We will now follow exactly what the video game camera follows for a while, because I feel like it and you’d reach that conclusion anyway. There was no sound coming from the speaker, other than what was a direct result of what was happening on the screen and a distant noise, like rain over a mile away, keeping something at bay.

“Wait, a cutscene with no music? That’s very strange.”

“That’s just the beginning.”

It followed a dirty blond boy’s back down a corridor, composed of grey walls and simple doors - like a dorm of sorts. A man with a long black beard and a sleepy face peeked out from one of the doors and yawned as the boy passed by. He turned at the end of the corridor and climbed up a rusty ladder, emerging in a common room with a football table, several non-football tables and their respective chairs, and a handful of punching bags in a corner, employed by sweaty men. Familiar to this environment, our guy passed by a group of thugs playing cards and headed straight for a second ladder on the other side of the room. He climbed up into a place barely big enough for two people, and one of them was the guard of the single door, a bald man in a faded red tunic, strapped by a large belt with a bronze buckle engraved with a soaring eagle, sitting on a chair with a machine gun beside him. He looked up briefly at the boy when he heard him coming up the ladder and nodded at him, granting him passage.

The final room was small, completely closed off from the outer world save from a gap in the wall, through which the alien sunlight gave the room an ominous glow. It held nothing but a headless mannequin, whose right arm held a strange device. Wiithout losing time to identify it, the boy took out his vest and grey turtleneck, exposing the scared skin of his back, and put the clothes on the mannequin’s empty arm.

“What sort of male protagonist would he be without scars?”

He unstrapped the buckles of the item from the fake torso and pulled it off. Up close, the camera revealed it to be three blue straps connecting a black glove to a simple buckle, and to a triangle shaped translucent object. The boy put the glove on his left hand, and gave the strap three twists on his arm, promptly and mechanically, as if he had done it for years. The strap bifurcated on his shoulder, and one half disappeared to the front. He reached out with his arm for the translucent device hanging behind his back and directed its tip to the back of his neck. Recognizing the spot, the device beeped, and three fine needles emerged from each side to pierce it. Shuddering for a moment, boy then reached for the remainder of the strap, pulled it under his right arm and fastened the buckle round his torso. Once finished, he quickly put the turtleneck back on, carefully covering the now luminescent yellowish device.

He grabbed the vest and left the room, retracing his steps to the common room where the same men still played cards and worked on the punching bags. Ignoring either group, once he found a corner to call his own, he produced a white sphere from his vest and, letting it linger on his hand for a moment, contemplating his decisions, he finally spared it a glance and commanded it:

“Form change.”

The sphere stretched into a black pole, decorated with bright reliefs at one end, pendants of a star and two moons in the middle, and a curved blade like the crescent moon at the other end. The guy held the newly formed scythe with both hands and hit the floor with its base. All the ornaments and colours of the scythe fell off, as if water shaken, leaving it white and barren, with a pool of dust in its shadow. Repelled by the floor, this dust rose into the air, slowly taking form and moving away from the hilt of the weapon. It solidified into an almost imperceptible skeleton, organs, muscle and fur, forming a very solid cat, almost as big as a dog, in black fur with yellow patches. It’s forehead forsook the black entirely, shining brightest of them all. The cat turned to face the boy, now crouched beside it, and allowed itself to rub under his palm, content and carefree.

Waiting of any sort in a cutscene is redundant and only makes the player angry, so only a few moments later loud techno music echoed from the screen. The boy rummaged around his vest for something that he took into his ear, and the audience was finally able of seeing his face.

His proud, amber coloured eyes were the only thing that saved him from being a train wreck – his face was a bit skeletal and creepy, with prominent cheek bones and a long nose, and his hair was impossibly unkempt, as if he had cut it himself with a butcher’s knife and no mirror in a mile’s radius. The most peculiar thing, however, was it seemed all of skin was covered in a fine layer of bright white hair.

Shame I couldn’t confirm that when we were together before, but I don’t remember anything of the sort.

