“Bull crap,” Okchoy says with a monotone voice.
“No way!” Luffa says, screeching voice. “You’ve got to be kidding me!”
“No,” I nervously chuckle. “I have a girlfriend now.” I haven’t told my sisters who it is. My mother is in the kitchen, lightly laughing at everything that’s going on.
“Mom! Do you know who it is?”
“Keep me out of this,” mom says, waving us like she’s shooing her away. “That’s up to your brother to disclose that.”
“She knows,” Okchoy says. Luffa agrees with her. “Kado, tell us her name.”
“Tell us,” Luffa says, adding more peer pressure. They stare at me with anticipation, silently waiting for me to answer them. “Kado!” Vodkis steps inside from the front door before I can say anything.
“Lady Vodkis?!” My sisters say in unison.
“Goodness, girls,” Vodkis says when she clutches me from behind. Her right-hand crawls over to where my heart is. “You’re making him nervous.”
“Wait,” Okchoy says, lazily pointing her finger at Vodkis and me. “You’re...”
“It’s a long story.” Okchoy and Luffa give me a look that seems like they’re questioning the validity of the truth. Their lips are straight. Both of their eyes stare without needing to blink.
“Well... it is,” I say. My sisters glance at my mother and get a subtle head nod from her.
“You’re dating her?!” Luffa and Okchoy scream.
“Yes,” I say, clutching my ears. Vodkis chuckles out her nose and holds me tight for a short moment.
“Girls, you might want to sit down,” my mother says as she exits the kitchen. “I got a big story to tell you two.”
One secretive long story later, my sisters now know of my past life and relationship with Vodkis including what our father did for her. The story has my sisters speechless about what to say next. They start talking about something but can’t seem to finish their thought.
“Girls,” my mom laughs in a snickering sort of way. “Speak.”
“I... I... uh... so,” Okchoy chokes on her words. “Zazarel?”
“Yup,” Vodkis says, snuggling her arms around my arm.
“And the hair,” Luffa says, touching her hair.
“Came from Vodkis,” my mother says then tugs on our white hair. “Not mine or your father’s doing.”
“How’s that? Isn’t father’s hair white?”
“Yes, but look closely to theirs.” Luffa comes close to examine my hair. “You’ve seen it moonlight his hair has a bluish tint.”
“Yeah.”
“Your father doesn’t have that effect.”
“What about Selanto?” Okchoy asks. “It’s been a while since we’ve seen our distant brother.” Vodkis whispers into my ear asking what he looks like.
“Vodkis!”
“Huh?” Vodkis says.
“You’ve seen him.” Vodkis hums as she tries to remember who my older brother is. It takes her seconds to figure it out.
“Oh! I remember!”
“Yeah,” my mom chuckles, walking into the kitchen. I take the opportunity to leave with Vodkis before I’m braided with any questions from my sisters. We take to the skies heading towards the city.
“That went well,” Vodkis says with a smile.
“Do you think so?” I say.
“No,” she giggles with her hand over her mouth. “It was awkward at best.”
“Did you see their faces?”
“Yeah,” she laughs hard, clutching her stomach. “They looked so confused.” I don’t have any words to say to deviate from another topic. We don’t talk as we fly together. Then she suddenly hops on my back, sitting cross-legged.
“Hey! What are you doing?”
“What I’ve always done.”
“Sit on my back?”
“I couldn’t fly when we were together so you had to piggyback me.” She repositions to laying on my back with her arms softly locking around my stomach. “And I used to do this a ton too.”
“We were pretty close.”
“You have no idea,” she quietly says.
“Well,” I say, thinking of something optimistic to say. “Maybe we can be there again.”
“I would love to have that again,” she says right behind my left ear. “Very much so.”
For several hours we wonder about the city of Courage, learning about what we like about each other and the things that interest us. Out of all the things about me, she dislikes only one thing. She can’t accept me as a fighter. No matter how much I tell her it’s a fun sport, she will not get it. Describing the way I fight makes her shut down. We sit in a public park not speaking to each other. She keeps her eyes off me and her attention on random things.
