Archive of Our Own ^beta

“Stay safe,” he asks, begs me, tightening his arms around my body, unwilling to let me go, pressing me against the front door’s frame. I shield my face against his shoulder to hide my tears and nervous shivering from him, but also from Mel and Jared, whose stares I notice on the back of my neck only a bit too painfully and intently.

“That’s my line,” I whine, holding him tighter. “You have to promise me you won’t do anything reckless.”

“And that’s mine,” chuckles Ian, pulling me away from him. He wipes a lock of hair from my forehead and bends his knees to be eye-level with me--with my teary, erratically panting face. It cannot be normal to be feeling like this. This host, I swear...

“Come on, you two,” scoffs Melanie. “You have to let go of each other sometime soon.”

Hearing her rather harsh words, we let our arms drop to our sides and try to step away from each other, but we don’t manage to keep at a larger distance than five feet. Which is awarded by yet another sigh from Mel, who approaches us, placing her hands in my shoulders, saving us from a moment more embarrassing than I’d like to confess.

“Quit the drama, please. It’s not the end of the world, you know. For either one of you. In fact, you’ve already lived an apocalypse and here you are on your feet,” she says, signaling Ian, kicking him softly on the chest. “And as for you, Ian--” she proceeds, turning towards me with her finger raised. “--you’ve suffered much worse than this. So please stop acting as if it were a goodbye forever. You’ll see each other in a few hours. Please. For God’s sake.”

Tears still wet on my eyes, I crack a smile. Ian even manages to scoff lightly. Trust Mel to mock around at a time like this--though it was exactly what we both needed. We’re taking it way too far. We, Ian and I, as a couple, have been through worse. I personally have been through worse, both physically and emotionally, for instance when I almost died on the desert trying to find the caves, or when I was willing to sacrifice myself on behalf of my beloved sister. Two experiences that happened not too long ago. This present endeavor shouldn’t be such a big deal.

And yet, I find myself comparing this situation to the moment when Mel and Jared parted separate ways for her to try the impossible, find her aunt in a city full of aliens, leaving Jamie at Jared’s care. That was the end of her life as she knew it, something I don’t only remember all too well, but simply feel the same way.

“That’s right,” agrees Jared, resting one arm around Mel’s shoulders. “One would have thought you were sick of each other’s touch after yesterday night.”

“Jared, timing, please,” reproaches Ian.

“Manners!” exclaims Mel at the same time, hitting Jared on the back of his head.

“Look who’s talking, considering the night you’ve spent with Mel,” I reply, getting some snickers in return, but everyone notices my voice a little restrained, tensed, saddened, not being able to join as easily as them the good mood. They slowly turn to look at me, again with long faces, and once again I try to shake it off.

“I’m sorry,” I whisper, wiping away some unfaithful tears. “I’ll be OK.”

It’s understandable the way we all christened this last night on our own special way with our partners; the depressing mood hovering over us, the hopelessness and resigned feeling... Going to meet ourselves the enemy, staying in a city full of Souls. How crazy is that? If anyone found here Jared, Mel and Ian, they’d be discarded before I could speak on behalf of any of them and try to save them.

“It’s just--I couldn’t bear it if anything happened to you. Do you realize the dangers I’m putting you through?”

“The dangers we’re putting ourselves through,” dismisses Jared with a caring smile. “We all wanted to come.”

“And I still don’t believe how I accepted it,” I whine, shaking my head, my arm around Ian’s neck tensing. Just because I couldn’t imagine a world without Ian and Mel, they had to come with me--dragging Jared as well, since HE couldn’t be in the caves without Mel. Only there we had to put a stop to it, or we’d’ve found our entire family here in San Diego.

“It’s called commitment,” he says, soft smile in his eyes. “You just had to do this, and since we all know how easy it is to convince you otherwise when you’ve made up your mind to do something,” he adds in a darker voice, rolling his eyes. At the same time, Jared chuckles and Mel just scoffs--all of them reminding as well my attempt at leaving the Earth, “we were not just about to sit tight back in the caves when you put yourself in danger. That was not an option we could have lived with. So we sat down and came to terms. And we all agreed to this. All our family.”

“And we also said there’d be no backing down,” resumes Mel, stepping within my vision field beside Ian. “Once we came here there would be no return. We all agreed to that one too.”

“Unless, of course, you’d like to pull this whole thing off,” says Ian, worry tainting his voice once again. As though we hadn’t discussed that one issue before.

“In which case, I can pull out the car right away and be outside the city in half an hour, and home in eight hours," says Jared, standing beside Mel. Always the man of action.

"The call is yours, Wanda,” Ian insists, worry in his eyes. I know how much he wishes I could orget all about the lectures, forget all about changing the world, about our suicidal mission and yes, retreat back to the caves.