"Call received."

"Are you ready?" A mechanical voice asked.

"Yes."

"Good. Everything’s setup on our end. You only need to remember your part of the deal."

"The Venatio payment and as many Bugs as I can get my hands on. You'll have them."

"I appreciate the fact that you don't ask questions."

"What good is asking a question if the answer isn't going to be useful?"

"With that mindset you'll go very far."

"Let’s get this over with."

"You’ll find me in an electronics shop in Panza Street. Tell the clerk who you are."

He finished the call and stood up, signalling the cat to follow him. Then, after finally putting on his vest, he produced something else from it, a small box with two buttons, and, after musing at it for a moment, pressed the first one.

A loud bang echoed on the building, and he hurried his step, letting the cat trot by his side as he made his out way out and keeping the detonator ready on his hand. Most who ran past him didn't even acknowledge he was there, more concerned for the cause of the blast and containing whatever damage was to be found.

Suddenly one of them did notice he was going against the flow and tried reaching for his arm to stop him. He nimbly stepped to the side, and, with a snap of his finger, the cat was flying towards the man's head and the boy was free to continue. With another click, the cat returned to his side and the man fell to the floor, grabbing hold of his unrecognizable face.

Soon there was no one else in his way, and he burst open a heavy door, letting the sunlight shine in his face with all its glory. He was standing on the patio of a compound buried inside a canyon, stretching its two arms further in, tied together by an imposing green metal gate.

As soon as he stepped out into the light, a siren yelled across the patio, and the gate started to open. The boy ran among the wall, ignoring the assortment of strange, wheel-less vehicles nearby until he found an old looking motorcycle. In the blink of an eye the blade of his weapon had found its way to the cat’s side, but it wasn’t impaled. Instead, the creature turned into the same dust particles that had made it in the first place. As they found its way back to the scythe, the boy vaulted in the motorcycle and pressed his right hand into the dashboard, making it turn on and scan it. Once it recognized him, the motor kicked in, the camera turned all the way to the face of the compound, and the pressed the second switch on the detonator.

Just as the motorbike sped away, taking the boy away from the camera frame, the entire second floor of the rock face burst into flame. Soon, the camera turned back forward, showing the world outside those large green gates. The spotless blue sky above covered everything and beyond in its magical mantel, and the flat brown gravel beyond the gate lost itself for miles on end.

***

The camera kept following the bike, but soon they realized the scenery wasn’t going to change anytime soon.

“Is it over?” Christine asked.

“I guess,” Sara answered with a shrug.

“It’s strange, it should have a black screen or something…” Sofia thought aloud, looking quizzically at the television.

“Did you see that cat?” Christine asked Sara.

“Yeah. That was real scary.”

“That guy was kinda scary too.”

“The one with the thing, right?” she asked gesticulating the scythe’s form, as she had no idea what to call it in English.

“Yeah, he looked kinda like... I dunno... He had a weird face.”

“Yeah.”

“Chis,” said David, drawing their attention to him. “I think we should send her to the hospital. She hasn't woken up yet.”

He was mentioning the dormant Yana, still lying on the sofa in the same position and giving no signs of rising from her sleep any time soon. What, you thought I’d forget about her?

“’Course not. But sending someone to the hospital is something that… doesn’t happen in this kind of stories.”

Oh, yeah? Watch me.

“But there's no one home to drive us,” said Sofia. “The only one here is Tania, and I don't think she has her own car.”

“That's not an issue, we have a limo waiting just outside,” answered David.

“O vosso pai não está cá?” asked Sara. “Ele estava cá à hora de almoço, ele até te deu o jogo.”

“Ele já se foi embora à bocado,” said Ricardo.

“So, the only one in this house is the maid that doesn't even speak English? That's a relief,” said Christine with a sarcastic tone after the Portuguese told her the only other adult that could be around had already left.

