first network jack and a hub connected to a few running laptops into the second, «I’m sure this is just old crap.»
Walking over to his desk, he started up that computer, running at the speed of light in comparison to the cobbled-together thing at the apartment, and opened up the several documents he had copied over several minutes earlier as the phone rang.
“The machine can get it,” he said, getting up and pouring a cup of coffee.
After several rings, the answering machine clicked and whirred for a moment.
“This is VE Repair,” a recording of Sasha’s voice said, “We can’t come to the phone so leave a message. And keep it short!”
More whirring followed by another clack and a beep before a man’s voice played.
“Uh hi, this is Austin Laney from Swallowtail Trailer Park. I know you guys aren’t always in the office, but when you get this, I was wondering how long it would be until you fixed the computer. Our internet pretty much relies on it, and it’s… not here. So, just give me a callback? Thanks.”
Another beep sounded before the machine clacked again and stopped whirring.
“I need to figure out when Eve picked up that G5 Tuesday.”
Right on schedule, he heard Yarelli’s SUV drive up and shut off.
«Goddammit,» he muttered, wondering just how drunk she would be from Japantown.
A couple of minutes later, a wolf wearing a black suit and sunglasses, aged in her mid-to-late thirties, stumbled into the garage, disheveled as expected.
“How fucking drunk are you right now?” Sasha asked as she let herself fall on the couch.
“Six outta ten,” she said, looking at Sasha as he took a bucket over to her that would occasionally serve as a trash can.
“If you have to vomit, do it in here.”
“Tha-” she said before vomiting into the bucket.
«How did we not beat these people in the Cold War?» Sasha asked in Russian.
When Yarelli finally came up for air, Sasha was ready with another bucket.
“What do you need me to sort out?”
“How much did you have to drink first?”
Yarelli counted on her fingers for a moment, “Enough to feel better after that damn sushi!” she said before laughing.
“You American Idiots drink more than we do in Russia. Not only is that a high bar to set, but you don’t even hold alcohol as well,” he said, taking the vomit-filled bucket outside and dumping it.
“I’ve seen you drink communist beer and race that thing of yours in town.”
“At least I know my limits,” he said, setting the bucket back down and getting a can of Red Bull for her, “First thing’s first, at least when your shitfaced like this, the housing deal that the government gave to me the morning of Eve’s high school graduation.”
“Yeah?”
“Is there any way that this could go to her instead of me?” Sasha asked, “The agreement is… rather vague, to say the least. I don’t think that there would be any major issue with that, though what was spoken went into more depth than what was written.”
“So? Cross out your name and put hers in, big whoop!”
“I’m no stranger to your government playing this bullshit,” Sasha explained, “If you’re gonna do that, just remember that I can make the Cold War come to a bitter end for you and NATO.”
“You weren’t even born in 1991.”
“No, but I’m more than capable to stop any fuckery you might have up your sleeves and booze bottles.”
“I’ll ask Director Schvinskyy about it tomorrow,” she said, drinking the energy drink, “What was the other thing?”
“I need you to make an alien exist legally.”
“You know I’m supposed to report that to my superiors, right?”
“You know what?” Sasha said, getting her on her feet and walking her to his car, keeping the bucket nearby, “We’re settling this there.”
“Hm?” the drunk agent said.
“You’re too drunk for me to tolerate without committing a crime that violates the Geneva Convention right now, there’s enough lag between here and my home server that, because Eve and Aygylaana are watching TV, prevents a decent response time, and for fuck’s sake, you’re probably gonna end up falling asleep soon anyway.”
Yarelli grunted as Sasha strapped her in his car and drove back into town.
“I hope you like this,” Evelyn said, taking some omelets out of the microwave and bringing them into the living room.
“Eggs?”
“I made them the way Sasha does. Cut-up fried bacon, pieces of honey ham, spam, and, for whatever reason, soy sauce and curry sauce.”
“It smells pungent,” Aygylaana said, catching a whiff as she poured a glass of soda, “Are you sure that is an egg?”
“Trust me, I’m sure.”
“If you have any poison, I would like to smell it.”
“Trust me, if there was any poison here, I’d be in prison,” Evelyn said, looking at the omelets one more time, “I don’t know how that isn’t considered a weapon of mass destruction.”
After a moment, Aygylaana started eating the thing, enjoying its flavor, “How would be a weapon of any kind?”
Evelyn looked on in mild shock as Aygylaana enjoyed the waste-of-eggs before speaking, “You haven’t seen it, but the odor from those things can clear out a room. I’m not kidding.”
“They are slightly spicy, but nothing of concern. Can you show me how to make them?”
“Oh God,” Evelyn said as Aygylaana started scrolling through the TV, “Just ask Sasha.”
“What is a Honda CVCC?” Aygylaana said, stopping at a YouTube playlist.
“Grandma has one from 1997. It’s an old shitbox he likes.”
“Why does Sasha prefer older technology in some places but newer in others?”
“Well, as far as cars are concerned, he says that the older ones are easier to work on. To be fair, he does have a point because they don’t have computers controlling everything that makes them work, something he says is a problem with newer ones. On the other hand, I’ve seen him search for six whole months to find a car part, so there’s that. I’ve told him and he has the money to go buy something new and drive off of the lot, but he says they’re just more to work on and that he ‘Wipes his ass’ with warranties.”
“I can see his point,” Aygylaana said, “Older technology on Egna was often easier for me to maintain as well,” she looked to her lap, “When I was a pre-adult, I would often not have a mother waiting for me after my lessons. She had a similar opinion of me as the others. Is the feeling of want and desire to wait for a pre-adult an irrational one?”
“If you and Sasha have a kid, they’d be extremely lucky to have you as a mom,” Evelyn said.
