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Infinity Smashed--Six Ways Raige Liked M.D.
So, been on a creative bender lately. Now a good chunk of the writing goes up. Spam ahoy! And it looks like Infinity Smashed has dug its teeth into me again. Oh, you stupid little deformed bunny, how I missed you!
Six Ways Raige Liked M.D.
1. On a Pedestal
Raige is positive his brain will melt out of his ears. Sure, going to Great Aunt Kara’s place for a week isn’t his idea of a fun summer vacation, but pet ferrets aside, at least it’s predictable. Boring. Normal.
This? This is anything but normal. This is so far from normal that it’s off the scale—which is logarithmic. He still isn’t sure what happened—one moment, he was in the airport, and then next was plummeting through the air. Near as he can tell, he just can’t remember getting on the plane, and then it wrecked, even though there’s no wreckage anywhere, and he has nothing but a bruise on the temple to show for it. He’s stranded in what looks like the Canandria Forest (AKA the epicenter of nowhere) for the foreseeable future, where there may or may not be bears. There is no Great Aunt Kara, no ferrets, no cable TV, no indoor plumbing, god, no food…
And he is stranded here, of all places, with her, of all people. The kid, who seems to think that none of this is at all bizarre or freakish. Who seems to think that Raige is a few horns short of a band for reacting as though this is anything but the most everyday and usual of occurrences. Who responds to his panicked shriek of, “Where’s the fucking plane?” with “I don’t know,” and doesn’t seem to understand why he might find this answer at all lacking.
Raige has no idea what sort of life this girl must lead to be so blasé about all this, but it must be really something.
In no time, she’s searching his backpack for something to use as a fishing line, humming Weird Al Yankovic off-key, while Raige is still busy cresting his first panic attack. All he can do is stand there, hyperventilate, and think that, oh God, he’s going to die. Starvation. Exposure. Eaten by bears. Why is she not worried?
“What should we do now?” He finally asks.
He doesn’t know what he expects. Maybe for her to suddenly drop everything and howl, “Oh God, you’re right, we’re going to die!” the way he feels she ought to be doing. Reaffirm that yes, all is lost, they’re doomed, so he stops feeling like he’s overreacting.
She doesn’t do any of that. Instead, she rolls her eyes at him and says with exasperation, “What do you think people do when they crash-land in a forest?”
He can’t say that he’s ever thought about such a thing before, but it’s okay, because apparently she has.
“We make camp.” And shaking her head as though to say, ‘God give me strength,’ she stomps off to find water, leaving him there.
He stares blankly after her. There are no words for her behavior. Again, he wonders, why isn’t she worried?
And his mind responds, because she knows what to do.
He pauses. The panic’s still there, but it’s no longer terminal. She knows something he doesn’t. Something that makes her see this as a significant but not-too-worrisome setback, instead of certain death. And though that might be insane, he has to admit, it’s probably a lot more conducive to survival.
Maybe he’s overreacting. Maybe this situation really is as survivable as she’s acting. Maybe, if he just does what she says, everything will be fine. Whatever her reasoning is, he is now positive that she knows what to do, and as long as he follows her, maybe her confidence will rub off on him.
As of now, she is his favorite girl in the world.
2. Off a Pedestal
Raige never intended for M.D. to ever find out he was crushing on her. There is a time and place to discuss this kind of thing, and stranded in the middle of a bear-infested forest in a parallel dimension with a talking cat is not the time or place.
But it comes out, thanks to M.D.’s whacked-out psychic powers that work only at the most inconvenient times. He’s starting to suspect that God is laughing at him.
Raige knows the moment M.D. finds out, because she starts staring at him with a look of flabbergasted horror that would be funny, if it wasn’t directed at him.
He knows the explosion is coming, but he still plays dumb. “Is there a bear behind me?” He asks politely. Like nothing has gone wrong. Like he hasn’t noticed a thing. Like M.D. actually possesses some semblance of subtlety and social graces.
She shakes her head, still staring at him.
He pretends to look over his shoulder for a bear—really, he’s making sure none are around to point and laugh when this goes horribly wrong. Or Bobcat, who’d probably try to give him well-meaning advice but only succeed in mortifying him further.
M.D. doesn’t seem like she’s going to stop gaping at him any time soon, so he might as well bite the bullet and drag it out into the open. Let her explode at him, reject him, and be done with it. “What? Why’re you looking at me like that?”
It actually takes her a while to speak. When she does, she says only one word, about an octave higher than she usually speaks.
“Urraaaagh!”
Couldn’t have said it better himself.
When M.D. verbally explodes, she talks loud, wordy, and fast, firing off verbal blasts like a human scattergun, as though if she says enough things, one of them will do the job. Random phrases stand out from the noise: “No, no, no!” “You have no taste!” “This wasn’t supposed to happen!” “I’m an alien, Raige. Doesn’t that deter you?” “Come on, milquetoast, for all you know I might make you pregnant!”
Hold the phone. “Whoa, whoa, whoa, who said anything about pregnancy here?” He says, raising his hands. He sure hopes it wasn’t him.
For a blissful moment, she is silent. The look on her face is priceless. After a moment of aborted stammering, she points at him and accuses, “It’s all your fault, you started it!”
She crosses her arms and glowers off into the distance, and Raige figures it out. M.D., survivalist extraordinaire, has met her proverbial maker. She knows that, and she knows that he knows that. And it’s killing her.