“Carl and Lenny can take us,” said David. The image on the television started to change, but no one paid attention to it. “And if they ask the housekeeper to explain why we left, their parents won't be surprised when they return.”

“What, we’re going over to that woman upstairs and tell her that we found that girl unconscious on the floor and are just going to the hospital with her? Yeah, right. She'll probably get the wrong idea and tell them she was molested or something,” interrupted Christine in a very bitter voice.

“How can you be so cynical?” asked her brother, with a slight irritated note in his voice.

“Have you even looked at her, David? She didn’t even know who I am!”

“Enough!”

Both of them silenced and stared at Sara. He knew he was in the right, and she was too outraged from the interruption to even speak against her.

“David, tell your bodyguards to come and help us take Yana to the hospital. I’ll talk to Tania and explain the whole thing to her.”

“She’s just fainted!”

“Christine, are you a doctor?”

“No, but-”

“Then you can’t be sure if she’s just fainted or if she actually has a problem.”

Getting closer to Sara so she could whisper in a more threatening voice, Christine showed her exactly how annoyed the situation made her.

“I don’t know that girl, I’m not forced to help you out with this bullshit. I have better things to do in this hillbilly country.”

“Really, Christine? Are you really that kind of person?”

If someone were to dare cross the stares in which the girls locked themselves into, they would be disintegrated. Outside of her parents, no one had the courage to stand up to the wrath of Christine Lonergan, except for that hillbilly country girl. Whenever she was being so stubborn even David couldn’t set her back on track, Sara had always managed, somehow, to change her mind and make the correct decision, like dumping the white powder a sinister man in a long coat had offered her once, or not entering the car of a Shaking journalist with no valid identity.

Blowing back her hair, Christine realized getting angry at that situation wasn’t worth the effort. Besides, she didn’t want to be seen as a cold-hearted bitch – who wasn’t to say one of the kids would post her response on the Internet and tarnish her reputation – and, in retrospect, leaving the girl on the sofa would leave a bad aftertaste in her mouth and quite likely ruin her chances of peering into the wealth of inspiration that was the whole reason for her trip there.

“Stay here, David,” she ordered turning around and leaving the basement.

With a somewhat satisfied sigh, Sara followed Christine up the stairs. As their shoes echoed on the varnished wood, Sofia and Ricardo turned to the television screen, already at the next phase of the game and awaiting further instructions. Their character was standing in the middle of nowhere, surrounded by rocky formations and dried soil. Old tires scattered around him might have indicated that something else was supposed to be there, but nothing that the game showed their players. The scythe and the old motorcycle were nowhere to be seen.

Since she already had the controller on her hands, Sofia jogged the joystick forward and the character jolted to a run. She stopped him and tried the rest of the buttons. None of them seemed to be working.

“Estranho, ao menos o menu devia aparecer…” she muttered, mashing what was the menu button for every single other game that they owned. Meanwhile, the door to the street upstairs opened and closed as if it was a rotating gate from a fancy hotel.

“Esquece isso, vê se consegues sair daí.”

Responding to what her brother had told her to do, Sofia moved the character towards the edge of the map, between two tires almost as big as they were. An invisible wall hampered his progress.

“Was their game broken? Is this why you said it was different from the one made by Specter?”

“Well… Yes, you could say that.”

“What the hell?” Ricardo thought out loud, proceeding to take the controller out of his sister’s hands and trying to have his way with the character. He stubbornly mashed his head against the invisible wall, refusing to go any further.

“Get the manual, maybe there’s something you’re missing,” suggested David a bit absent minded, as most of his attention laid on the fainted girl on the sofa and on whatever was going on with his sister and her friend.

As Sofia reached out for the case and her brother said something in Portuguese against her actions, likely suggesting that checking the manual was against all that is sacred for a non-casual gamer like himself, the image on the television turned to static for a moment, making noises that tightened all three of the kids’ chests. When they turned to see what was going on, the noises stopped. The character had the scythe on his hand, the black cat stood by his side, and he was no longer in desolate nowhere.

