Chapter 21 Xolotl
Xolotl
Barrera’s exactly the kind of general I always liked the best. He takes initiative, and he’s full of ideas and energy. He’s also as bloodthirsty as I’ve seen, not pausing for a moment before taking the life of most anyone.
Including his own boss.
The very person who set up this coup in the first place, killing all his commanding officers and giving him the power he has, is the person he tries to kill. I had never once considered someone like him might be a liability to me.
After all, I’m proof against all weapons.
Or I was.
Gabe’s bullet took a chunk out of my shoulder, and it took me quite a few moments to heal the damage. A dozen or so axolotls are now living in Birch Creek behind Whitney’s house, thanks to that incident.
Imagine my surprise when my own general hits me with the strongest missiles they have, and instead of blowing me to kingdom come, they disappear into my body just as they always have.
I can’t help my massive smile.
This time, when I reverse a missile, I aim it right at General Barrera. “You gambled,” I say. “And you lost.”
Then I blow him and all his supporters to tiny bits.
Whitney looks appalled, all the blood draining from her face.
“I’m so sorry,” I say. “I can see that I took that too far.”
“Are there two missiles in there?” Her grin’s almost evil. “Because there’s another group of soldiers cresting that ridge.”
I really do love her.
She holds my hand as I take them out. The jets overhead keep firing, and I can’t stop them, since I’ve lost my long-distance death-snatching ability. But I do keep absorbing every single thing they lob at me and turning it back on them.
I eradicate every group of troops that comes after me, subduing the entire civil war before it can grow and move against another part of America.
I worry about the balance of life and death without something like me actively pruning, but Whitney’s happy with me once we put a stop to this, and that matters more to me now than anything else.
By the time we get home, the news is already announcing that the coup was like all the catastrophic strikes that have happened all over the West—the result of carefully timed and executed covert terrorist attacks.
I can’t help my smile. I may not have succeeded in creating the full-on war that I set out to start, but I imagine the current president will spin this into a justification to attack someone.
War is bad.
Warmongers are evil and bring suffering to humanity.
But the suffering itself turns people to faith, and we live better lives with faith. Whitney and I may have to agree to disagree on that.
“You didn’t let her get hurt.” That’s all Whitney’s mother, Abigail Archer, says to me when we return. But the glare she gives us both convinces me to never cross her again.
The next few weeks, while I search for an “aptitude” so I can find a job, I join her family for all their normal holiday things.
We make sugar cookies, which Gabe decorates very badly, and Whitney makes into tiny, delicious works of art.
I cheat and use water and wind to make really beautiful cookies.
Everyone gushes that I’m a natural, and Whitney doesn’t rat me out.
We go shopping, using a small portion of Whitney’s nine thousand dollars, and buy small gifts for all her family members, including Izzy, who, judging by her fiancé’s job, wants for nothing. It baffles me.
“It’s the gesture that matters,” Whitney tells me.
That sends me into a tailspin, since I have no money and no way to get anything for Whitney. I do notice her looking at a few dresses, a pair of jeans, and some boots, and I’m still able to materialize clothing from nothing, so I make her a few new outfits, which her mother helps me wrap.
“Where exactly did you get these?” She appears to be searching the clothing for something. “There aren’t any tags on any of it.” She glances at me suspiciously.
Tags?
“Did you steal them? Just tell me you didn’t steal them.”
“I didn’t,” I say. “Actually, I—”
She pats my hand. “I don’t want to know. Just don’t do anything illegal, okay?”
The human world’s chock full of rules that make no sense.
For instance, in order to cut down a tree out in the forest, we have to first procure a license from the government.
At least cutting a Christmas tree is a tradition I understand.
They celebrate the death and rebirth of their Savior by killing a tree.
“Then, after Christmas, you’ll bring it back to life,” I say. “Right?”
Whitney grimaces.
Her mom and stepfather stare at me blankly.
Gabe laughs and slugs my shoulder. “Good one, buddy. I love it.”
No one answers my question, and I feel too stupid to press further. While walking around the property, I don’t see a row of trees in progressively larger sizes, so if they do bring the dead tree back to life, they must not plant them near the house.
But the Christmas tradition I look forward to the most is definitely when everyone gathers to eat dinner on the eve of Christmas. I find that I quite like eating, and I’ve been looking forward to this meal, where I will meet all the members of Whitney’s family and be presented as her boyfriend.