Suddenly, Raige doesn’t feel hurt anymore. Suddenly the whole thing just seems ridiculous and hilarious. After being chased by bears, dumped in another dimension, and surviving a not-plane accident, this is what’s making her run around like a beheaded chicken.
It makes him feel oddly competent.
Raige rubs his temples. The bruise has mostly healed by now, so he can’t blame the developing headache on it. She catches it, and asks, “Should I shut up now?”
“That might be a good idea.”
Astoundingly, she actually winces and obeys, looking down at the ground.
For a while, they just sit there. Raige sighs. Well. This is going just great. Unfortunately, he can’t think of anything to say to make things better. Of course he knows she’s an alien (sort of) and a runaway genetic construct; when he found out, his sexuality promptly decided it was flexible. And despite her best efforts, she has yet to annoy his attraction into submission—though he must give her credit for trying.
All he can think of to say is, “Let’s just be friends,” but he has never heard of that actually working.
Then M.D. mumbles, without all the sarcasm and whining and pseudo-intellectualism, “If it makes you feel any better, I like you too.”
Raige looks up, and she has her face buried in her arms.
He pats her shoulder. “I knew what you meant.”
Apparently she mistakes his smile for mockery, because she raises her head, scowling at him. “It’s not funny.”
“Yeah it is,” he says. “Face it kid, you’re stuck with me.”
He expects a wisecrack bemoaning her fate, but instead, her expression grows serious—and a bit sheepish. She fiddles with her gloves. “Look Raige, I need to come straight with you. I haven’t quite told you everything.”
For a moment, Raige’s brain locks. Oh God. She’s already told him about parallel dimensions and man-eating bears. What could possibly be left? Does she eat babies? Does her species explode every Sunday on the new moon? What?
“When I said I was barely female, I was being literal.”
If she’s going to tell him she’s transgendered, Raige will be more than happy to inform her that after realizing he’s into aliens, he doesn’t think he’s going to be phased by his attraction to anything.
“Apparently I’ve been altered a bit.”
Altered?
“They fixed me.”
“Like… a computer?”
“Like a dog.”
Raige’s brain 404s.
Apparently she misreads his face and takes it for incredulity; she stands up, pulls her shirts up, and nudges her jeans down. Which would normally make him squirm, except she’s showing him a surgical straight scar across her hips.
Raige just stares at her. There are no words for this—this feeling that this must be one of M.D.’s sicker jokes, even though she isn’t keeping steady eye contact and looks nervous. It has to be a joke, because people, even on other planets, do not behave this way. They don’t—
“See?” She points. “Uterus, tubes, eggs… all that stuff. Removed a long, long time ago. I’m about as sexless as you can get.” And she drops her shirts down and shrugs. “So Raige, I’ve got to be honest. If you ever want to live a healthy life, you won’t want me as a girlfriend. Just give the whole idea up.”
Raige stares at her stomach, then at her face. She can’t hold his eyes. Her arms are clamped across her chest, her shoulders hunched.
Raige doesn’t know what he wants to do more: cry, hug her, or shake her and hope her stupid psychic powers make her understand why what she’s just said is so horrible.
She fidgets. Raige knows he needs to say something, but he has no idea what. Years of cocktail parties and social training have not prepared him for this. There are no words for this, except maybe, “no,” over and over again.
Finally, speaking very slowly so he can focus on the words and his voice won’t crack, he says, “My god. I think that’s the saddest thing I’ve ever heard.”
M.D. gapes at him. “Don’t pity me! It’s I who pity you! You and every other child who has to suffer through that mess you call puberty.”
Language deserts him again. All he can do now is stare at her as she gestures at him, tries to keep him looking at her while she tells him how great it is, being her. How now she never grows out of her clothes, never has to deal with getting kicked in the balls or getting a period, never has to worry.
M.D. throws out her arms. After their time in the forest, she’s tried to get him to believe a lot of impossible things, in a handful of different ways, but he’s never seen her look so earnest. “Honestly, milquetoast!” She says. “I’m the luckiest kid in the world!”
Raige shakes his head. He wants to grab her and tell her no, she’s wrong, they were wrong, all of this is wrong, but the words die in him. She’s obviously okay with it. Shouldn’t he let her be okay with it? After all, it’s her body, and maybe she didn’t get to choose what was done to it before, but she gets to choose what’s done to it now, and if she’s okay with it…
Raige drags his fingers back through his hair. The rationalizing doesn’t help. It’s wrong. Deep in the emotional, knee-jerk core of him, on a level he can’t explain, it’s wrong.
He almost wishes she hadn’t told him, because now he wants to chase down M.D.’s creators, and he wants to shake them, and he wants to demand they tell him what the fuck was wrong with their people, that they could do this to kids. To her.
He can’t keep from looking horrified, but M.D. completely misses why, because she asks, without the brass and sass, “Are you going to ditch now?”
He looks at her incredulously. Somehow, he finds it in him to joke; he has to or he’s going to melt down, and that doesn’t seem fair when it’s her who had the horrible things happen, not him. “Do you honestly think I want to be with Great Aunt Kara and her stupid little ferrets that badly?” He even manages a sickly chuckle. “God! I’m not that big on filial piety!”
