D. MacHale - The Soldiers of Halla

Dad said, “On each territory it was the job of the previous Travelers to mentor the new Travelers. To guide them and to give them a moral compass, based on their particular world, that would guide them during their difficult mission.”

I saw something on the edge of my vision. This time when I looked, I thought I caught a fleeting image, far in the distance. It looked like Kasha walking upright with another klee. It was Seegen. Her father. The Traveler from Eelong before her. Was she getting the same talk I was? Were all the other Travelers here in this barren, forsaken place learning of their true history?

“So the Travelers before my generation didn’t battle Saint Dane?” I asked.

“No,” Dad said with certainty. “They were preparing you and the others for the battle.”

I nodded, letting this sink in.

“But you guys aren’t Travelers. Or are you?”

“Not exactly,” Dad answered. “But we are the same as you. It was planned for you to have a Traveler mentor, but circumstances changed. Saint Dane saw to that. He was already at work before you became a physical part of Second Earth. Things had to change. We became your family, and Press was given the task of mentoring you.”

“So who bailed? Who was supposed to be my mentor if it wasn’t you guys or Uncle Press?”

“Alexander Naymeer,” Dad said flatly.

It was a good thing I was sitting down.

Naymeer was definitely a Traveler. But like Nevva Winter, he was corrupted by Saint Dane.

“Do you know what happened to him?” I asked tentatively. I hoped they didn’t, since what happened to him was that I had killed him. That was the kind of nasty tidbit you wanted to keep from your family.

“I told you,” Shannon said with a hint of thirteen-year-old impatience. “We know it all.”

So much for keeping things from my family. I jumped up and paced nervously. Though I had wanted to know the truth for so long, hearing it wasn’t easy. It was a lot to get my head around, and we were just getting started.

“Saint Dane told me we were illusions,” I said. “I don’t know, maybe I’m in denial, but it’s kind of hard to accept that none of us are actually real.”

“Because we are real!” Mom said with passion. She quickly stepped forward and took both my hands. “I told you before, sweetheart, the love we have for you, and that I know you have for us, isn’t a fantasy. Or a mirage. All that happened before you left Second Earth was reality. Everything we did. Everything we shared. It was real. We were given a gift. We spent more than fourteen years living on Earth, experiencing all that world had to offer. That can never be taken away from us. We were as human as anyone else.”

“But not anymore?” I asked.

She didn’t answer. At least not with words. Her sad eyes said enough.

It was an odd feeling to know that my family had known the truth all along and had been keeping it from me. I guess that was all part of the deal, but still. They were my family! Mom and Dad taught me not to lie. As it turned out, they were lying to me every day.

“You couldn’t know,” Mom said, as if reading my mind. “I’m sorry that we kept this all from you, but you needed to be a part of Second Earth. It was all about your being a normal person with the perspective and experiences of your territory. You were fighting for the people of Second Earth. In order to do that, you needed to believe you were one of them.”

I looked up at the starry sky, watching the colorful, charged clouds flying by. It was beautiful. Though as spectacular as that sight was, the ground around us was a total contrast. It was dark. Bleak. Desolate.

“What is this place?” I continued. “I’m afraid you’re going to tell me we’re really little green aliens from the planet Nimrod or something.”

When I looked down at my mom for her answer, I blinked. She stood in front of me, holding my hands, but I could see through her. Literally. I could see Shannon and Marley right through my mom.

“Mom?” I gasped.

“It’s all right,” she answered soothingly.

It wasn’t all right. Mom was disappearing. Her hands no longer had substance. I quickly glanced to Dad and Shannon. They too were flickering, as if they were lights that were slowly running out of power. Dad walked toward us, wavering between solid and transparent.

“I told you that Solara wasn’t always like this,” he said soberly. Sadly. “This is what Saint Dane has wrought. His only hope of controlling Halla is by destroying all you see around you. Or at least destroying what it should be.”

I heard a quick bark from Marley. When I looked to my dog, he was gone. Disappeared.

“What’s happening?” I asked in a panic.

Dad said, “Our ability to exist as physical beings comes from all that surrounds us here. We are fed by the essence of Halla. It’s that very essence that Saint Dane has been methodically destroying.”

This was all getting a bit too cosmic for me. I needed answers, and it didn’t look as if Mom and Dad were going to be around much longer to give them. Shannon jumped up, ran to me, and kissed me on the cheek. It felt like nothing more than a soft, sweet breeze. She was nearly gone.

“I miss you, Bibs,” she said. “Don’t worry about us. Kick some ass, all right? We’ll be watching.”

She had called me Bibs since she was a baby and couldn’t pronounce Bobby. That had to have been real, right? I reached out for her, but too late. She’d disappeared. My sister was gone. Again. In the sky above me, I heard what sounded like rumbling thunder. I glanced up to see one of the dark clouds suddenly glow bright red.

“Mom?” I gasped in desperation.

My parents stood together. They were nearly gone.

“This is right, Bobby,” Mom said reassuringly. “You don’t need us. We only came to see you again, and let you know that we’re fine. That you’re fine. You don’t have to worry about us any longer.”

“But… where are you going?”

“Nowhere,” Dad answered. “And everywhere. Shannon is right. We’ll be watching. Your job isn’t done just yet.”

“You can’t go!” I cried. “I’ve got more questions now than before!”

“We love you, Bobby,” Mom said. “We’re proud of you, and maybe most important, we believe in you.”

“I don’t want to lose you again!” I screamed.

“Then make things right,” Dad said.

A moment later they were gone. I had lost my family. Again. At least, I thought I had. In the dark sky above I saw two more dark clouds crackle with light. One flashed yellow, the other deep blue. What the heck was that about? I found myself standing alone on a shelf of gray rock on a desolate world that was supposedly my birthplace. Not at all how I thought the day would play out. But was I truly alone? As I said before, I felt the presence of life around me. It was more like a feeling of energy, or spirit, than anything physical. I know, that’s weird. It felt weird to me, too. But I wasn’t afraid. Not even when I caught glimpses of figures that could have been people who floated by. I kept turning, hoping to bring one into focus, but that didn’t happen. Could one of them have been Shannon, or my mom or dad? Was that what they meant when they said they weren’t going anywhere? Were they still right beside me, only in some kind of spectral form? Or had they flown up and become colorful clouds in the sky?

Solara. What was this place? Where the heck was this place? Okay, when was this place?

“Guys?” I called out. “You still here?”

I didn’t expect an answer, but I got one.

“Who you talking to?” came a deep voice.

I spun to see Uncle Press standing a few yards from me, with his hands on his hips and a smile on his face.