Landing a Little Later [Story]

[Comic]

You're very young. You remember the dark filled with lines of light, then blue, and the brightness, and the loud noises, and rolling and rolling.

~

You slept. When you woke up, they were there, father and mother. They picked you up in their arms, and you felt safe and welcome, part of them.

~

You're slightly older.

You hear a scream, and people yell.

One of the big trucks has rolled over.

There's a man under it, he's hurt, you know. His legs aren't right.

People don't notice you, they're so busy.

They're trying to lift up the truck. It won't move.

There's crying and more shouting. So you help.

You reach out to the truck, and push with your hand. It lifts up.

People pull the man out from underneath the truck, and there's a long time when no one says anything. You keep the truck up as high as you can.

People just look at you.

Then father and mother come, and they gather you up in their arms. You travel with them for what seems like a long time.

Father tells you about a new game, where he and mother play dress up, and they have made-up names, and you get to play, too.

And the baby is on the way, little Ricky.

~

You're eight years old.

Ricky is five. Father and mother sit down with you while Ricky is playing on the swing.

Father and mother. You always notice their hands and faces.

Their hands reach for each other's when they are together and happy and safe. And they reach for you and Ricky when there is trouble, to protect you.

Their hands reach for yours. Their faces are complicated, more complicated than ever before. It isn't easy to understand.

Father, and mother, explain. About the ship from another world. About finding you, and loving you, and choosing you for their son.

They explain about being different, and hiding, "because sometimes being different in some ways can frighten some people, and some people when frightened make bad choices."

So, to protect those people, from their bad choices, and to protect the family from people like that, the family has to keep the secret.

Which is why people can't know about how much you can lift.. or how fast you can run.. or about the special vision and hearing.. or how needles won't stick you.

~

You're eleven years old.

Father, mother and Ricky are dressed up for the show.

You're dressed up, too. The mask. The clown clothes.

They're dressed up for the center ring, and you are dressed up to stay out of the spotlight, because it's safer that way, and to protect everyone.

Ricky's good, too. The best. He's not strong like you, and nowhere near as fast, but he has something special. Like he was born for the big top.

You watch, from out of sight. You always watch, when they put on the show. You love to see every throw, every catch, every flip.

And there, you see it. Something's not right. Something's very wrong with the trapezes. You can see even from where you hide, the saw marks.

You've never run so fast before.

Mother is falling, and father is swinging to catch her on his own trapeze as the lines on both side snap.

Ricky is right there, leaping for one of the broken lines.

Faster, faster, up, up and away to the blur that is mother's falling form. Your hand catches her wrist. She spins, you spin.

Your hand goes out, as if in slow motion to catch father's wrist, too. It's all so slow.

But .. what's holding you up, high above the crowd?

And then Ricky is there, inverted, holding your legs by the ankles, his own ankles locked and intertwined with the improvised swingline.

The ringmaster, the clowns, everyone comes out. It's what they do to cover for a big mistake, you know.

You're worried, you've shown too much to the crowd.

But the circus is a show, and the crowd is convinced they saw what they didn't.. all part of the show.

The Ringmaster, Haly, he's sweating, and keeps looking toward one man in the audience.

It's the other man, however, that you notice. The one you think of as the Beast Man.

The Beast Man dresses nicely. He moves nicely, on the outside of his clothes.

On the inside, he's cramped up, and crammed in on himself.

More muscles than Big Cyr.

Folded like Mr. Harry the contortionist to look smaller than he really is.

The horses smell something on the Beast Man, and begin to react.. when the Beast Man notices, and turns his attention to them, and they calm.

He does something, and they calm. But what, how?

You see him pass between people, around people, among people. All the while, he moves closer to your family.

You move close to father and mother and Ricky. You reach for their hands. You put yourself between them and him.

"That's some show," the Beast Man says. Up close, you see his skin and his bones.

They're wrong. Calluses, scars, mends, thick and hard. His hands are made to hurt. He's made all out of hurt.

His voice sounds so light, sincere, friendly. You hear the precision in its timing.

You see how he moves each muscle in his throat. He makes it happen that way. He means for it to sound exactly that way.

You watch his eyes, and they're moving .. wrong. The angles of the lenses of his eyes move to you, study you, with a method, a pattern.

You hear his heartbeat pick up pace, and then, impossibly, you see him decide to slow it, as if he knows you know.

He is all deduction and cunning, skills you cannot guess and knowledge beyond your senses, this man of hurt, the Beast Man.

You protect your family, standing between him and them, and not letting go of father or mother's hands.

Above your head, the grownups talk. Father, mother, the Beast Man.

He's a rich man. Famous. He does good works, mother says. How can they not know?

