I'm Not From Earth - 25. Twenty Five

t w e n t y f i v e

"What about father?" Rover asked, taking Slade's hand and allowing himself to be hoisted up.

"He's fine, and we'll get out through the window so he won't know where to follow. He won't be out cold for long, as I didn't really hurt him."

"Really?" Rover asked doubtfully, staring at his father's prone figure. From this angle, he seemed almost tranquil in his sleep, though worn out and stress ravaged his face was. Rover's fingers twitched, and he wasn't sure whether he wanted to give his father an extra kick or a quick embrace before he left. Embrace! Rover snorted. His father had just tried to kill him, and here was Rover feeling affectionate towards him. Love is messed up, Rover thought, and as he said it, realized that he had never hated his father. He couldn't, because he knew deep in his heart that his father, though he had a funny way of showing it, loved him too.

He turned his gaze to the silent Slade, the edges of his sharp profile gleaming like a blade in the moonlight, and laid a hand on his shoulder. Slade turned his eyes to Rover's hand, his expression holding a slight surprise, perhaps at the contact that Rover never initiated, and looked up questioningly.

"Let's go," Rover said.

Slade frowned, pointed lamely at his father, opened his mouth for about a second, and then concluded it all with an awkward nod. "Alright, sir." He hesitated before turning around and bending his knees, his arms behind him in that familiar gesture of proferring his back. Rover grinned, and jumped on. Slade coughed, chuckled, ran straight at the window and skidding violently to halt when he realized that it was closed. He apologized sheepishly, slid it open to its full length, and jumped out.

The familiar feelings of dropping hit Rover at once: wind against his face, gravity tugging at his hold on Slade, adrenaline coursing like molten metal through his arteries. This time however, there wasn't a single trace of fear. Rover savoured it all. He felt a rush every time they bounced upon a rooftop. He counted each time Slade landed testily on a branch. He smiled when they started birds from their sleeping perches and bats from their midnight hunts.

Not once did Rover bother asking where they were going, and not once did Slade ask whether or not Rover was feeling nauseous or if he was doing alright. The gentle horns of traffic and the breeze were the only things that could be heard, the forever maze of bright windows of light and the outlines of black sky scrapers the only things possessing their visions. Slade's comforting presence was the only thing that Rover could feel; the warmth of his skin beneath the fabric of his shirt, the warmth that seeped through Rover's fingers and deep into his chest, so warm it was hot, so hot that it set the very strings of his heart in a fire that was as intense as it was enduring. And even though Rover did not know what this feeling was, not once did he stop to think and question it.

A few more drops and jumps, and then Slade stopped. Rover climbed down his back, staggering a few steps. They were settled on top of another concrete rooftop, this one vast and spacious.

Rover hesitated, then walked cautiously to the edge and looked down. A wave of painful dizziness washed through him and he took a few steps back, shaken by the vast, magnificent sea of buildings. Slade's grin was illuminated by the billions of lights below.

"The highest tower," Slade said quietly.

Rover searched for something to say, but came up with nothing. So instead he asked a question.

"Why are we here?"

A pause.

"Because they're coming."

Slade spoke it with such casualness that Rover totally didn't comprehend the words at first, but then he froze when he saw his friend's expression. An array of emotions fluttered across Slade's face and all of them were blatantly evident, unlike how he had ever expressed himself. His brows furrowed in worry, his lips trembled in a hint of a smile, the dimples in his cheeks flashed in uncertainty and he could have been grimacing or grinning. His eyes shone with both excitement and... Was that fear? Rover wondered.

"Are you sure?" Rover asked, and Slade threw a shaking hand to his brow.

"I don't know -- no, I do know," he said, and his words were slurred and rushed. "You remember what you said before right? After I pulled you from the ship and woke you up? You said that the thing -- what happened to the crystal ball..."

"A distress signal." Rover nodded slowly, still unsure. "Did you -- ?"

Slade shook his head. "You were right about what happened to the first ship I think. That one was a distress signal, but I didn't anything like that this time, or you would have been able to as well -- and I'm guessing, probably the rest of the city. But I was just sitting in bed, at home, and my head just filled with... with the thoughts of some other presence, and I knew immediately that it was --"

"Another ship?" Rover breathed, and suddenly he was sharing shivers and exchanging grins with Slade.

"Yeah," Slade said. "I felt it -- I can't describe it to you, but you felt something like it already when you first saw the crashed one -- but this time its tons more powerful and new ship is coming and its full of people and its coming here to take me. Rover, its coming here! I'm going home!"

Rover bit his lip and he tried to imagine a shining crystal disc hovering over his hometown, but instead wound up dazed with the effort. The burning feeling in his chest suddenly escalated tenfold -- if that was even possible -- and it was eating away at Rover insides. Was it excitement, or fear of what could happen next? Was it anger or loneliness? Was it... could it be...?

"Rover."

"Uhm, yeah?"

Slade didn't reply, only returned with a look in his eyes so intense and deep Rover could not blink to break the stare. "What is it?" Rover asked.

"Will you come with me?"

"What? To where?"

Slade placed a strong hand on Rover's shoulder and said, the words spoken nothing by two syllables trembling on his lips.

"My home."

*