“You should do something else for fun,” Vodkis says.
“I do, Vodkis.”
“Like what?”
“I like painting.”
“Well, you should be a professional painter then,” she says, scooting close with her leg touching me.
“Whoa!” I slightly move away from her. She backs off a bit to give me some space. “Why do you sound angry?”
“Ugh! Fighting is not a sport, Kado.”
For two minutes straight she goes into a rant about how fighting is a tool for survival and a weapon for peace. She tries to use her union ambassador job as an example. I want to tell her that the example makes no sense. She hasn’t been around in twenty years, so I’m positive she lacks understanding of our returning culture.
“Vodkis, I think you’re missing the idea,” I say.
“What do you mean?” She says, slightly raising her voice. “Don’t try to defend it. What you’re doing is dangerous.”
“Vodkis... It isn’t.”
“It is and there is no way you can make me see otherwise.” She crosses her arms and legs and turns her head the other way.
“Vodkis...”
“No, Zazarel.”
Goodness. Vodkis must be so angry with me. I don’t think she realized she accidentally called me the wrong name.
“Okay,” I say, standing off the bench. “I’m gonna go train.”
“Wait! You’re just going to leave me?”
“I don’t know what to say anymore.” I hover high enough to the point my feet are over her head. “I’m going to go to Master Umpkin’s training temple facility.”
“Umpkin? W- where is his temple?” I point east of Courage. “Wow, he’s a master?”
“You trained under him, right?”
“It was temporary,” she says as she floats to my level. “So he’s the one that made you a fighter,” she says with an angry frown. “Take me to him, now.”
“Easy, Vodkis,” I whisper, rubbing her upper arms with my thumb. “No need for this... tension.” She abruptly yet gently moves out of my hands to get on my back.
I fly us to Umpkin’s temple. Most of his students are not here since it’s the weekend. The few that are here are practicing their striking exercises. I spot my good friends Mayze and Dice sparring blindfolded in one of the temple’s open rooms. Umpkin watches them outside the ring as they go at it.
“What the hell are they doing?” Vodkis says and hops off.
“Probably qualifying their blindfold certification,” I say as I hover over to a different room where no one is in. “I had to do it.” I wave for her to come down as I descend to the ground. She stays in the hair with her attention zoned in on what’s happening next door. Her thumbs are clinched into her hands. When I say her name, she moves slightly closer to me.
“Hmm? Yes?”
“Are you coming down?”
"I am..."
There’s a moment of hesitation before she comes down to me. Something about this place is making her continually look around. Nothing in the building looks odd, yet she can’t keep her eyes from staring at everything. I choose to ignore her so I can focus on my routine. The first thing I do is stretch all my muscles. After getting that done, I do a bit of shadow boxing. I perform a powerful back kick to end it. Some air blows into Vodkis’s face, blasting her hair behind her head. All I hear are grunts, scoffs, and anything that sounds like disgust. Her mood is breaking my concentration.
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“Vodkis, please be quiet,” I say, momentarily pausing to see her.
“Can we do something else?” Vodkis says when she grabs my foot when I kick the air. Her grip is strong. No matter how hard I try to wiggle out of it, I can’t budge.
“You can leave if you want to.”
“But...” Her hand opens enough for me to get my foot out. “I want you to be with me.”
“If you’re going to stand there and do nothing, do you mind moving somewhere else?”
“Yeah... Sure.”
Finally, she leaves me be. I go through my entire training set without any sort of distractions. When I look for Vodkis, she’s squatting in the corner of the room, looking me down. She stands up once I walk in her direction.
“You’re... good,” Vodkis says. “Umpkin instructed you well.”
“There’s so much to discover,” I say. “I feel like there is more to dynamism.”
“Well,” she sighs and pauses for a moment before speaking again. “There’s more out there, but you would have to join the Union.” I’m intrigued. Vodkis is a Union Ambassador therefore her power is double or far beyond my imagination.