“Why are you lying?” she said immediately.
“Okay, yeah, I think you’ll be terrible as a mom. Being completely honest with myself, I don’t even think it would survive birth with what you two do.”
Aygylaana rolled her eyes, “As long as I am pulling things out of you,” she said as Sasha’s car roared into the driveway.
“Oh thank God,” Evelyn said as the garage door opened.
“I’m back,” Sasha said, coming in with Yarelli on his shoulder, dropping her on the couch, “When you’re done with my furniture, put it back. Yarelli, the one with red hair is the alien I’m fucking.”
“Please explain,” Aygylaana said, “In this context, ‘fuck’ means to engage in sexual intercourse, correct?”
“Yes.”
Yarelli looked at Aygylaana and started up again.
“Oh ho ho!” she said, grabbing Aygylaana’s breast for a moment, “Now… it all makes sense. You like dem jugs, don’t you?”
“Make her stop,” Aygylaana said in Egnadian.
“Aygylaana, she’s shitfaced-drunk. Yarelli, you’re completely wrong about that.”
“Is it dat ass?” she said before laughing.
“Wrong again, idiot!” Sasha said, confirming a few options on the laptop, “Aygylaana, this thing’s ready. You want me to show you how it works or do you wanna just dive in headfirst and learn as you go?”
“I can figure it out,” Aygylaana said, hurrying over to the laptop.
“Alright then,” Sasha said, “Eve, Yarelli is gonna talk to Schvinskyy tomorrow about the house in that community that I hate so damn much. Maybe they can get it worked out where the house could go to you, at least that’s what I’m hoping.”
“That place is on the other side of town!” Evelyn said as Sasha’s phone pinged, “Plus, I don’t know if it already has furniture or not.”
“It’s somewhat furnished, but most of the stuff would still have to be brought in by you. The HOA over there fills the house to make it more appealing, but to me it’s just clutter. I think the master bedroom and living room are the only two rooms furnished, though again, I’ve seen them change things on a whim. Besides, if the crap inside is staged, then we should have enough room between the company van and my Reliant wagon to get you moved in.”
“I- I’ll think about it,” Evelyn said as Yarelli vomited again.
“Could I talk to you in the garage for a minute?” Sasha said, leaving the room.
“Why are you doing this?” Evelyn said as soon as the door was closed, “I didn’t ask for this!”
“Okay, we both know you have attachment issues. Your mom works at the church and your dad works, somehow, as a coach at a school. Both of them are generally gone from the house all day, leaving your grandmother and sister there by themselves. Your mom doesn’t want you to grow up too fast, you help keep Benjamin from killing himself by doing something stupid, your grandmother is trying to relive her youth, your dad hates change with a passion. Tell me how their dysfunction isn’t resting on your shoulders.”
Evelyn looked at Sasha for a moment before sighing in defeat, “Sure, you’re missing my point, okay?”
“Whoa, if anybody is gonna be condescended to here, it’s gonna be you by me. Got it, Sweetie?” he said, patting her on the head as he finished.
“Don’t. Call me ‘Sweetie’. Again,” Evelyn said, pissed off and through gritted teeth.
“Whatever you say, Sweetie,” Sasha said, blatantly ignoring her, “You’re never gonna get that band-aid off if you keep being gentle with it. Your Mom’s gonna find more ways to keep you as her little girl, your Dad is gonna be afraid to collect pension and retire, and your grandmother is probably gonna try to go bungee jumping and break her neck in the process; that’s how desperate they are to keep you in their lives right now. To them, you represent stability of something that got flung outta the window and set in a bag of flaming dog shit on the front door. Clearly, none of you wanna face that for anything.”
“I don’t have attachment issues.”
“And I don’t have amazing tastes in music:- we can both keep fighting about this or we can just agree that I’m right and you wanted to keep breastfeeding and wearing a diaper because you somehow inherited your father’s pathological metathesiophobia.”
“Run,” Evelyn said after a long pause.
“This is intuitive,” Aygylaana muttered to herself in Egnadian as Yarelli snored softly on the couch.
“You figure everything out alright?” Sasha asked as he and Evelyn came in, the former having a black eye and the latter being extremely pissed.
“I did,” Aygylaana said, turning to face Sasha, “What happened!?” she screamed in Egnadian.
“Eve has an aversion to dealing with her problems.”
“The next time I do that, it’ll be two feet lower, you jackass!”
“Watch what you say,” Sasha said, walking over to Aygylaana and looking over his shoulder, “She’s violent.”
“I will deal with her later, then.”
“Funny how I got my glasses in November and I’m already on the second pair,” Sasha said, taking out an eyeglass case and emptying its contents onto the counter.
“Visual aids can be a true pain,” Aygylaana said, adjusting her own glasses, “This is a powerful computer.”
“What kinda old junk did you use on Egna?”
“I built my own from literal garbage.”
“That’ll do it,” Sasha said, pouring a glass of vodka.
“It looked ugly, but the results were favorable to acceptable in most use-case-scenarios.”
“Most?”
“They were often purpose-built devices. The hardware and software were both ancient.”
“Nothing like using a copy of CP/M running on a Zilog Z80 to make a thermostat controller. Always invigorating.”
“A what?” she said, making her way to the Wikipedia page for the processor.
“Open a new tab and look up the Kaypro. I literally used to have one of those controlling the lights, air circulation, and radiator in the apartment at the warehouse. Complete pain-in-the-ass to set up, but I had automation. Whatcha gonna do?”
“That seems as a logical conclusion.”
“Seeing as how it worked while it did, I’ll fuckin’ take it. Evelyn, I’m teaching Aygylaana how to drive a sports car. Tell Yarelli that if she doesn’t drown on her vomit and drool,” Sasha said, walking outside with Aygylaana.