A pair of heavy steps sounded on the wooden staircase and Carl came down to the living room with Sara. Sofia, Ricardo, and David’s attention were momentarily taken away from the television to witness the suited man lift Yana, and silently haul her away.

“We’re going to take Yana to the hospital to see if she’s fine, ok?” said Sara, preparing to go join him. “We’ll let you know when she gets better.”

“Ok,” answered David mechanically, his mind to busy struggling to find a reasonable justification for what had just happened with the game. Before he knew Sara was gone and the door’s wind chime sounded for the last time.

“What’s going on?” asked Sofia, watching the cat lash its tail from side to side in an impatient motion.

“Maybe it was all just a glitch,” said David, trying, and failing, to convince himself that was the most reasonable explanation. “Or maybe that’s how the game’s supposed to be.”

Hovering just slightly above the character’s head, the camera framed a large dusty plaza where countless people battled each other with a variety of colourful weapons, ranging from swords to bowling pins, even pistols echoed somewhere in the chaos. None of those who were hit came out with a scratch, and no matter how much one hurt the other, all the battlers simply continued to fight, as if they were meant to do so until the end of days. And with no exception, all of them were enjoying themselves immensely.

Sofia robbed the controller from her brother’s hands and pushed the joystick forward. Both the character and his cat walked among the crowd, if only for a couple of steps before the screen turned static once more.

That time, however, they could clearly hear a scream. The scream only a girl can conjure when she’s being genuinely attacked and has no other way of defending herself.

Recognizing the voice, the siblings exchanged worried glances while the television steadied itself.

“What, what is it?” asked David.

“That sounded like Yana,” answered Sofia.

The image steadied itself again to show the character facing off against two individuals much older than him, a blond with a shiny leather jacket and a mulatto stomping the remains of a cigarette under his worn out and untied sneakers. Behind them, an olive-green pick-up truck with no wheels waited for a driver to lift it up in air.

“There’s nothing for you here, kid. Get lost,” said the mulatto as the boy stopped and briefly analysed the two of them.

“Who was she?” he asked pointing with his head at the back of the pick-up.

“That’s none of your goddamned business,” answered the blond producing a white sphere from his jacket. “Now, you’re going to turn around and go home to mommy, and if you don’t do that, I’m going to show you the definition of pain. Do you understand?”

“The pain I know is far worse than anything your tiny little brains can hope to imagine.”

Before the blond could answer, his partner clicked his tongue with a laugh and produced an identical sphere from his trousers. “Can you believe the nerve of this punk? Let’s teach him some respect before we send the bitch to Kioo, Harley.”

“Sounds like a plan, Marley. We even need the workout for the Venatio.”

At their command, the spheres stretched on their fingers, forming rings that erupted into three long claws and a small hook. The mulatto had a fairly simple design, but green scales and dim colours gave the impression that the blond guy’s knuckles had turned into the hands of a very carnivore and ferocious dinosaur.

As the camera turned to capture the character’s response, he removed the white scythe from his shoulder, took a deep breath, and grimaced at his opponents the same way a hunting hound grimaces as its cornered prey.

“That’s too bad.”

***

When she woke up, Yana felt like she had been trampled by a rampaging herd of wildebeest. She got up. She was dizzy. She wanted to lie down again. She couldn't lie down again. She had to know where she was. Blurry images swerved in front of her eyes. Voices echoed in her head. She managed to focus a fragment of her scattered strength and identified people. Who were those people, walking around? Why didn't they help her? They didn't know she needed help. But that’s impossible. She could barely walk. Where was she? Bulgarl. What's Bulgarl? Where's Bulgarl? Why was she in Bulgarl? She only wanted a fix. She’d go to Ellage and see her grandparents after that. Of course. Her grandparents. But her grandparents lived in Oxford. Where was Ellage? What was Ellage? Why did she think her grandparents lived in Ellage? She grew up in a broken household with a suffocating mother. That’s not true. She had always lived with mother and father and her big sister in Cima.