She doesn’t look up from picking at her fingernails. “I figured that without some exotic alien girlfriend you might chicken out.”
Okay. Raige really wants to latch onto her now and somehow hug okayness into her, so she never says things like this ever again. But somehow, he doubts her psychic powers work that way. He takes a deep breath, lets it out, and tries to push aside the horror. That was then; this is now. She’s okay. They’re okay. She’s telling him not to freak him out, but to be honest. She cares about his opinion.
“Kid, I don’t care if you’re an exotic alien girlfriend or an exotic alien banana,” he says. “You’re you and I figure I like you anyway. I’m coming.”
And that makes her look up and smile at him. Not her “I’m going to insult you” smirk, or her “you want this used car” grin. Just a plain, “I like having you around” smile. And if she does, hell, Raige has followed her this far, he might as well follow her further.
As bratty as she can be, at least when she says she likes him, she honest-to-God means it.
Then she sighs melodramatically and asks him, “Well, if I’m going to have you around, I’ll have to ask. What’s your real name?”
After a moment, Raige says, “I’ll only say mine if you’ll say yours.”
They trade names, but they’ll only ever call each other M.D. and Raige. It’s just a formality, at this point, a way to cement the decision that no, they’re not going anywhere.
And horrible as the whole conversation was, Raige’s glad. Relieved, even. Life is throwing enough at him right now as a bachelor. God only knows what kind of girlfriend M.D. would’ve made, but he can’t deny that she will be—already is—the most interesting friend he’s ever had.
He’s okay with that.
3. Dressed Up (and down)
It’s obvious that Bobcat has tried to spruce M.D. up. For one thing, the clothes actually fit. He never realized how skinny she truly was; without her layers of bagginess, she looks as pathetic as a longhaired animal that’s been shaved—and about as pleased. She keeps fidgeting and tugging at her sleeves as though they’re too tight. And her hair is not only down, but also properly brushed. She keeps tossing her head trying to get it out of her face.
She does look… nice. Kind of. But mostly, she just looks uncomfortable. Raige has never seen her shoulders so defensively hunched. Her hair looks great, but that expression on her face… well.
When she jumps into the snowdrift, he suspects it’s as much to ruin her appearance as to celebrate her official promotion to junior healer.
When she claws her way out, soaked and shaking, Raige laughs and lifts a hank of wet hair out of her eyes, and she lets him get away with it. “Wet hair is very becoming on you,” he reassures.
To his surprise, she attempts to grin sweetly at him. It involves a lot of teeth. “Really? You think so?”
Taken aback, and suddenly embarrassed, he stammers something that goes nowhere, and she declares vindictively, “It looks a lot better on you!” and shoves him into the snow.
When he comes up, she’s doing a poorly coordinated, unholy-love-child-of-disco dance of victory, pointing and laughing at him. There’s a string of leaves on her shoulder, her tunic is clinging to her bony body, and she can’t dance to save her life.
She’s beautiful.
4. Stubborn
Raige has been back to normal life for less than a week, and he’s never felt so much longing for man-eating trees and dragons.
His dad thinks… well, never mind. The band kids think he’s useless. He’s way behind on his show music, everyone is constantly asking him questions, and all the answers he knows are wrong. His social life has never been all that great, but now it’s completely dead, because he can’t even begin to explain where he’s been all this time. He’s spent most of the past few days just trying not to cry too much.
It seems ridiculous, but he’s starting to really wonder if he spent the last two months wandering the Vaygo countryside, completely delusional. Just imagined the whole thing. It certainly feels crazy enough to be a brief psychotic episode. (The thought makes him laugh humorlessly; he never would’ve known that phrase but for M.D.)
Real as it may have been, the summer feels like a few bars of color and improv in the composition of his otherwise bland, rehearsed life, fast receding in his sight. It’s only been a few days, but he already feels in his gut that the adventure is over, with nothing for him to remember it by except psychological vocabulary words and how to say, “Don’t eat me!” and, “I don’t understand,” in Pidgin Sign. The whole thing already feels like a disjointed, madcap fever dream.
At least his marching practice keeps him busy. The monotonous repetition of steps, the same twenty measures over and over, the reassuring weight of the drum on his shoulders and chest, the sweltering heat of late Vaygo summer, the sweat on his skin, they’re all soothing. They all help keep him in a numb haze where he doesn’t have to think, or feel, or wonder.
While he’s out marching on the asphalt, beating his drum, nobody asks him questions. Nobody looks at him funny. He’s no longer Raige, possibly demented failure at life. He’s just Bass Drum Number Four, a cog in the metronomic machine of the percussion section. There’s just him and the beat, filling his ears and his mind, never judging, a constant companion, playing over and over in the same steady measure. One, two, three, four, dut, dut, dut, dut…
Eventually, he has to go home, but the songs stay in his mind.
He starts falling asleep with his headphones on, patting his beats against his chest. He starts dreaming in four/four time.
He doesn’t dream about Canandria, the Jaunter’s League, or Treehouse.
He starts staying late on afternoon rehearsals, practicing his steps alone across the parking lot. He tells everyone he’s catching up, but really, he’s just avoiding going home. Inside his head, the music plays on constant loop, never ending, only refining.
On the asphalt, everything narrows down to the beat. His headphones are on, pumping the music. It’s twenty beats faster than they’re playing now, but that’s okay, he’s adjusted. One, two, three, four, dut, dut, dut—
He sees Wendy waving like an air traffic controller and pulls his headphones down.