Home. It’d be nice. To be back with my family, my human family, the only one I’ve dared to recognize for the past months.

However, it’s not only about me anymore.

“No, I’m sticking with my plan. Thanks, though.”

“Of course you are,” Ian scoffs. Ever since we left the caves he’s half-wished I’d back down and ask to go back home, even if he never said so openly to any of us, much less myself. He too wishes to be back with Nicholas, in our dorm, sleeping the three of us as a family in one bed, in one tight embrace. I feel like an irresponsible mother every day I’m away from my own son--and that’s not a feeling I’m used to.

But I couldn’t. If I went back to the safety of the caves, I’d be leaving at stake billions of human lives, including, most specially, my son's. I want to give him a live worth living, a life in his own, rightful Earth.

I couldn’t live peacefully at the caves, away from everything, raising my own human kid knowing he’d never see the Earth for what it is. I couldn’t take it. I tried during the weeks my family was discussing this crazy idea of mine and every day just got worse and worse. They just knew I had to try with their help and consent before I’d begin to contemplate any suicidal plan on my own. So this was the best idea we could come up with. And even if I can save only one of those billions of human lives, it’ll be all worth it.

“You have to be certain, though,” Mel insists. She holds me by the shoulders, forcing me to look straight in her eye. There’s no way I could lie to her, though I’m not sure what effect cause the tears in my eyes.

“I am, really. It’s just stupid,” I reply, pushing her away gently and taking my suitcase. It'd be more appropriate to say that I am stupid, but that'll only bring another argument with my family members, and we can't have that. I'll be arguing a lot with a lot of people the next few days and weeks and for Pete's sake I don't want to add my family to the list. I need them by my side, I need their support. “But I’ll only do it if you abide to my rules.”

“We will, don’t worry,” say Jared, Ian and Mel at the same time.

“You have to promise,” I insist, trying for once to look and sound stern. With any luck, some of Mel's bad manners will have rubbed off on me after all the time we spent together. “I’m not able to spend a whole day in campus lecturing such important subjects and worrying about you all that time.” I’ve got enough in my plate as homesick as I am and this heart’s ache from being away from my son.

“We promise, Wanda,” say the three of them one more time. But similarly to them, I still need to be sure. It’s gonna be a long day and hopefully, a long term. I don’t think I’ll ever get to finish the academic year, though. At least, when he’s old enough to understand, I’ll be able to tell my son that I tried. I really did.

“No excursions on your own. No getting out of the apartment. No music, no loud noises, no racket that might bother the neighbors. If something’s missing, make a list and I’ll go shopping in the evening. All curtains and blinds shut during the day. No answering the doorbell or the phone. No interacting of any kind with anyone passing by. And, above all, absolutely no kidnappings,” I add more severely.

“Calm down, Wanda. We’re not that stupid.” I know they’re not. Even though by now all of them could extract a soul from any human host, and probably must repress the urge to do so to every one of our neighbors, I know they wouldn’t be so reckless. That’s not an adjective I’d use to describe any of them. Thank the Lord.

“We’ll behave,” sighs Jared.

“This isn’t the caves. Danger is actually surrounding you three from all sides and you just can’t get out of here whenever you want to.” A part of me aches for trapping them under such horrible circumstances, being them all creatures who've hated and feared entrapment for years now. It's almost the perfect epytome for the "Lock them and throw the key", but if we want this to work, it just has to be this way. I need them safe. We need our family safe. There's just no other way around it. We had to commit.

“We know. And we’ll be fine, really, Wanda.”

“It’s a promise. Come on, you just can’t be worrying sick about us three on such an important day.”

We don’t have any more time to convince ourselves or make promises to each other. Two knocks on the door freeze the four of us some very long seconds. Ian moves away from the door, where he was leaning on, and goes stand with Mel and Jared behind me. A stupid move, since if there was really a fight, I couldn’t physically protect them any better than they could protect me.

“Wanderer?” asks a voice full of concern. The known voice makes me relax at once and Jared, Ian and Mel, seeing my reaction, calm down as well. I send them a look over my shoulder, but before I’m completely turned their way, they’re already halfway to the dorms, away from the hall, walking as silently that I haven’t heard nor hear any of their steps. I sigh to calm my nerves and take my briefcase once again.

“Curt, hello, good morning. I’ll be out in two seconds. I’m sorry, I didn’t realize I was late.”

“You’re not, darling, not exactly. Just on time,” he replies cordially through the door, and I can imagine him smiling politely. I’ll have to get used again to Souls’ gentleness. Being on time--or not being on time--is, technically, for us Souls, being later. Something Ian and the rest of our family would never comprehend. If we ever get our Planet back, they'll have to understand that being fashionable late isn't decorous within a Souls' community.

