Part 14
‘Kinraetown’ only covered about a half-mile of businesses and buildings which were primarily-owned and operated by ‘Kinrae’. Aside from the trivia books, Lissa brought a small audio recorder and her digital camera, in case, as she said, “We need proof of junk going down.” I brought my device and controller along with the card Tessa gave me when we first officially met. And Allison made sure we had snacks and a packed supper in case we couldn’t find a good place to eat.
The gateway to the area was marked by a rainbow-mottled “friendship arch” which bore the words spoken by Olivia nine years ago. I looked at it with solemn skepticism.
The businesses were typical for the area. Watercolor murals of landscapes around the world covered the walls. A small hair shop with a few anime patrons occupied the nearest corner. Beside it was a store which seemed to sell just about everything, especially the oddest things, like rolls of chicken wire. The other stores were similarly-small and sold just about everything you could imagine from any normal store. As we walked along a couple of anime girls welcomed us and asked, “Can we help you get to anywhere?”
I passed the card to one girl with long, indigo locks tied into a ponytail. She read the address and then looked over her shoulder before directing us down the main area and to the left to an off-shoot right after the next major street. None of them seemed to react to the information on the card in any abnormal or suspicious way. Any of them could’ve been Tessa but, after all this time since she’d last shown up, I’d begun to take her at her word that she was leaving me alone.
A cluster of restaurants ranged from Indian cuisine to a local burger shop. Aside from the exuberant tones of paint everywhere, nothing looked different from any shopping center. In fact, as I thought about it, it fit with the ‘Kinrae’ stated philosophy. They were wildly-curious about humans. It would make sense they would take all the interesting things they saw in our cultures and want to put them together in a single place.
That theory was also helped by being one that Professor Brandt had talked about exhaustively for nearly an hour, drawn from papers she liked and parts of the book which delighted her. I just rested my head against the wall that day. One of the new places I hadn’t heard about before included shirts which were of the same visual quality as the Kinrae. If I’d seen that some weeks ago then I would’ve been reaching for my wallet. As it was, I just pointed it out to Lissa and she pondered buying a shirt on the way back if they had her size.
I also found myself intrigued by an art shop, though it only sold reproductions of great works from around the world. The more I looked around the more I wondered if this was just for temporary Kinrae travelers to pick up a memento while visiting our universe rather than anything else. I could make the case but there were products like clothes clearly intended for men and women.
The theory was bolstered by the small hotels crammed between markets. I didn’t take the opportunity to stumble into one of the ‘Kinrae’ leaving a hotel to see if they were as dense as a brick wall. However, the doors in front of the little hotels looked like they were built sturdier than the other doors.
Allison stopped to buy us a little, fried puffball on a stick which resembled a mix of something oriental and something one would find sold at a fairgrounds. They were tasty. A narrow, two-story bookstore seemed to line its walls with books from every human language put to print. I didn’t notice any English books until about a third of the way back, nor did I notice any which were immediately recognizable. Allison didn’t either (with her face nearly pressed to the glass). I promised her we would come back later for a longer inspection of the books.
Lissa lingered by a toy store, noticing the most unique creations and recreations of toys. She said she was looking for something to take back to Quilla. I pondered over how… human this place all seemed. Maybe Kinrae wasn’t such a bad name for them if they wanted to be so much like us. I had to drag the others along as the shops got ever more interesting. A spice shop. A video store (at least there I recognized many of the titles…if only the Kinrae brought along alternate reality films and DVDs with them).
Finally, we came to the location which was marked on the card Tessa had given me. Of all places, it was a flower shop with several colorful displays in front. After rechecking the address, I went through the front door.
It was slightly cooler than outside and humid. I left Allison and Lissa to browse in the front as I made my way towards the back of the store. The cash wrap was empty but there was a space which led even further back into a storage area. I offered a tentative, “Hello?” before noticing a door to my right. It was marked with a handwritten sign that read, “Repairs and Other Services”. The handwritten script seemed familiar but it didn’t match Tessa’s or anyone else’s I knew.