“Hey!” Wendy shouts. “Come on, or you’ll miss your ride!”
Raige sighs. “Okay, I’m coming.” He turns off his Walkman (portable CD players skip when he jogs), tucks it in his pocket, and trudges up to the band hall. Time to go back to reality.
He tries to keep his mind blank, full of nothing but music and heat and exhaustion, so he can delay thinking about going home. He nods at the other drummers, shuffles to the drum room, tucks his sticks into the pouch, and heaves off the drum to lift it into its alcove between Bass Drums Three and Five.
Except there’s a swarthy, golden-eyed face, right where his drum should be going, jumping out at him.
“Hiya, buddy boy!” It bellows.
Raige screams, drops his drum, and falls on his butt on the drum room floor.
M.D. climbs out of the shelf. Wherever she’s been, it must be one heck of a story—she’s covered in sand, bruises, and scorch marks. She smells like stale sweat, gasoline, and oddly, cigarettes. Her eyes have dark circles, her face looks pinched, and she holds one of her arms gingerly, as though it’s broken. More worryingly, she looks tired. Even… haunted. But her smile is real and that’s all that matters.
“God, you gave me a heart attack,” Raige breathes, and adds, “I never thought I’d see you again.”
And even with the wear and tear, she slides down the drum cases with attempted panache, stumbles, and declares, “Me? You never thought you’d see me again? C’mon, milquetoast, you know me; I always come back.”
He wants to hug her, but he also wants to cry. But she’s not into the whole physical contact thing, so he just fusses over her arm, while she claims it’s nothing and pretends she’s not in pain.
When she asks him to leave everything behind again, just for a little while, he says yes. Because she came back for him. She didn’t have his address, a map, or two functional arms, but she came back for him.
He leaves his Walkman behind. He won’t need it where he’s going.
5. On the Battlefield
M.D.’s taking off her herb belt.
“Run,” she orders.
It’s possibly the most sensible advice she’s ever given him. Raige is a pacifist with no powers, and he can run a four-minute mile. Still, part of him rebels against leaving his friend behind with her world’s equivalent of Darth Vader.
“You’re doing what she says?”
“I don’t trust want you hurt either.” She takes off her herb belt and slaps it into his hands. “Here. Hold on to this for me.” Like she’s ever coming back for it. “Now run.”
And she bolts towards where Number One waits, leaving him standing there.
She’s insane. Her wrist is still broken, she still hasn’t caught up on rest, she’s still beaten halfway to hell, and even if she weren’t, she’s no match for Number One. What’s she going to do? Wisecrack?
He hears her voice, can’t make out tone or words.
Oh God. He almost giggles. She’s doing just that, isn’t she?
But pride isn’t power. She has to know she hasn’t got a chance. Which means she’s buying him time, throwing herself headlong into danger so he can get away.
The belt’s surprisingly heavy. He squeezes, and feels something hard. One of the pocket flaps shift and he finds a pair of handcuffs. Trust M.D. to keep them.
Raige looks at the cuffs. His mind leaps into physics. Electricity, current, resistance—short-circuit. And M.D. and Number One’s powers are all based off electricity…
Bingo. He’s even lucky; M.D. left the cuffs open.
Raige pulls them out and takes a deep breath. He has no idea if this’ll work, but M.D.’s risking everything to buy him time. He’s not going to waste it.
6. Off the Battlefield
After the fight, M.D. sleeps for sixteen hours straight in one of Scorch and Flame’s hospital beds.
Raige has a hospital bed of his own, courtesy of Number One. Turns out she doesn’t need her hands to win a fight. He feels awful but also oddly good. He’s not sure why, but for the first time, he’s not panicking after something horrible has happened. He’s not scared out of his mind. For the moment, at least, he feels completely at peace.
It’s not that he has nothing to worry about. Oh, he does. School, M.D., Thomas. His dad. He should be worried. He should be eaten through with guilt.
But right now, he isn’t. Right now, he’s alive, and everyone else is alive, and that sounds like a huge success, right there. Everything else is icing.
He’s not worried about M.D. either, even if she is out cold and wrapped in bandages. If there’s one thing he’s learned by now, it’s that M.D. survives everything, and under the bruises and burns and exhaustion, she looks oddly peaceful. She’s not curled up in a tiny ball of tension, and she’s not tossing and turning, flailing in a nightmare. This time, she lies still, on her back. It’s like she knows she’s safe too, even though she’s unconscious.
At noon, she groans and opens her eyes.
Raige smiles. “You’re awake.” He’s too sleepy to joke.
“Not for long,” she mumbles, and her eyes slide to him. They’re bleary and unfocused, but her voice is still brassy, despite the slur. “Looks like you’re a hero now, milquetoast. How do you feel?”
For a moment, Raige doesn’t know what to say. Hero? Him? He’s not a hero. He’s a coward, the guy who ran away from home, who didn’t tell his dad why, who spent far too much time the past couple months panicking, crying, or trying not to. He doesn’t fight. He doesn’t win. Certainly not against the Lord High Poobah of Super-Soldierdom.
But the word feels… good. He’s not sure he believes it, but he does like it.
M.D. thinks he’s a hero. How does he feel?
“Very, very sick,” he finally says.