Glancing over my shoulder to make sure none of my human family members are at view, I take the keys of the house and open the door, to meet Kathy, my previous Comforter, and her partner, Curt, waiting for me at the hall with wide smiles. I doubt they heard anything about my conversation with Ian, Jared and Mel, or my attempts at calming down; even if they had, they wouldn’t acknowledge it out loud.

“Good morning, Wanderer.”

“Good morning, Kathy. It’s so nice to see you again.”

“Likewise, m’dear. Shall we get going?”

“Of course. Please lead the way.”

Kathy and Curt nod and turn to climb down the stairs. Taking advantage of these seconds to spare, I lock the apartment’s door, a precaution I’ve never taken here on Earth. But it’s not to prevent someone breaking in, it’s to prevent someone breaking out.

I join the Comforter and her partner outside and we engage the fifteen minute stroll to the college, catching up joyfully on each other’s lives. Blissfully, I had no problem returning to Wanderer’s old life in San Diego. I didn’t have to lie for too long either. No Seeker questioned me about my absence and my old friends--the Healer and my few fellow companions at college--were delighted to see me again. They offered me my job back without hesitation, even before I’d asked for it; the Soul they had replaced me with had only been in four other planets, so his lessons weren’t as interesting as mine. I felt a bit bad taking his job, but after a long chat with him over coffee, it was settled. And we came here from the caves precisely so I could get my old job back, so I couldn’t have refused either way. My only request: living in a two-bedroom apartment as closest to college as possible. In case something happened to Ian, Jared, Mel, or to me, I needed to be nearby.

“So, how are you feeling?” asks Curt.

“A bit nervous, if I’m honest,” I say, smiling shyly. “I haven’t taught in a while, it’ll be a bit tough to get used to it again.”

“Don’t worry, I’m sure you’ll be fine, as you did before,” says Curt, sending me a reassuring smile, while Kathy hugs me by the shoulders. “Everyone’s really excited to have you back.”

“Hold on,” I beg, politely, stopping in the middle of the sidewalk. “Everyone?”

“Well, you were quite known back then, due to your extensive experience out there,” explains Curt, a bit surprised by my reaction. “And your sudden appearance after these two and a half years have intrigued a lot of people. You’re having a full house. A lot of Souls are interested in what you have to say.”

I take a deep, long breath, trying to calm down and prepare myself. This is what I wanted, the social interest. But I certainly wasn’t expecting this on the first day back. It’s a bit too much.

“That’s--I’m glad to hear that,” I lie the best I can, through clenched teeth. I may not be under any Seeker’s microscope, but I’ll be watched by who knows how many Souls. This is just perfect.

Somewhere impossible, I hear Mel’s words inside my head reminding me to quit with the drama. I can’t be sarcastic around Souls. Nor impolite, smart mouth, or any other bad habit I’d acquired at the caves. This is going to be tough--I wish I still had Mel with me to help me, control my impulses. It’s easy to fall back on the gentleness way of the Souls, but not for a long period of time. Maybe I could ask Denny or Burns to join me at classes some other time. Just not being alone would be grant.

In the end we get to college and everything comes back to mind without trying. I remember where my class is and this time I lead the way, Curt and Kathy following me close by, chatting easy-going about something I’m too nervous to remember. Thankfully, I think they can see how I’m feeling and they don’t try to calm me down, talk me out of this or anything else--they just let me be.

Curt’s warning doesn’t begin to cover how crowded my classroom is. Not only every chair in the room is full, but it seems to me there isn’t a free space in the classroom--there are dozens of Souls on their feet around the room, leaving very little free space to move around, everyone gathered in small groups of friends, chatting in murmurs with each other. My entrance attracts the attention of too many people: some conversations quit, others raise in volume, some people turn to look at me in awe and other feelings I can’t decipher right now--or I don’t want to acknowledge their fear and suspicions. I must say, I hadn’t expected this. What kind of publicity has Curt taken over for this to happen? I don’t know what their expectations are and, frankly, I’m starting to panic.

I imagine what Mel would say to me. To take a deep breath, stop freaking out, quit the drama and tell me I could do this. I’m a Soul with a goal. I can do this. I’ve done it before and it’s for the greater good--even if some people here wouldn’t believe me.

Someone grabs me from my arm. Kathy, her partner lost somewhere chatting with some other teacher, smiles politely at me.

“Quite different from the desert, huh?” she asks me.

“A bit, yeah,” I laugh nervously. “I don’t think I’m prepared for this.” I am definitely NOT prepared for this. When did I ever think I was? Who in the world told me I was? Well, actually, I know the answer to that one: Ian did. Maybe a couple more months of preparation wouldn't have been amiss--but then again, giving my family their lives back couldn't wait for two more months for me to feel ready, because if I know myself, I'd never have felt ready to go back to College and face Souls again--lie to Souls for a personal gain.