The Beast Man says he enjoyed the show, and admired Ricky's art, and liked my.. comedy.

He said it just like that, with a pause before. Everyone else thought it was just a show. Except the Beast Man. He knew.

You told father and mother, but they said not to worry. The Beast Man was famous for being an empty-headed playboy, father said.

Mother pointed out how he always did good works, so that made up for his .. they looked at each other, and announced it was bedtime for Ricky and you.

Ricky couldn't stop talking about the Beast Man. When I told him what I saw, Ricky thought it was 'cool'. He liked him more, knowing that.

You watched him, the Beast Man. He had gone to his sedan, and stayed there, after everyone else left. So you watched him.

After Ricky and father and mother fell asleep, he was still there. Watching.

You heard Haly and an angry man's voice. Then the Beast Man crept from his automobile, wearing a mask and heavy cloak.

The Beast Man moved toward the arguing men. Mr. Haly had been good to us. You wanted to protect him.

So you crept, too. Quieter than the Beast Man. Faster. And you watched.

The Beast Man came up behind the angry man, unheard.

Even you had trouble hearing him.. which you didn't think could happen, not so close. Not when you can hear the heartbeats of mice

Until he spoke. With that controlled voice. "You will leave this circus alone. Your shake-down is over. People don't pay protection in my city."

Mr. Haly turned color, like people in the House of Horrors do, and made a squeaking noise, and crawled into the corner.

The angry man.. it was even worse. You could hear his heart pounding suddenly, faster than any human heart. You saw his whole body react. He was pure fear. And a gun.

You wanted to protect Mr. Haly from the gun, but didn't have time.

Before the angry man could even reach inside his jacket to get to it, the Beast Man was on him, with those hands made to hurt, unfolded, showing his real size, using all of those muscles, more than any circus strongman's.

The gun dropped out of the jacket. The Beast Man twisted the angry man's bones and joints, hurting him, making him scream in pain and fright. And the Beast Man's heart.. it beat perfectly smoothly, like a man going for a walk. A nice walk. A happy man. While he hurt the angry man.

You were about to turn from protecting Mr. Haly to stopping the Beast Man, when he said the words that stopped you, "I know you sabotaged the trapezes. I know you cut those lines. You planned to murder that family, because this man wouldn't knuckle under to your threats. You were going to take those parents away from that child right in front of his eyes." He didn't mean you. The Beast Man meant Ricky. He _noticed_ you, but he thought about Ricky. And there was that same pause. "Imagine the pain a child feels in a moment like that. No. No. A man like you can't imagine that pain. But I know that pain. Let me share it with you."

The Beast Man didn't injure the angry man in his grip. His fingers touched, moved, barest pressure. You saw the angry man's voicebox lock up tight at the first touch, strangling sounds but not breath. You saw the Beast Man's hands move, but did not understand the strange magic, the way he worked the angry man's flesh into balls and knots where muscles bunched and froze in place, or spasmed and convulsed. You were almost hypnotised by it.

Haly had crawled away and started running for it.

You don't think the angry man was hearing things any more by the time you found your voice. "Enough," you told the Beast Man, stepping in front of him, pulling the angry man from his grip.

The Beast Man looked like a dog when you take away its food. But he hid it again, you think he hid it before he even knew he was doing it.

"Justice," he said.

"Enough," you repeated. You know justice. This wasn't it.

"I'm saving their lives. If he isn't stopped, he'll do it again. If not to your family, then to another one. Will you be there to catch them, too?"

You thought about his words. How he shaped them in his throat. Made the sounds work for him. You'd seen mesmerists before.

"Enough tricks," you said. "You've had the show you paid for. Haly circus doesn't give the sort of show you're after."

"Truth," he said.

It didn't faze him, that you were, what you were. He knew you were different. He was treating that difference with respect, but he'd shown Ricky more respect. The difference didn't matter to him. Not like it would for some people.

"You aren't going to protect the next people this man will try to hurt.. by hurting him." you were learning from the Beast Man. You used his pause, now, too.

"You think Haly will testify? Trials are long and hoodlums like this have friends on the outside," the Beast Man challenged. "Haly's business needs to move, and Haly with it. You think the cops aren't in the pockets of bosses like this thug reports to?"

"This is the circus. We'll take care of it the circus way," you told him. "You best leave. Hardworking people have earned their sleep. I think it best you not disturb them."

The Beast Man set his jaw, and whirled on his heel, striding away. He left in his sedan, driving without lights until far away.

You penned the angry man up in one of the storage wagons until morning.

They're circus people. With some time to put our act together, they explained to the angry man how things would be. You weren't really part of that. That's part of the adult world.

And then Ricky ran away, to go to the Beast Man, to become his student.