M.D. laughs, happy and triumphant and snorting.
All the small things can wait. Right now, stuck in the hospital with his best friend, sick as a dog, Raige feels great.
Six Ways Raige Liked M.D.
1. On a Pedestal
Raige is positive his brain will melt out of his ears. Sure, going to Great Aunt Kara’s place for a week isn’t his idea of a fun summer vacation, but pet ferrets aside, at least it’s predictable. Boring. Normal.
This? This is anything but normal. This is so far from normal that it’s off the scale—which is logarithmic. He still isn’t sure what happened—one moment, he was in the airport, and then next was plummeting through the air. Near as he can tell, he just can’t remember getting on the plane, and then it wrecked, even though there’s no wreckage anywhere, and he has nothing but a bruise on the temple to show for it. He’s stranded in what looks like the Canandria Forest (AKA the epicenter of nowhere) for the foreseeable future, where there may or may not be bears. There is no Great Aunt Kara, no ferrets, no cable TV, no indoor plumbing, god, no food…
And he is stranded here, of all places, with her, of all people. The kid, who seems to think that none of this is at all bizarre or freakish. Who seems to think that Raige is a few horns short of a band for reacting as though this is anything but the most everyday and usual of occurrences. Who responds to his panicked shriek of, “Where’s the fucking plane?” with “I don’t know,” and doesn’t seem to understand why he might find this answer at all lacking.
Raige has no idea what sort of life this girl must lead to be so blasé about all this, but it must be really something.
In no time, she’s searching his backpack for something to use as a fishing line, humming Weird Al Yankovic off-key, while Raige is still busy cresting his first panic attack. All he can do is stand there, hyperventilate, and think that, oh God, he’s going to die. Starvation. Exposure. Eaten by bears. Why is she not worried?
“What should we do now?” He finally asks.
He doesn’t know what he expects. Maybe for her to suddenly drop everything and howl, “Oh God, you’re right, we’re going to die!” the way he feels she ought to be doing. Reaffirm that yes, all is lost, they’re doomed, so he stops feeling like he’s overreacting.
She doesn’t do any of that. Instead, she rolls her eyes at him and says with exasperation, “What do you think people do when they crash-land in a forest?”
He can’t say that he’s ever thought about such a thing before, but it’s okay, because apparently she has.
“We make camp.” And shaking her head as though to say, ‘God give me strength,’ she stomps off to find water, leaving him there.
He stares blankly after her. There are no words for her behavior. Again, he wonders, why isn’t she worried?
And his mind responds, because she knows what to do.
He pauses. The panic’s still there, but it’s no longer terminal. She knows something he doesn’t. Something that makes her see this as a significant but not-too-worrisome setback, instead of certain death. And though that might be insane, he has to admit, it’s probably a lot more conducive to survival.
Maybe he’s overreacting. Maybe this situation really is as survivable as she’s acting. Maybe, if he just does what she says, everything will be fine. Whatever her reasoning is, he is now positive that she knows what to do, and as long as he follows her, maybe her confidence will rub off on him.
As of now, she is his favorite girl in the world.
2. Off a Pedestal
Raige never intended for M.D. to ever find out he was crushing on her. There is a time and place to discuss this kind of thing, and stranded in the middle of a bear-infested forest in a parallel dimension with a talking cat is not the time or place.
But it comes out, thanks to M.D.’s whacked-out psychic powers that work only at the most inconvenient times. He’s starting to suspect that God is laughing at him.
Raige knows the moment M.D. finds out, because she starts staring at him with a look of flabbergasted horror that would be funny, if it wasn’t directed at him.
He knows the explosion is coming, but he still plays dumb. “Is there a bear behind me?” He asks politely. Like nothing has gone wrong. Like he hasn’t noticed a thing. Like M.D. actually possesses some semblance of subtlety and social graces.
She shakes her head, still staring at him.
He pretends to look over his shoulder for a bear—really, he’s making sure none are around to point and laugh when this goes horribly wrong. Or Bobcat, who’d probably try to give him well-meaning advice but only succeed in mortifying him further.
M.D. doesn’t seem like she’s going to stop gaping at him any time soon, so he might as well bite the bullet and drag it out into the open. Let her explode at him, reject him, and be done with it. “What? Why’re you looking at me like that?”
It actually takes her a while to speak. When she does, she says only one word, about an octave higher than she usually speaks.
“Urraaaagh!”
Couldn’t have said it better himself.
When M.D. verbally explodes, she talks loud, wordy, and fast, firing off verbal blasts like a human scattergun, as though if she says enough things, one of them will do the job. Random phrases stand out from the noise: “No, no, no!” “You have no taste!” “This wasn’t supposed to happen!” “I’m an alien, Raige. Doesn’t that deter you?” “Come on, milquetoast, for all you know I might make you pregnant!”
Hold the phone. “Whoa, whoa, whoa, who said anything about pregnancy here?” He says, raising his hands. He sure hopes it wasn’t him.
For a blissful moment, she is silent. The look on her face is priceless. After a moment of aborted stammering, she points at him and accuses, “It’s all your fault, you started it!”
She crosses her arms and glowers off into the distance, and Raige figures it out. M.D., survivalist extraordinaire, has met her proverbial maker. She knows that, and she knows that he knows that. And it’s killing her.