“I’m sure you'll be great,” she replies. “You’re a strong soul, Wanderer, don’t forget that. You fought against Melanie, a hostile host; what could be worse than that?”

“Right now, this classroom full of people seems way worse,” I confess, forcing laughter to pretend I’m joking.

At this point Curt reappears, saving me from the conversation, though this only means it’s time to face everyone else in the room. The few people who were surrounding me bid farewell and climb the stairs to find someplace to stand where they don’t bother anyone, so I’m faced alone with Curt, who’s still smiling at me, grabbing me politely by the same spot on my arm Kathy was.

He leads me to the dais; slowly, the conversations quieten till it’s almost silent by the time we get to the teacher’s desk. I leave Curt to prepare the slides I’ve brought with me, the slides I’ve been working on with my human family. With the projector still turned off, I go to stand closer to Curt, who’s presenting me at the moment.

While he babbles, I mute him out, needing to concentrate, and scan the room. I find myself looking for the Seeker, her small figure, all dressed in black, and have to remind myself that she’s no longer here. Blissfully. I shouldn’t be feeling that relieved, though that’s what I am, knowing she’s not in this classroom again for suspecting me. Focusing on my breathing, I wipe my sweaty hands off on my skirt. Perhaps the suit was a bit too much, I reckon now, since no one but a few colleagues, Curt and the dean are wearing a suit--just plain, ordinary clothes. My blue shirt and charcoal jacket and skirt, finished with black high heels, seem a bit too much now. Nothing I can do about it now, however.

“Well, without further ado, let me leave the floor to Wanderer, now,” says Curt, starting an applause as he turns towards me. I step forward, kiss him on the cheek and he jumps off the dais, letting me receive the warm welcome.

This is it. Dear, I’m so not ready for this.

“Thank you all,” I say, and slowly the classroom falls into silence again. “I see some known faces here, so welcome back to you too. To those of you new here, as Curt has said, here I’m called Wanderer, but some of you may know me as Lives in the Stars, or Rides the Beast.”

As usual, my nicknames raise some surprised and awe murmurs around the classroom, but they die soon enough.

“Like you, I’ve had many names. I’ve lived altogether in eight planets, which gives me more than enough experience to talk about most of the lives out there. But this, this is my tenth life. I had to change hosts because the human I was put in in the first place was not docile enough. That’s the reason of my sudden absence two years ago--I left so that I could try to fight her without endangering anyone close to me. And though ultimately I was forced to change hosts, I won’t say I lost the battle. Quite the opposite. I learnt so much from my previous host--That’s why I can say, without a second doubt, that I could start a new life thanks to that knowledge.”

Again, a surprised, bemused and marveled murmur raises as a response to my words. I don’t think there has ever been a Soul who’s claimed as much as I have. Though we learn from each Planet we conquer, there was much to improve here on Earth when the first souls got here. We took over their knowledge and technologies as it were; didn’t take the time to learn anything else from these brutal species.

“I’m guessing by now you all know my method of teaching,” I presume, silencing the room again. “I’m here to explain the stories of all the universes out there,” now my steps, heading to the desk and the projector, are the only things that can be heard. “And so I thought I could start this new term with a unique history.” I turn on the projector and the images I’d prepared come to live at the gigantic screen behind of me, showing pictures of a particular blue and green round planet. “This one. The Earth’s.”

Now I have not only engaged a surprised murmur, but also heated and right outraged conversations all around the room. Even Curt, whom I spot in the crowd, seems completely astonished by my twist. I bet he’s wishing he’d consulted with me my new ideas for the subject beforehand.

“Please, everyone,” I beg, though not all the conversations quit, this time. “You know I’m here to report my experiences about every Planet in existence. Isn’t the Earth one of these planets? Don’t we have a moral obligation to study its history too?”

A student’s hand rising in the air is the first of many, many interruptions I expect today. But I thank this first one.

“Yes, please.”

“Of course, the Earth is one of this system’s planet, and theoretically this subject includes under its studies the Earth as well, but isn’t it a little bit redundant to talk about the planet we all inhabit at this given moment?” demands the student. His remark is met by some nods and exclamations of agreements. As it couldn’t have been any other way.

“Let me answer with another question--Have you ever bothered to study the Earth’s history? Will you?”

The student, as well as any other soul who’d agreed with him earlier, looks a bit taken aback, and I don’t need a verbal answer, though I get it either way.