Pushing on the door revealed a small set of steps with fuzzy, brown carpeting. I felt a quick rush of familiarity again. However, the steps looked like countless ones I’d seen before and the carpet appeared like something my uncle may have had in his house a long time ago. That didn’t help the odd feeling. I almost turned around to grab Allison. But the top of the stairs cast a long, warm ray of light down at me and I didn’t feel afraid, so much as confused.
The room at the top had parts and equipment scattered all over. I thought for a moment I’d stumbled upon Clayton’s secret lab. Turning a corner, I noticed an anime girl hunched over a workbench. She had black goggles on as she worked on what looked like welding. Whenever she touched her instruments to the device before her, a blue light came on. I waited until a pause in her work to say, “I’m looking for Naltra. Tessa sent me.”
The girl turned and flipped her goggles up. Her eyes were vast with detailed patterns of burnt umber. Her hair was a darker shade of blond and tied into a ponytail behind her. She had grease across her chin and wore a black tank top with dark-green pants.
I was about to take out the card Tessa had given me but the girl raised a hand and told me, “I’m Naltra. Well, it’s a name I like. It’s not a perfect name. Those rarely exist but… it’s a name which suffices.”
I looked for a place to sit down and asked, “Like Kinrae does for your kind?”
Naltra shrugged. “Names are histories and futures. Names can be statements. Names can be things that hold you back or things that propel you forward. I took the name Naltra and I gave it my own meaning. For me, it means ‘one who brings others along’.”
I told her that was nice and she continued, “But you’re not here just about names.….You’re here about the device. The battery.”
I assumed Tessa must’ve filled her in. I told her, “Tessa told me you might be able to fix it.”
Naltra brushed at her hair. “I can tell you there’s nothing to fix. Your device needs a new battery. I’ll get one. But that’s not the problem.”
This tale has been pilfered from Royal Road. If found on Amazon, kindly file a report.
Raising an eyebrow, I asked her, “How can you know that without looking at the device?”
She held out her hand and I reached into my bag for the device. I gave it and the controller to her. She opened it up and cracked her fingers. She told me, “This will just take a minute…”
I leaned back in my chair and watched as she popped out the battery from the internal component.
Immediately, I felt a strange fuzziness in my head. The sound in the room became like it was over a faint radio station. Certain things around me felt indistinct. I was alarmed and confused. I yelled out to ask her what she was doing but I couldn’t make out her reply.
I’d once taken nitrous for a wisdom tooth extraction and it felt like that, only I had no idea why it was happening. As it felt even more like I was going to slip away, the phenomena vanished and Naltra announced, “New battery. All good.”
I staggered up from the chair and away from her.
“What the hell just happened?”
I glared at Naltra but she kept her same, calm expression. She showed me the little battery-package she’d replaced and said, “It won’t make much difference though because it’ll drain at the same rate but you may notice less of a delay when using it now.”
I swallowed and told her, “Something strange just happened to me.” I described what I’d experienced and she rested her chin against her hand. After I was done, she replied only, “It’s feedback.”
Naturally, I had to inquire what that meant. She didn’t give me an answer. Instead, she asked me, “Sean…how do you feel right now?”
I frowned and looked at her a moment before offering, “Confused and alarmed.”
She nodded. “Understandable. But what I want to know is....Are you ready to have a discussion about the big questions you’ve been pondering for weeks? If you’re not, then there’s no problem with that. But if you are then you’ll have to make a choice which will change your entire life. Like Allison’s choice to embrace change for the sake of love. What’s your choice, Sean?”
I held my hands up. I was still processing the weirdness of a moment before, weirdness like the world winding down. And now she was offering me…answers? Well, she just said ‘discussion’ but that was something.
Part of me wanted to say no and go back to Allison and Lissa and finish a day downtown and then head back because her words felt like being trapped at the edge of a cliff. At the same time, this was what I’d been seeking. This was the place I wanted to know. I needed to know.