Suddenly, Raige doesn’t feel hurt anymore. Suddenly the whole thing just seems ridiculous and hilarious. After being chased by bears, dumped in another dimension, and surviving a not-plane accident, this is what’s making her run around like a beheaded chicken.
It makes him feel oddly competent.
Raige rubs his temples. The bruise has mostly healed by now, so he can’t blame the developing headache on it. She catches it, and asks, “Should I shut up now?”
“That might be a good idea.”
Astoundingly, she actually winces and obeys, looking down at the ground.
For a while, they just sit there. Raige sighs. Well. This is going just great. Unfortunately, he can’t think of anything to say to make things better. Of course he knows she’s an alien (sort of) and a runaway genetic construct; when he found out, his sexuality promptly decided it was flexible. And despite her best efforts, she has yet to annoy his attraction into submission—though he must give her credit for trying.
All he can think of to say is, “Let’s just be friends,” but he has never heard of that actually working.
Then M.D. mumbles, without all the sarcasm and whining and pseudo-intellectualism, “If it makes you feel any better, I like you too.”
Raige looks up, and she has her face buried in her arms.
He pats her shoulder. “I knew what you meant.”
Apparently she mistakes his smile for mockery, because she raises her head, scowling at him. “It’s not funny.”
“Yeah it is,” he says. “Face it kid, you’re stuck with me.”
He expects a wisecrack bemoaning her fate, but instead, her expression grows serious—and a bit sheepish. She fiddles with her gloves. “Look Raige, I need to come straight with you. I haven’t quite told you everything.”
For a moment, Raige’s brain locks. Oh God. She’s already told him about parallel dimensions and man-eating bears. What could possibly be left? Does she eat babies? Does her species explode every Sunday on the new moon? What?
“When I said I was barely female, I was being literal.”
If she’s going to tell him she’s transgendered, Raige will be more than happy to inform her that after realizing he’s into aliens, he doesn’t think he’s going to be phased by his attraction to anything.
“Apparently I’ve been altered a bit.”
Altered?
“They fixed me.”
“Like… a computer?”
“Like a dog.”
Raige’s brain 404s.
Apparently she misreads his face and takes it for incredulity; she stands up, pulls her shirts up, and nudges her jeans down. Which would normally make him squirm, except she’s showing him a surgical straight scar across her hips.
Raige just stares at her. There are no words for this—this feeling that this must be one of M.D.’s sicker jokes, even though she isn’t keeping steady eye contact and looks nervous. It has to be a joke, because people, even on other planets, do not behave this way. They don’t—
“See?” She points. “Uterus, tubes, eggs… all that stuff. Removed a long, long time ago. I’m about as sexless as you can get.” And she drops her shirts down and shrugs. “So Raige, I’ve got to be honest. If you ever want to live a healthy life, you won’t want me as a girlfriend. Just give the whole idea up.”
Raige stares at her stomach, then at her face. She can’t hold his eyes. Her arms are clamped across her chest, her shoulders hunched.
Raige doesn’t know what he wants to do more: cry, hug her, or shake her and hope her stupid psychic powers make her understand why what she’s just said is so horrible.
She fidgets. Raige knows he needs to say something, but he has no idea what. Years of cocktail parties and social training have not prepared him for this. There are no words for this, except maybe, “no,” over and over again.
Finally, speaking very slowly so he can focus on the words and his voice won’t crack, he says, “My god. I think that’s the saddest thing I’ve ever heard.”
M.D. gapes at him. “Don’t pity me! It’s I who pity you! You and every other child who has to suffer through that mess you call puberty.”
Language deserts him again. All he can do now is stare at her as she gestures at him, tries to keep him looking at her while she tells him how great it is, being her. How now she never grows out of her clothes, never has to deal with getting kicked in the balls or getting a period, never has to worry.
M.D. throws out her arms. After their time in the forest, she’s tried to get him to believe a lot of impossible things, in a handful of different ways, but he’s never seen her look so earnest. “Honestly, milquetoast!” She says. “I’m the luckiest kid in the world!”
Raige shakes his head. He wants to grab her and tell her no, she’s wrong, they were wrong, all of this is wrong, but the words die in him. She’s obviously okay with it. Shouldn’t he let her be okay with it? After all, it’s her body, and maybe she didn’t get to choose what was done to it before, but she gets to choose what’s done to it now, and if she’s okay with it…
Raige drags his fingers back through his hair. The rationalizing doesn’t help. It’s wrong. Deep in the emotional, knee-jerk core of him, on a level he can’t explain, it’s wrong.
He almost wishes she hadn’t told him, because now he wants to chase down M.D.’s creators, and he wants to shake them, and he wants to demand they tell him what the fuck was wrong with their people, that they could do this to kids. To her.
He can’t keep from looking horrified, but M.D. completely misses why, because she asks, without the brass and sass, “Are you going to ditch now?”
He looks at her incredulously. Somehow, he finds it in him to joke; he has to or he’s going to melt down, and that doesn’t seem fair when it’s her who had the horrible things happen, not him. “Do you honestly think I want to be with Great Aunt Kara and her stupid little ferrets that badly?” He even manages a sickly chuckle. “God! I’m not that big on filial piety!”
She doesn’t look up from picking at her fingernails. “I figured that without some exotic alien girlfriend you might chicken out.”