“No, I must say that I haven’t, nor wasn’t planning to--”

“Then why would you refuse to learn more about this beautiful, marvelous Planet? Amongst all the Planets out there, the Earth has the longest and most extensive history of them all, despite the fact that its inhabitants have the shortest lives out there. Perhaps it’s a cause-effect equation,” I add, and, surprisingly enough, some souls laugh at my attempt at joking.

“We know the Earth’s history,” replies another student. “Same way I know the story of every Planet I’ve been to--I’ve always received the usual information about it.”

“Exactly, we know each Planet’s story.”

“Like she’s said, it’s not the same,” I reply politely. “You know each Planet’s history because you’ve been informed about it. And because you’ve been part of that history. As I’ve mentioned earlier, the Earth’s history is unique in itself, being as extensive as it is; none other Planet has seen as much evolution as this one. We know by heart the evolution of the spiders, dragons, flowers or dolphins because we’ve lived them too. But we weren’t here while the dinosaurs existed. We didn’t see the creation of the pyramids, the Eiffel Tower or the Berlin Wall, or the catastrophe of the World Trade Center--and never will we.”

“But we know all about it,” insists one student, leaning forward, clearly interested in what I have to say against his words. The reaction of some people close to him, sitting or standing in the aisle, should be enough: some of them don’t seem to be completely aware of the events I’ve mentioned. Of course, I can’t bring that up.

“Maybe you do. Yet you have never studied it.”

“Because we don’t need to. We know, for example, how computers work without ever being taught how to use them.”

“Really?” I exclaim, going back to the teacher’s desk. I stop by the table and tap the computer sitting on it. “If I’m being honest, I could use this device, use its searching engines, operate the projector, yes; but I don’t think I could dismantle it, or name all of its pieces, or fix it if it broke. Someone here could do it?”

It’s obvious no-one could and I smile in what I hope isn’t a condescending face. Damn it, controlling my feelings and behaving perfectly orderly all day long in front of Souls is harder and more taxing than I'd expected it to be. On the other hand, it's clear as water that I don't truly belong into the human world either now, so. . . Where the hell do I fit in? Who in the world am I?

Such philisohpic questions and deep intrsopection about who I am is not due right here in the middle of my very first lecture, however. “Only a mechanic could do it. And why’s that?”

“Because that’s their Calling,” says one men from the back after some seconds of shock silence.

“And because they’ve studied machines such as a computer to be able to repair them in case they need to be repaired. You can’t fix something without understanding it, and you can’t understand something if you don’t study it previously.”

“I’d say we pretty much fixed the Earth from humankind’s devastating presence,” snorts a young boy sitting in third row. Some of his immediate classmates scoff with him, and most of the classroom agrees with him as well. I can’t deny that one either.

“Certainly. There’re no wars, there’s no hunger, the environment’s healed,” I agree. It’s not possible to fight that logic. “We fixed the Earth. But, do we understand this Planet?”

“We know its history,” repeats one of the men standing in the aisle.

“We think we do,” I remark. “But all we know about the Earth is the knowledge our host had of his own Planet.”

“Isn’t that enough?” replies a woman.

“Do you think that’s enough knowledge to understand this Planet?” I ask in return.

Once again, I don’t find any opposition to my point and smile briefly. It’s going better than I could have expected. Though there’s still a long way to go.

“Let’s do an experiment, please. Raise your hands. Who here has heard of Plato? The pyramids? El Quijote? The Industrial Revolution? Montesquieu? Founding Fathers? The Rosetta Stone?”

Most of the audience raises their hands on the majority of these random subjects, but others don’t. That’s one of the problems of being inserted in the body of a human child who had no time to study and process all of humankind’s history.

“Thank you,” I say once I’ve proven my point and hands lower slowly. “What I wanted to show is that we only know what our hosts knew--which is not the same as knowing a certain subject because we’ve studied it by ourselves. So, can we truly say that we know the Earth? That we understand this Planet?”

“I think we do,” says a young girl, her voice soft and a bit confused, perhaps without realizing it was a rhetorical question. “We know enough.”

“Your word of choosing proves exactly what I’m saying,” I reply, trying my best not to sound condescending; thankfully, the girl doesn’t look hurt. “It’s not enough.”

“To your point of view,” interjects a man, a bit rudely.

I chuckle, glancing sideways to the man sitting at the far left corner of the sixth row, to calm myself and loosen up the tensed atmosphere after this unexpected introduction.

“Yes, of course, to my personal point of view. But isn’t one’s point of view supposedly shared by one and by all?”

The man’s eyes open gradually, knowing I’ve just used the Soul’s thinking against his words. He understands my point, and so does everyone else, as it’s a common thought amongst us, but many few Souls truly see what I meant. The sentence I’ve just recited belongs to one of our many teaching from Origin Planet. One we can never refute and must rely on and share throughout our lives.