No, that's not me. Who are you?

I could ask you the same thing.

“Excuse me, what is happening here?”

“It’s a massive trip. Only this one wasn’t induced by illicit substances.”

She was leaning on something, a wall, a building, fighting herself, fighting the voices. She lifted her head to find guidance, and she saw someone's hands being melted by a dark substance, choking smoke, a disease that would spread everywhere and devour everything, an inner turmoil greater than a broken heart and a murderer's plight. She screamed.

Everyone looked at her.

“Y-your hands...”

The melting hands tried approaching her. Sounds reached her from farther than the horizon. She didn't understand anything. Was she dreaming, was this a nightmare? She tried running away. She fell into someone's arms. A guy. He reminded her of Eric. Who was Eric? How could she not know who was Eric? Everyone knew who Eric was. He was talking to her.

“His hands... They were dark... Like they were being eaten by something...” she managed to whisper.

The guy holding her lifted his head and moved his lips. Yana tried turning around to see whom he was talking to. He started moving her. She didn’t like it. She had to escape. She had to find her friends. She had to find her parents. She had to find her grandparents. They were walking. She didn't know where. She didn't want to go. She started resisting. He started pulling her. She managed to unhook herself and limped back.

“Stay away from me!”

She felt something hard hit her head and she fell on the ground. The last of her strength deserted her.

Why was she there? Oh, yes... The video game... She had hit a button... And everything became hazy and confusing.

***

The second time Yana woke up, she found herself being capable of correct, straight lines of thought. Leaning on a metallic surface, she took a hand to her forehead to make sure her headache wasn’t because something was broken, and, for a moment, her eyes crossed her feet. She was wearing a pair of brown jackboots. Looking over to the rest of her clothes, she discovered she had been given a new outfit - a denim mini-skirt and jacket, and a striped blue and yellow t-shirt. She also had a bra on, which she was sure she had left out earlier that day.

The set wasn’t too distasteful, but as much as Yana would like to know who the hell had changed her, the more pressing question was finding out where she was, why did it have the most blazing sun she had ever felt on her skin, and why it was so quiet around her.

She turned and peeked above the surface she was leaning against, one of the walls of the back of an olive-green pick-up truck, and found it was surrounded by a small crowd, staring in awe and fear at a huge black cat with yellow patches lashing its tail from side to side, as if trying to whip the people from a distance, and a boy next to it that, tapping a white scythe with a yellow blade, stared back at the crowd as if waiting for them to bow down to him. Her stomach threatened to try a somersault, but the feeling quickly waned away when Yana realized he was not one of the people that she had seen during her previous state. It had all seemed so weird - it was like she had been an entirely different person for a moment.

“Well? Does anyone else want to try?” the boy asked to the crowd that, remaining silent, started to disperse. His free hand, hanging by a pocket, was covered with a black glove with a wire that emerged from the back of his middle finger and disappeared onto the sleeve of his grey turtleneck. “I’ll make you regret it. Steal your hidan too if I feel like it.”

No one gave him any sort of satisfaction as most people present simply walked away, acknowledging the fact that he didn’t really exist. Only a handful of teenage girls stood near, whispering, trading glances between themselves and sometimes towards him, but before they could put whatever scheme they were planning in motion, the cat arched its back and hissed at them. Taking the warning to heart, they left as well, taking one last look at the boy, his cat, and Yana before vanishing in the flow of a large plaza.

Reaching for the skies around were dozens of buildings that felt like were brought over from both the richest and poorest cities of the world, planted there and then promptly forgotten. Glassy skyscrapers mingled with edifices that had no windows at all, with freshly done apartment blocks, and decrepit stories that could fall over at any given moment, but still had clothes hanging to dry in the breeze and a guy on a dirty tank top with a radio next to him nodding his head to the beat of some sweet tunes.