Okay. Raige really wants to latch onto her now and somehow hug okayness into her, so she never says things like this ever again. But somehow, he doubts her psychic powers work that way. He takes a deep breath, lets it out, and tries to push aside the horror. That was then; this is now. She’s okay. They’re okay. She’s telling him not to freak him out, but to be honest. She cares about his opinion.
“Kid, I don’t care if you’re an exotic alien girlfriend or an exotic alien banana,” he says. “You’re you and I figure I like you anyway. I’m coming.”
And that makes her look up and smile at him. Not her “I’m going to insult you” smirk, or her “you want this used car” grin. Just a plain, “I like having you around” smile. And if she does, hell, Raige has followed her this far, he might as well follow her further.
As bratty as she can be, at least when she says she likes him, she honest-to-God means it.
Then she sighs melodramatically and asks him, “Well, if I’m going to have you around, I’ll have to ask. What’s your real name?”
After a moment, Raige says, “I’ll only say mine if you’ll say yours.”
They trade names, but they’ll only ever call each other M.D. and Raige. It’s just a formality, at this point, a way to cement the decision that no, they’re not going anywhere.
And horrible as the whole conversation was, Raige’s glad. Relieved, even. Life is throwing enough at him right now as a bachelor. God only knows what kind of girlfriend M.D. would’ve made, but he can’t deny that she will be—already is—the most interesting friend he’s ever had.
He’s okay with that.
3. Dressed Up (and down)
It’s obvious that Bobcat has tried to spruce M.D. up. For one thing, the clothes actually fit. He never realized how skinny she truly was; without her layers of bagginess, she looks as pathetic as a longhaired animal that’s been shaved—and about as pleased. She keeps fidgeting and tugging at her sleeves as though they’re too tight. And her hair is not only down, but also properly brushed. She keeps tossing her head trying to get it out of her face.
She does look… nice. Kind of. But mostly, she just looks uncomfortable. Raige has never seen her shoulders so defensively hunched. Her hair looks great, but that expression on her face… well.
When she jumps into the snowdrift, he suspects it’s as much to ruin her appearance as to celebrate her official promotion to junior healer.
When she claws her way out, soaked and shaking, Raige laughs and lifts a hank of wet hair out of her eyes, and she lets him get away with it. “Wet hair is very becoming on you,” he reassures.
To his surprise, she attempts to grin sweetly at him. It involves a lot of teeth. “Really? You think so?”
Taken aback, and suddenly embarrassed, he stammers something that goes nowhere, and she declares vindictively, “It looks a lot better on you!” and shoves him into the snow.
When he comes up, she’s doing a poorly coordinated, unholy-love-child-of-disco dance of victory, pointing and laughing at him. There’s a string of leaves on her shoulder, her tunic is clinging to her bony body, and she can’t dance to save her life.
She’s beautiful.
4. Stubborn
Raige has been back to normal life for less than a week, and he’s never felt so much longing for man-eating trees and dragons.
His dad thinks… well, never mind. The band kids think he’s useless. He’s way behind on his show music, everyone is constantly asking him questions, and all the answers he knows are wrong. His social life has never been all that great, but now it’s completely dead, because he can’t even begin to explain where he’s been all this time. He’s spent most of the past few days just trying not to cry too much.
It seems ridiculous, but he’s starting to really wonder if he spent the last two months wandering the Vaygo countryside, completely delusional. Just imagined the whole thing. It certainly feels crazy enough to be a brief psychotic episode. (The thought makes him laugh humorlessly; he never would’ve known that phrase but for M.D.)
Real as it may have been, the summer feels like a few bars of color and improv in the composition of his otherwise bland, rehearsed life, fast receding in his sight. It’s only been a few days, but he already feels in his gut that the adventure is over, with nothing for him to remember it by except psychological vocabulary words and how to say, “Don’t eat me!” and, “I don’t understand,” in Pidgin Sign. The whole thing already feels like a disjointed, madcap fever dream.
At least his marching practice keeps him busy. The monotonous repetition of steps, the same twenty measures over and over, the reassuring weight of the drum on his shoulders and chest, the sweltering heat of late Vaygo summer, the sweat on his skin, they’re all soothing. They all help keep him in a numb haze where he doesn’t have to think, or feel, or wonder.
While he’s out marching on the asphalt, beating his drum, nobody asks him questions. Nobody looks at him funny. He’s no longer Raige, possibly demented failure at life. He’s just Bass Drum Number Four, a cog in the metronomic machine of the percussion section. There’s just him and the beat, filling his ears and his mind, never judging, a constant companion, playing over and over in the same steady measure. One, two, three, four, dut, dut, dut, dut…
Eventually, he has to go home, but the songs stay in his mind.
He starts falling asleep with his headphones on, patting his beats against his chest. He starts dreaming in four/four time.
He doesn’t dream about Canandria, the Jaunter’s League, or Treehouse.
He starts staying late on afternoon rehearsals, practicing his steps alone across the parking lot. He tells everyone he’s catching up, but really, he’s just avoiding going home. Inside his head, the music plays on constant loop, never ending, only refining.
On the asphalt, everything narrows down to the beat. His headphones are on, pumping the music. It’s twenty beats faster than they’re playing now, but that’s okay, he’s adjusted. One, two, three, four, dut, dut, dut—
He sees Wendy waving like an air traffic controller and pulls his headphones down.