After almost a minute, a female student from the right of the fifth row raises her hand.

“Of course. There’s no conflict among us. We all think the same, for the interest of our existences and Planets.”

She’s also reciting our beliefs, I notice with a bright smile.

“However, do I sense a “but” somewhere in there, miss?” I insist.

“But humans don’t,” finishes the girl after some long seconds, noticing the stares of everyone in the classroom.

“Exactly,” I approve, bowing my head to her slightly, thanking her for showing what I was trying to say. “It’s my point of view, probably not shared by any of you here, but my thinking diverges from yours simply because I can, because there can be different opinions in this world.”

“Different opinions is what led to wars, both civil and global, amongst humans,” declares a young boy, just a little bit frightened. “And many other tragedies here on Earth. Different opinions almost devastated this Planet to nothing, till we came here.”

“Yet different opinions is what made every human unique. Is what allowed the existence of great thinkers such as Plato, Montesquieu and thousands of others who propelled human’s knowledge. Is what helped create the Earth as we knew it when we first came here. Their technologies, their way of being and living; what they believed in. Different opinions is--everything.”

I let those words sink in for some long, long minutes. They all need time to process what I'm saying and will need much longer to understand the hidden meaning--the love. I couldn't expect results on my very first lecture, I'm not that crazy a Soul to be that optimistic. The goal today was not to have my classes shut down and not to be expelled from College. I cannot read Curt's face to guess what his reaction's bound to be at the end of the lesson.

Taking a sip of my water, I look around the classroom, trying to gauge their feelings and responses. Not as many people as before, when I first introduced the subject, seem to be against that idea now.

“I’m going to give you one more reason why we should proceed this line of studying. Have you ever stopped to realize how amazing and extraordinary these Hosts are? No other species in any of our Planets resemble in the slightest humankind. They take up to eight hundred twenty-seven points of our beings, leaving only one hundred and eighty one left to perceive things around us through our ordinary channels. Humans are the only species who need to extract so much information about their surrounding world, some of which always ends up misinterpreted, only to, live.”

“Are you saying that five senses are too much for our Hosts?” asks a boy, clearly mockingly, making those surrounding him snicker as well.

Though I try, I cannot not answer rudely to him. No-one will insult humankind in my lectures. Thye're allowed to believe they were vile, horrible, violent, awful species and I respect so, I once felt the same too, but I'll have no one using that foul language inside this classroom. There are lines I will not overstep. “Five senses? Whoever told you this species has only five senses?”

That snaps him out and he gives me a bewildered look back.

“Well, they do, don’t they? Sight, hearing, smell, touch, taste--”

“And how ‘bout the senses of balance and vertigo, acceleration, temperature or pain?” I demand. “All of the above are senses too, aren’t they?”

“I--Guess so,” he admits after two long seconds. “Sorry, Wanderer.”

“That’s quite alright,” I reply politely. “But we have to appreciate not only this World, but also the species living on it."

No-one seems to be that angry at me as before, or that appalled by the possibility of studying this particular World anymore. I may even have some people actually interested in what I can explain to them. Time to step forward.

“Well, cards on the table now, who wants to proceed this line of teaching?”

At first no-one says anything and my heart falls to the ground. I don’t show it, though, and I stand firmly on the dais. Slowly, some very few hands raise, their owners looking around the classroom, a bit afraid. It is true there has never been an open discussion or argument among souls. The great thing is--that’s not what we’re debating here.

Gradually, more and more hands start to raise to the air, some shoot right up, other people raising only their hands slightly. I’m pleased to see that Curt, my Comforter and quarter of the college’s scholars, as well as a vast majority of students, raise their hands too. After five long minutes, it seems everyone’s made up their minds; and apparently, the guests are the souls who are more clearly against my thinking and teaching. A minority, thankfully.

Murmurs rise around the classroom when everyone sees the result of the informal vote. Confusion turns into shock, which then turns into anger, and soon enough I hear growls and other foul expressions of language that should most definitely NOT be used by Souls. I find myself unable to regain control of the lecturers, bewildered because of the reaction that's erupted as well as the fact that they're refusing to listen to a teacher, and no one listens to me when I ask for a minute of silence to explain myself and compose ourselves. Given the unfortunate circumstances, Curt is forced to stand up again, addressing his closest peers. Seeing as him standing gets no results whatsoever, he drops his hands in defeat.