Exhaling, the boy put the scythe over his shoulder, watching the people navigate through the plaza stretched out in front of them with a feeling close to disappointment. For a moment, Yana tried to figure out what they were doing, but the movements of most of the individuals there were too intricate for her to understand. She wanted to blame the blazing sun mercilessly jabbing at her skin, but her clothes seemed to protect her from its effects somewhat, artificially maintaining her cool against the heat.

“Guess they were right about this place,” the boy said, looking over to the cat afterwards. “What do you think, Moonlight?”

Choosing to ignore him, the cat sat down and licked its paws to clean the fur on its head. Yana could swear she had seen them glistening with blood before it took them to its rugged tongue.

“Hey…” Yana said, trying to get the boy’s attention as she prepared to leave the back of the truck. However, a strong qualm interrupted her movement, forcing her to sit back down as he finally faced her. His face was a little creepy, his hair was a mess and his vest had to have come from a war movie. In any other circumstance he and those of his kind would be last ones Yana would rely on for help.

“You okay?” he asked as she took a hand to her forehead to try and fight back the qualm.

“Just a little bit dizzy… I’ll be fine,” then, as she felt her strength return, Yana looked back up at the boy and asked: “What is this place?”

“Bulgarl,” he answered mechanically, expecting her to recognize the word. She did, only the wrong word.

“Bulgaria? How did I end up in Bulgaria…?” Yana asked, to herself this time, wondering in the back of her head when exactly did Bulgaria gain a sun worthy of the Sahara desert.

“Not Bulgaria, Bulgarl,” insisted the boy, slightly tilting his head. “What’s Bulgaria? Another city?”

“No, it’s a country in Eastern Europe.”

“Europe?”

If that boy didn’t know about Europe, his geography was incredibly lacking. “Are we in America?”

“No, this is Rujad.”

“Rujad?” the word was as unfamiliar to Yana as the whole environment enveloping her, and although she tried her best to place it, there was nowhere where it would fit.

It was probably somewhere in Africa. That would explain the sun.

“So, we’re in Africa, then, right?”

“I already told you this is Rujad.”

“No, I mean the continent.”

“The continent? I’m pretty sure they said it’s Mashariki.”

A force suddenly gripped Yana’s chest as the slightest of panics knocked on her train of thought.

“This is Planet Earth, right?”

Something clicked inside the boy’s mind, as his eyes widened with a minimal of amazement and deep curiosity.

“No. This is Dunia.”

“But you’re Human!”

“I’m Hidanna. Everyone’s Hidanna,” as the information sunk deep in Yana’s brain, the boy continued his train of thought aloud. “You said you were Human? That makes you an alien.”

Yana turned back around and stared down at her new boots, trying to be alone for a moment and mentally reverse that entire conversation.

She had somehow ended up on an alien planet. And she was the alien. She was an alien on the world of Hidanna, whatever they were, and she was definitely not in a position where she could rule over them, unlike what she had seen from so many other made up sources on aliens. Looking for something that would place that location somewhere she already knew or could recognize, Yana desperately eyed the plaza and the buildings surrounding it. None of the advertisements planted on the walls and roofs of the city were written in a language she could identify, let alone comprehend, none of the signs above the doors had familiar symbols or creatures in their figures, none of the people on the plaza seemed to even be sane, thrilled with a handful of skilled combatants using items she didn’t even know could be weapons.

However…

“But we look exactly the same,” she and the boy both said at the same time. He didn’t have tentacles, or laser guns, or thousands of teeth, or even more than two arms. His body was just a human as hers, or humanoid, if what he claimed was true. And everyone around them was the same. If she was lucky, that was just another way of calling themselves human like her.

“How did you end up here, anyway?” asked the boy.

“I have no idea,” she answered, shaking her head. “I was just playing a video game, then I hit a button and...” then something clicked inside her own mind, and she faced him. “This place, it isn’t in the middle of a desert, is it?”

“Rujad’s a desert. That’s why the sun’s so strong,” he answered, pointing at the spotless blue sky.