As Christmas Eve finally dawns, I’m as excited as I imagine the kids who believe in the fat criminal are.
“Now, I know I’ve said this, but you aren’t to say anything about Santa Claus,” Whitney says.
“Right.” I nod. “Some of your family and friends have small children, and they all believe there’s a fat man who flies around with magical deer pulling his sled, which carries a magical sack that materializes toys from nothing for good children.” I smile. “See, I was paying attention.”
Whitney sighs. “It’s the magic of Christmas.”
“Aren’t you a little worried that this fat man might damage something when he breaks into your house?” I can’t help my frown.
“He’s not real, remember?” Whitney asks, sounding a little exasperated. “We’ve been over this. The myth has his elves making the toys up in the North Pole all year, and he delivers them.”
“But you said the children don’t tell him what they want until December. How can the elves make things all year if they don’t know what the children will ask for?” I arch an eyebrow. “Would the lie not make more sense if the fat man made them out of nothing?”
Whitney groans.
“And if you were looking for realism, you should have him live in the South Pole. I’ve been to the North pole, and there’s nothing there—certainly not a workshop run by small people with pointy ears.”
Whitney smiles then, and she kisses me. Honestly, that makes all the nonsense worth it.
Whitney has a phone interview with a company she’s excited to work for, a contract negotiations team for a company called Equine Elixirs.
She was so excited that I got excited for her.
It does, however, leave me with nothing to do, which is how I wind up having breakfast with Gabe.
“Tomorrow, when we wake up,” Gabe says, “there’ll be even more gifts under the tree.” He bumps my shoulder with his own. “What’d you get for Whitney?”
Before I can answer, he opens his mouth again.
“You know, Steve always gets Mom something amazing. Sometimes it’s a horse. Sometimes a great piece of jewelry, or the dog she wanted that he said he never wanted.” He tosses his head toward the tree. “You can tell me what you got, though—I’m a vault. I won’t tell her a thing.”
“I—” I clear my throat. “I wrapped up some clothing she liked when we went shopping.”
“Really?” Gabe looks disappointed.
I realize I’m about to lose Christmas. I never lose. Never. I swear under my breath. “Alright, tell me again what Steve gets Abby, and what Whitney’s favorite gifts have been and why.”
After a little coaching, I understand that Christmas is a bigger deal than I thought it would be for humans. Gabe offers to give me a ride into town—they’re all scared of my driving for some reason. He texts Whitney, and then we leave.
“Are you sure she won’t be upset when she finishes her call and I’m not there?”
Gabe slugs my shoulder, which I’ve intuited is similar to how my brothers would set each other on fire or hit one another with a lightning strike.
It’s a human male sign of affection, but also a, “stop that, idiot,” reaction.
“Nah, man, she won’t be mad. She’ll be happy you have friends.
” His brow furrows. “Or at least, she’ll be happy that you’re hanging with her brother. ”
“Are we not friends?”
Gabe’s eyes light up. “Even though I shot you when we first met?”
“Barely a scratch,” I say. “And the only reason you were able to do that was that, like your sister, you’re a mixture of light and dark energy. Apparently that’s one of the few energy signatures capable of harming me, even now.”
“That’s super weird,” Gabe says. “What happens if someone else shoots you?”
“The bullet disappears.” I shrug. “So, nothing.”
“No way.” Gabe insists we make an unplanned stop. “We have to test some of this.”
I read the words on the sign at the entrance to the location where Gabe brought us. Green River Batting Cages.
“What on earth could we possibly learn here about bullets?” I ask.
“Just wait and see.” But Gabe’s head-bobbing grin isn’t very encouraging. He plonks some money down on the counter, and then we’re ushered back to a small area where there’s a machine and a basket full of smallish white balls. “Okay, you stand here.”
He’s positioned me in front of the machine. “But then—”
Gabe must have turned it on, because a moment later, one of the balls flies out of the machine and right at my head.
Just before the ball can strike me, it disappears.
“No way.” Gabe swears, loudly. “That’s the coolest thing I have ever seen.”
“I told you—” Another ball disappears into my body. Then another. And another. Each time, Whitney’s brother swears, pumps his fist in the air and dances around.
“So with like, bullets, same thing?”
I nod.