“Listen everybody! QUIET! " his yell does get everyone silent, if only due to pure shock--no one has ever needed to raise their voice this way inside of a classroom. Or anywehere at all, really, since we Souls took charge. "It’s rude to attack another Soul with such grave accusations,” he reminds the audience, who gradually stop babbling, some blushing after realizing their manners. A few whisper their apologies and I approve and thank them with a nod of my head. Curt addresses me one look, asking wordlessly if I'm alright after the disproportional string of insults and lack of manners I've been a victim of, and after I nod again, takes another second to breathe deeply before he resumes his speech, turning around to eye all students and peers. “Wanderer’s a dear teacher here at college. Every teacher has their own method of lecturing and until now, no-one’s complained before. This is hers. If someone disagrees or feels insulted or aggravated in any other way by her methods, they may leave.”

After such harsh words, I glance around the room discretely, afraid of the amount of students and audience who may take the suggestion only too freely. I identify some of the unequivocal signs: some shift in their seats, other refuse my eye, uncomfortable coughing fits and nervous tics raise all around the classroom. I don't speak up at all, giving them time to decide and make their own choices.

In the end, a man by the last row slams his notebook shut and stands, glaring at me from so far away as he descends the stairs and makes his way out of the classroom. After that, more people follow gathering their notebooks, pencils and backpacks. Respecting their decisions as a proper Soul should do, I just look at Curt for him to keep quiet about it and rest on the desk. Arms crossed, head dropped, I allow everyone who wishes to leave and not attend the lecture. I just keep my head low in order not to meet anybody's eye and avoid holding grudges against any of them.

Five minutes later, the classroom settles and I look up again. Only a handful of people left--maybe twenty or so--and everyone else seems confident enough to stick around, at least for today. I understand that for some of them it was just too rude to step outside even when given the choice to do so. I accept their deference as well.

Curt still stands, in shock after the line of people leaving the classroom. He's in two minds about following them out and dragging them inside again or staying out of respect, and maybe making another speech for those who have chosen to stay and will, theoretically, behave themselves from now on. Taking a deep breath and putting on a fake smile for everyone's sake, I just wave at him to stop wondering and resume his seat. All things considered, not opening my eyes to a completely empty classroom is an achievement in my book.

If he understands exactly what I meant and what's at stake, I don't know, but he sits down without a word, getting a reassuring squeeze of hand from Kathy. On my end, I rub my hands and face the audience again.

“OK, then, thank you all for staying behind. I hope the lecture meets your expectations and is itneresting enough for you to give me part of your time. "Now, without further ado, let’s start, shall we? As an introduction of some sorts. Can someone who’s been slightly interested in human studies tell me what ‘God’ meant to them?”

My very last weeks at the caves were, to say the least, quite interesting. My informal lectures became all of a sudden that much more important, in which everybody took turns to speak and teach each other; even Jamie was the lecturer a couple times. The same way as they wanted to learn about all the Planets out there, I wanted to learn as much possible on this Planet, from their rightful owners. How they saw and understood their Planet, before the Apocalypse went down. Every tiny little detail about the Earth, from prehistory to the day their world ended, every achievement, every thinker, every milestone. So I could pass exactly the same to my audience. So as not to let them forget their past, in order for them to pass it on to the new generations--Nicholas, for start.

I’m back at my desk, preparing the new slides, showing some human paintings that were used to represent the varying ideas of God. I could only find them thanks to Mel, Jared and Ian, of course--I didn’t even know what to look for in the beginning.

One student--I remember his face, though not his name--raises his hand slowly. I nod at him and he starts speaking.

“It’s something quite difficult to understand and explain--”

“There’s no wrong answer,” I reply politely, trying to calm the poor boy down. Doesn’t need any unnecessary pressure. He listens to me and takes a deep breath again.

“Well, ‘God’ was presumably a human creation to give an uneducated and estimated explanation to everything they couldn’t give an answer to. It was this supernatural being who created the Earth and everything in existence, who was cause and reason to all living creatures and everything that happened in the known universe, which, of course, wasn’t that extensive back then. In the end, however, it was only an excuse to justify any good, but specially, bad action humans did, and hence spreading war and death around the globe in the name of a superior being they couldn’t even prove existed. Furthermore, it only brought discrimination and segregation among humans, since there wasn’t an only God, but there were many, many believes, all of which differed at some point. They could never agree on the terms of their religions, nor the number of existent Gods, for example.”

This ambiguity creates some disbelieving murmurs, which I dismiss quickly.

“That was very well put, thank you. I reckon you’ve taken human studies?”

“Bits of it, yeah,” confesses the student, blushing shyly.

“Someone has anything else to add?” I ask, looking around.

Seeing how we’re going back to my usual method of teaching, of me chatting around and asking for the participation of my audience, more and more people begin to get comfortable with me and raise their hands.

“Historically, humans thought they were sent here to Earth for punishment, so their lives were only and exclusively dedicated to honor ‘God’ and accepted their miseries as punishments,” says another boy. “They thought there was this afterlife existence after death, which would be peaceful, joyful--everything they didn’t have on Earth.”