“What was the training like?”
“Excuse me?”
“I’ve thought of joining to learn what they know.”
“Kado,” she chuckles in short intervals. She suddenly clasps her hands together before talking. “Do you know what they do?”
“Yeah,” I lie, knowing little of what the Union does. “Patrol the world and protect the innocents," I say, sitting with her in the corner of the room.
“You ignorant child,” she whispers under her breath with her palms covering her eyes. “There’s so much more to it, Kado.”
“Uh, like what?”
“I’ve killed many people,” she whispers in my face without blinking her eyes. “Do you want to be a killer for peace? Do you have the guile or political speech to avoid going to war?”
“No,” I say honestly and without hesitation.
“You’re young.” She touches my heart. “You don’t need to be in the Union to further your wisdom.” Somehow she activates my verve without me powering it up. My clothing flaps upward as if the wind is blowing from under me. “Wow,” she says with a light smile.
“What?” Her eyes are glued to my chest. Her pale cheeks blush pink the more her hand moves around. “Vodkis?”
“Zazy,” she says, softly, echoing my name twice.
“Vodkis!” I have to move her hand off to make her stop touching me. “What are you doing?”
“I’m sorry.” She crosses her arms but holds them close to her stomach. My verve returns to normal. The flowing energy stops making my clothing move. We stop talking for a few seconds, so I break the silence by asking her a question.
“Why do you keep calling me that?”
“Sorry, Kado. When I see you... feel you... hear you...”
“You see who I was.”
“Would it be weird if I said I missed you?” She says, letting her tears fall from her eyes. I’m unable to come up with an answer. When I look into her teary eyes and delicate smile, I fear that responding with any answer will make her cry. “Never mind,” she says and looks away with her hand over her mouth. She weeps anyway. It’s quiet but only lasts for a short time.
“Uh,” I say, thinking about how she can take her mind off my past life. I want to ask her if she knows the next stages of dynamism and if she can teach me them. But I feel like asking that at this moment might be a dumb idea since she’s sad.
“Is there something on your mind, Kado?”
“Can we... chill at your place?”
“Uh... sure.” Before she leaps into the air, I tug on her dress, hoping it’ll keep her in place. It works, but she does lift into the air. “Yes, Kado?”
“Don’t you wanna ride on my back?”
“You know what,” she says, hiding her smile with the back of her hand. She zips around my back and locks herself on me in a blink of an eye.
“Whoa! You’re fast... and strong.”
“You sound amused.”
“I am,” I say, taking to the skies at high cruising speeds. I coast high above the sky. The warm sun beams down on us directly over our heads. The wind is calm and not too loud in my ears at the speed I’m soaring.
“So,” she says as she gets into a sitting position, “what made you want to fly up this high?”
“It’s calming. I do it sometimes when I want to be alone and take in the sights.”
As I’m looking off to my left to view a giant rainstorm forming far in the distance, she hovers in front of me with her face next to mine. We fly at the same speed without compromising the distance between us. The heat from her face is warmer than the sun for some bizarre reason.
“You’re so like him,” she says, gently, creeping closer to my lips.
We come to a slow halt without breaking the distance from our faces. She kisses me without warning and then comes back for a second one. I quickly prepare myself for it, making my lips meet hers. We kiss four times without taking them apart.
“Kado!” She cheers, tackling me hard for a cuddle.
“Oof, easy,” I grunt. “You’re going to crush me.”
“Sorry about that, my love.” Her grip loosens enough for it doesn’t hurt. “Let’s stop messing around and head to my place. I’ll have Nion whip us some snacks.”
“Sounds wonderful.”
“Good. I’ll race you.”
“You’re on!” She counts down from three but takes off on one. “Hey!”
I take off as fast as I can possibly go. There’s no way in hell I can reach her at the rate I’m going. After two seconds I lose her in the distance. The moment I see her house, she and Nion are outside the front door, waving me down and smiling. The workers tending Vodkis’s garden bow their heads the moment I land. They keep their head down until I walk past them.