Was I ready? I had no idea. Maybe I’d never be fully ready but I was tired of not knowing. I took a breath and asked her, “Can my friends join us?”
As soon as I asked that, I heard Allison in the other room exclaim, “Clayton would love this place!” Footsteps followed her. Lissa and Allison came around the corner. Lissa asked, “Did you get it repaired?”
Naltra gestured to my friends with a hand, saying, “Here they are.” That was rather convenient. Allison said that they’d asked about me downstairs and a nice shopkeeper told them where to go. Seeing Lissa and Allison made the anxiety wane but also made my choice feel ever closer. I could tell Naltra to shove off. I could go. But that felt like running away. That felt like hiding when my parents' anger was at its peak. Tessa said I needed to face that. I needed to make my choice.
Allison glanced around with eyebrows raised and offered, “Ummm…did someone say something bad? Or break wind?” Naltra couldn’t resist a snicker and a sigh before saying, “What’s going on, Allison, is that Sean here is facing a choice. He can follow me and learn more about us than he ever dreamed or he can go back with you and return to a class where he learns what the Kinrae assume about us. That’s the choice and no matter what choice he makes, his life will never be the same.”
With wide eyes, Allison asked, “You’re not gonna brainwash him, are you? Or wipe his memory and turn him into a girl?! Or feed him to manhood-eating serpents?!”
Naltra flashed a skeptical look before shaking her head and saying, “None of those things. He will simply have a talk with someone who can answer his questions. But he needs to make the choice that he wants to have that talk, that he’s ready to face certain truths. Once something is learned, you can’t go back to a state before you learned it. Learning is always a challenge but he may find that amazing and beautiful things follow knowledge and change.”
Allison and Lissa both asked if they could go with me but Naltra told them, “It’s his choice and it’s what he will learn. Of course, he will be free to share it with those he trusts as he sees fit but it will have the most meaning for him and the most consequences.”
Allison commented, “You anime girls have cryptic Zen master nailed down pat.”
Naltra let loose a sudden giggle at this. “My apologies. We have our ways.”
With a frown, Allison shook a finger and admonished, “Make sure you don’t fry or hurt my cutie!” Lissa nodded and even had her camera out. Naltra bowed her head.
It was decision time for me. I felt prickly and hot despite the coolness of the room. I could easily say no. I could easily go back down those stairs and convince myself I didn’t need to know. I could drop the class and I could just live with Allison and my friends all the same. But I didn’t.
I took a deep breath and told Naltra, “I want to know. I choose to know. I choose whatever comes.” Then I held my breath.
Naltra smiled and tapped me on the head. Nothing happened from that. I looked around. Nothing had changed. I looked back to her. She smiled and said, “Follow me then.”
And so I did. I followed her to a back room. It looked like a normal apartment with eclectic furnishings taken from the shops around the area. Something about it all looked vaguely familiar. I had a sense of what was going to be in each subsequent room before we got to it. So strange.
Eventually, she came to a door at the end of a hall. I knew it was a bedroom but I had no idea how I knew that. How could I possibly know that when I’d never been here before?
Naltra set her hand on the knob and said, “You still have a chance to back out, if you’re unwilling. Usually, my bedroom is more packed but this is good because it’ll allow you some privacy while you talk.”
I took a few breaths, ignored the bewildering implications of her words, and told her, “No going back.”
She opened the door. I had been in this room before. The walls were nice with vivid, lavender details and ornamentation. There were windows, a few open. I could hear cars passing on one of the nearby streets and even faintly hear the train line from far off. It had the usual things you would expect in a bedroom but a space had been cleared out for an egg-shaped object sitting to one side with several power sources plugged into it. It was the size of a single bed.
I had been in this room before; I knew that immediately. But it was a dream. Had my dream been of a part of this universe and not another? I puzzled as Naltra approached the egg-thing and tapped along a portion of the side. She remarked, “Brace yourself…things are about to get rather weird.”