“Does it have Coliseums?”

“I thought you were an alien. Why do you know about the most vital thing in our culture?” the boy asked raising an eyebrow.

Ignoring his question, Yana had already reached her conclusion. “I’m inside the game… You’re the main character. Everything in the cover is here, the desert, the Coliseums-”

“You think you’re inside a game?”

His tone of voice was no longer laid back or curious – that was the tone in which someone who likes to pick random people to stalk with an axe could have spoken. Yana turned back to the boy and found him eyeing her as if she wasn’t even there. He could have been a statue, and no one would tell the difference.

“You aren’t inside a game. This world is real, incredibly real, and if I hadn’t helped you, you’d know exactly how real it can be. I’ll leave you there so you can see for yourself.”

“No, no, I believe you,” said Yana, seeing her only chance of getting out of that place leaving her stranded. She could not afford to lose his company – he was the main character. As shady as he looked and sounded, he was the guy on the cover of “Hidan Battle”, of that Yana as absolutely sure of. And the main character always wins, the main character is always righteous, and the main character always gets what he or she wants. That was a fact for every single piece of media she had come across with, so it had to the case for the storyline of a video game as well. Tagging along with him was the best way to for her to stay safe until she found a way back to Earth. All she had to do was put up with some strange demeanour. It was just like dealing with her grandparents if they found her awake at 2 a.m. in some chat with her friends that simply wouldn’t come to a conclusion. It’s no big deal once she gave it a quick thought.

“This Jack person sounds dangerous, though. Is he really the main character?”

“Of the “Hidan Battle” game? Absolutely not.”

“Oh, so they are not inside the game?”

“Isn’t that what he just said?”

“People from the game could not recognize it differently.”

“Well, not the case here.”

Definitely not the case here. Not only is the game completely different story-wise, I don’t think anybody in Specter’s writing team could come up with half the shit that happened that day, especially for a PG-12 game.

“Once I get back home, I’ll make sure this is a different place,” she ended up saying.

A smirk drew itself on his face, as the boy turned cheerful again. “Tell you what, then. I’ll help you go back home if you take me with you.”

A bit puzzled by his request, Yana shrugged back at him. “Yeah, sure, but why do you want to go to another planet?”

“Sightseeing.”

“I have the slight impression that you are lying,” answered Yana, unconvinced by such a mediocre reason.

“It’s not a lie. It’s one of the many reasons I could be stating to be willing to go to an alien planet. It’s not the main reason, but it definitely qualifies as a reason.”

Yana found herself agreeing with his surprisingly reasonable argument. “Alright, what’s the main reason then?”

“Trying out your alien food.”

“You’re a terrible liar.”

“I know,” the boy answered, his smile growing. Seeing as he wouldn’t say another word on the subject, and both the sickness and the headache were gone, the red haired managed to stand up and vault her legs across the back of the pick-up.

“Well, we have no time to waste then,” she said, then jumped to the floor next to him. The large black cat glanced at her for a moment before going back to its grooming.

“What should I call you, by the way? Is “alien” fine?”

“’Course not,” she answered, crossing her arms. “I’m Yana. Yana Natvisky. And you?”

“They’ve been calling me Jack for a while now,” he said. Before she could say how weird that whole sentence sounded, he continued. “That’s Moonlight and Sunshine’s in here,” he said pointing at the patched cat and tapping the tip of his yellow scythe with a white, wavy blade that glew as it reflected the sun’s light on the floor. Naming weapons was regular in stories, so Yana focused most of her attention on the concentrated feline that held back its hygiene once it felt it was being observed. It was much bigger than any other cat Yana had seen in her short lifetime, but that didn’t mean she wasn’t beautiful in her own way.

“Can I pet her?” asked Yana, kneeling to her height, as the cat’s golden eyes stared right back at her with one of her paws frozen in mid-movement.

“She bites,” Jack answered with a bit of a warning tone, “so I wouldn’t if I were you.”