“Greetings, Kado. I hope you like cake,” Nion says.
“What kind of cake?” I say.
“It’s Nion’s special Plum cake. You’ll taste buds will love it,” Vodkis says, taking me into the house and over to the couch.
Vodkis and I stay close, cuddling on the couch while Nion makes her famous plum cake. It still amazes me that I met her yesterday and she now she's my girlfriend. There’s much to learn about who she is from then and now. That’s the first thing I’ll have to get used to moving forward with our lives. Her mind has to be mentally damaged from all the turmoil she went through. I have to watch what I say and pray my actions won’t hurt her further.
After eating Nion’s delicious plum cake, Vodkis eagerly takes me into her bedroom. It’s situated on the second floor at the backend of her home. Her room is three times the size of mine. To the right are two white wooden doors with golden handles. Far in the left corner is her gigantic bathroom.
“Hey, Kado,” Vodkis says at the volume our race uses to communicate beyond the level of a whisper. My ears twitch in her direction before I turn my head. She sits in the middle of her bed with her legs open and hands to her side. “Come here for a sec.”
“Yes? Do you need something?” I say, standing at the edge of the bed with my shins resting on it.
“Come here,” she chuckles, tugging on my waist belt. I carefully lay on top of her to fit the body mold she wants me to be in. I’m locked into a cuddle I can’t escape nor want to. It’s oddly satisfying being in this position with her legs and arms anchoring me down on her. Her soft breathing and purring give me pleasant chills all over my body.
“Vodkis,” I say then pause the moment I accidentally purr. “I didn’t mean to do that.”
“Nonsense, my love. Don’t apologize for feeling excited.” She kisses my neck, slowly, enticing me with soft smooches. I’m overloaded with some much stimulation that I force myself off her. “Kado?”
“I shouldn’t be doing this.” I feel like I’m on the verge of having a panic attack. My heart rate is up and I feel as if I’m out of breath. “We just met, like... yesterday.”
“But I’ve known you for years.”
“But for me, it’s been a day, Vodkis. I shouldn’t be doing this.” I head out to the balcony to lean over the metal railing, hoping it’ll prevent my panic attack from worsening. After a minute of slow breathing to reset my heart rate back to a normal speed, she joins me on the railing. At first, she looks at the ground below us before looking me in the eyes. “Vodkis...”
“Wait,” she cuts me off. “I want to get this off my chest.” Her hands gently grab my forearm with her thumbs resting a top of it. She soothes my arm with her thumbs the entire time she speaks. “Ever since you came back into my life, all I wanted was to return to the love we had.”
“Vodkis,” I sigh. "I’m not him.”
“Yes, you are! You are him!”
“We’re two different people now.” Her thumbs stop soothing my forearm. She unexpectedly removes her hands from me to cover her mouth as she takes a step away.
“Zazy,” she muffles through her hands and shakes her head side to side.
“It’s Kado," I say and pull her back to me by tugging on her left hip. “I don’t think this will work out for us. I’m too... different.”
“We are meant to be together. You’re differences will not be a problem.”
“Will it?”
“No,” she says after hesitating to respond.
“It will.”
“It won’t!” I’m finding her statement tough to believe after witnessing her attitude at the temple.
“Maybe we should start as friends. I don’t want to disappoint you.”
“That’s the most disappointing thing you’ve said,” she says calmly, without blinking her eyes. “I will not become your friend,” she says, poking my chest after saying each word. “You are my boyfriend. The love of my life,” she cries. “If you want space, I’ll give it to you.”
“You will?”
“Just... don’t go running to another girl.”
“I wouldn’t dare to,” I laugh. “I’m stuck with you.”
“Stuck?” She scoffs with a quick light-hearted jab to my upper arm. “You make it sound like I’m a nuisance.”