“Hey!” Wendy shouts. “Come on, or you’ll miss your ride!”
Raige sighs. “Okay, I’m coming.” He turns off his Walkman (portable CD players skip when he jogs), tucks it in his pocket, and trudges up to the band hall. Time to go back to reality.
He tries to keep his mind blank, full of nothing but music and heat and exhaustion, so he can delay thinking about going home. He nods at the other drummers, shuffles to the drum room, tucks his sticks into the pouch, and heaves off the drum to lift it into its alcove between Bass Drums Three and Five.
Except there’s a swarthy, golden-eyed face, right where his drum should be going, jumping out at him.
“Hiya, buddy boy!” It bellows.
Raige screams, drops his drum, and falls on his butt on the drum room floor.
M.D. climbs out of the shelf. Wherever she’s been, it must be one heck of a story—she’s covered in sand, bruises, and scorch marks. She smells like stale sweat, gasoline, and oddly, cigarettes. Her eyes have dark circles, her face looks pinched, and she holds one of her arms gingerly, as though it’s broken. More worryingly, she looks tired. Even… haunted. But her smile is real and that’s all that matters.
“God, you gave me a heart attack,” Raige breathes, and adds, “I never thought I’d see you again.”
And even with the wear and tear, she slides down the drum cases with attempted panache, stumbles, and declares, “Me? You never thought you’d see me again? C’mon, milquetoast, you know me; I always come back.”
He wants to hug her, but he also wants to cry. But she’s not into the whole physical contact thing, so he just fusses over her arm, while she claims it’s nothing and pretends she’s not in pain.
When she asks him to leave everything behind again, just for a little while, he says yes. Because she came back for him. She didn’t have his address, a map, or two functional arms, but she came back for him.
He leaves his Walkman behind. He won’t need it where he’s going.
5. On the Battlefield
M.D.’s taking off her herb belt.
“Run,” she orders.
It’s possibly the most sensible advice she’s ever given him. Raige is a pacifist with no powers, and he can run a four-minute mile. Still, part of him rebels against leaving his friend behind with her world’s equivalent of Darth Vader.
“You’re doing what she says?”
“I don’t trust want you hurt either.” She takes off her herb belt and slaps it into his hands. “Here. Hold on to this for me.” Like she’s ever coming back for it. “Now run.”
And she bolts towards where Number One waits, leaving him standing there.
She’s insane. Her wrist is still broken, she still hasn’t caught up on rest, she’s still beaten halfway to hell, and even if she weren’t, she’s no match for Number One. What’s she going to do? Wisecrack?
He hears her voice, can’t make out tone or words.
Oh God. He almost giggles. She’s doing just that, isn’t she?
But pride isn’t power. She has to know she hasn’t got a chance. Which means she’s buying him time, throwing herself headlong into danger so he can get away.
The belt’s surprisingly heavy. He squeezes, and feels something hard. One of the pocket flaps shift and he finds a pair of handcuffs. Trust M.D. to keep them.
Raige looks at the cuffs. His mind leaps into physics. Electricity, current, resistance—short-circuit. And M.D. and Number One’s powers are all based off electricity…
Bingo. He’s even lucky; M.D. left the cuffs open.
Raige pulls them out and takes a deep breath. He has no idea if this’ll work, but M.D.’s risking everything to buy him time. He’s not going to waste it.
6. Off the Battlefield
After the fight, M.D. sleeps for sixteen hours straight in one of Scorch and Flame’s hospital beds.
Raige has a hospital bed of his own, courtesy of Number One. Turns out she doesn’t need her hands to win a fight. He feels awful but also oddly good. He’s not sure why, but for the first time, he’s not panicking after something horrible has happened. He’s not scared out of his mind. For the moment, at least, he feels completely at peace.
It’s not that he has nothing to worry about. Oh, he does. School, M.D., Thomas. His dad. He should be worried. He should be eaten through with guilt.
But right now, he isn’t. Right now, he’s alive, and everyone else is alive, and that sounds like a huge success, right there. Everything else is icing.
He’s not worried about M.D. either, even if she is out cold and wrapped in bandages. If there’s one thing he’s learned by now, it’s that M.D. survives everything, and under the bruises and burns and exhaustion, she looks oddly peaceful. She’s not curled up in a tiny ball of tension, and she’s not tossing and turning, flailing in a nightmare. This time, she lies still, on her back. It’s like she knows she’s safe too, even though she’s unconscious.
At noon, she groans and opens her eyes.
Raige smiles. “You’re awake.” He’s too sleepy to joke.
“Not for long,” she mumbles, and her eyes slide to him. They’re bleary and unfocused, but her voice is still brassy, despite the slur. “Looks like you’re a hero now, milquetoast. How do you feel?”
For a moment, Raige doesn’t know what to say. Hero? Him? He’s not a hero. He’s a coward, the guy who ran away from home, who didn’t tell his dad why, who spent far too much time the past couple months panicking, crying, or trying not to. He doesn’t fight. He doesn’t win. Certainly not against the Lord High Poobah of Super-Soldierdom.
But the word feels… good. He’s not sure he believes it, but he does like it.
M.D. thinks he’s a hero. How does he feel?
“Very, very sick,” he finally says.
M.D. laughs, happy and triumphant and snorting.
All the small things can wait. Right now, stuck in the hospital with his best friend, sick as a dog, Raige feels great.