“I didn’t mean that. What I meant to say was--”
“I know what you implied, my love. I’ll be the only woman you’ll love.”
“Yeah,” I sigh, then watch her workers pick fruit from her trees. They make me wonder what kind of duty she had. “Hmm,” I say out loud, debating whether I can bring up a memory from her dark past.
“Hmm?” she hums, looking at me.
“Nothing,” I say the moment I see her smile.
"No, tell me."
“Could.... you show me how strong you are?” Before she can roll her eyes fully and give me a sulky look, I say, “Please. I want to see your power.”
“My power is used to enforce peace, not for show and tell, Kado.”
“Vodkis,” I beg with my hands clasped together and head bowed. “Just this once.”
“No.”
“Please!”
“Kado,” she growls and then smiles to the left side of her face. “I’m not going to do it.”
“Just this once.” I get on my knees to make her submit to my wish.
“Oh, no, no, no.” She stands me on my feet while prying my hands apart then holds them close to her lap. “I’ll do it.”
“Really?”
“Yes, but only once.” I’m so excited for this moment to see her power that I kiss her cheek. “Nion,” she says, keeping her attention on me. Nion appears behind her, but she doesn’t turn around to face her. “Clear the field.”
“Right away,” Nion says. She flies over to the workers in the field, telling them to vacate the area so we can use it. Vodkis takes me by the hand over to an open spot beyond the garden.
“So, what would you like to see?”
“Everything...”
“Everything?” She repeats and lets out a single chuckle. Her body begins fazing in and out as if she’s running circles around. The speed increases enough to make it seem like she’s going the opposite way.
“I can barely see you!”
“It took many days of training on gravity-intense worlds to travel this speed,” she says with an overlapping echo before finishing her sentence in a normal voice when she comes to a complete stop. “Try to knock me down.”
“Okay.” I try pushing over with my hands on her shoulder. It feels like I’m trying to topple over a mountain. She isn’t budging. The only thing that gives is the skin and muscles I’m pushing in. “Why are you so heavy all of a sudden?”
“I don’t know. I guess I’m just really fat.”
“Very funny.” I try with all my might to push. My feet dig into the ground, skidding into the soil. “My goodness!”
“Enough, my love.” I’m nearly huffing and puffing from using almost all my strength. Maybe I can make her move if I power up.
“Let me try this.”
“It won’t work.”
“You don’t know what I was going to do.”
“Actually,” she pauses to bring her lips to my left ear, “I do know. You’re going to tap into your latent power.”
“How’d...?”
“It’s what I would do.” The more I realize how powerful she is, the greater my respect is for her ability to achieve such a magnitude.
“Who trained you?”
“Nion did for the most part.”
“Wow!"
“Yeah!” She lightly snickers in a giggling way. “It was necessary for my job. I had to become strong to fight against any threat.”
"So, it's pointless for me to try?"
She glances at the house for a good moment with her head tilted to the side and hums to answer my question. There’s a small grin on her face that increases in size by a small percentage. I stay quiet watching her gaze for a moment. She catches me looking, but I don’t shy away. The little yearning I have for her begins to grow. I feel like I’m becoming emotionally close in a loving way.
“Kado,” she says in an innocent, sweet delicate voice. "I've seen that face before. What are you thinking now?"
“Do you wanna head back to your room?”
“My... room?”
“We were getting somewhere, and I screwed it up. Can we try again?”
“Kado,” she blushes. “I don’t think you understand what I was trying to accomplish.”
“And that was?” She holds my hand while taking me back to the house before continuing.
“Forget about it. Let’s lay together, and I’ll tell you stories of my favorite memories of you.”
Vodkis fills my ears with moments of my past life with her. The multitude of stories can fill a codex with the amount of detail and emotion I’m hearing. The deep love she has for me is immaculate. I’m the only man she’ll want. No one can replace me. Strangely, I feel honored and humbled she kept her promise to never be with another man. I’ll eternally cherish that. I look forward to the long life we’ll share in this new age of our people.