I don’t have to signal anyone for people to start talking orderly.

“God granted miracles too to those loyal subjects who, as he’s said, devoted their lives to the worship and dedication to his ‘commands’ and rules.”

“I’m sorry; miracles?” demands another boy from the third from last row.

“Care to explain, please, miss?” I ask and she nods before turning to face the man.

“Miracles, like--Something out of the ordinary, that couldn’t possibly exist or take place because they were contrary to the established Laws of this world--yet ‘God’ was able to produce them. Like magic,” she tries to elaborate. “Cures to cancer, or to make rain during a heat streak, things like that.”

The man nods in acknowledge, thanking the girl, and not two seconds go by that another woman speaks up.

“God was not only a justification for actions and an explanation for what were usual phenomena, but also it was somewhat of a ‘salvation’ concept, I think?” she says. Despite her doubts in her speech, I nod as to make her keep talking and explain her thoughts. “This links with what that boy said earlier--they all believed in another life. Similar to skipping to another species in another Planet,” she explains to her immediate audience. “But that’s not physically possible for humans, as you know, unlike we can. They thought of--reincarnation, I think that’s the word. That after death, their soul could transmigrate into another body to live another life. God allowed that miracle, if humans regretted their sins before dying. God allowed them salvation from their sins and punishment.”

“Something else?” I demand. “Somebody knows how many religions did they have?”

“Wouldn’t dare to say an exact number, but there were the religions of Catholicism, Islam, Christianity, Buddhism,...”

“Judaism too.”

“And Confucianism, wasn’t it?”

“I want to say too that not every human in the world was religious, however. There were those who didn’t believe a superior being existed or had created the Earth and everything else in the Universe.”

“Exactly, very good point,” I say. “Allow me to cut this argument here, please.”

Now that I’ve put a stop to the fast exchange, everyone breathes calmly for some seconds, myself included, to organize my thoughts.

“Yes, everything said here was accurate and well argued, without a doubt. But let me make some corrections, if I may.” Nobody stops me, of course, and I signal the first student who’s spoken out. “Though I agree with your cynical point of view about this superior being, let’s give humankind some credit here. They first started believing in a higher entity many millennia ago, when they first starting developing from other animal species, when their capacity of reasoning was very limited compared to the ones they had when we came here. Human’s evolution throughout history is quite something and, as some of you have said, they created something bigger than themselves to give an explanation to those things they didn’t understand. Lightning, rain, death, rage. Inevitable phenomena, often natural disasters, they weren’t able to grasp with their limited knowledge. Let me ask, how many of you were implanted into a baby human when you got here?”

A dozen hands shot in the air, not as panicked as the first hands-up question I asked.

“And though yourselves, as a Soul, could more or less understand what was going on around you, mainly because you’d seen it before in your previous lives, or because you were taught all of it eventually, you only saw, heard and touched it through a baby’s eyes, ears and palms--some very limited powers of observation and deduction. Imagine living like that all your lives, without the ability of improvement, the capability of process rationally all the information received by your senses and then act accordingly. Quite the confusing existence, wouldn’t it?” I ask, and some laughter rises from the furthest rows. “Can we all agree, then, that it makes sense that humankind started giving such mystic explanation to those phenomena they couldn’t understand?”

Unanimously, it seems we can.

“But--The wars and losses that were mentioned?”

“I’m not going to make an accurate explanation of religion, at least not today, since I can’t wrap my head around that either. But long story short, this mystic belief spread, and, as it so often happens when it comes to humans--”

“Different opinions grew,” someone finishes for me and I nod to confirm it.

“Indeed. How many Gods there were, their powers, their punishments, the way they were supposed to be worshipped, or even the lectures they gave humans to follow. All the religions mentioned before differ on some aspects on these matters. Matters that lead to vicious, bloody wars ‘in the name of their truly God’. Unfortunately.”

I let by some seconds of respectful silence in the memory of the thousands of human lives lost to that reason throughout Earth’s history--one of its darkest time. But I can’t allow this subject to linger for much longer. I’m not a scholar on this one, either.

“Another correction, if I may. There were indeed six to seven major religions at the time we came here. But, on a side note, Catholicism was a form of Christianity. And, as your fellow companion has said, at the time we arrived, not everyone believed in God anymore; some humans had evolved from this primitive thinking. It was estimated that a quarter of the global population didn’t believe in any religion--agnostic people.”

“I’m sorry, if I may,” says a boy, who I cannot see from where I am. Some men and women on the aisle have to move so the student who spoke is visible.

“Yes, please, go ahead.”

“How could they still believe in this superior being? With the existent hunger around the globe, the diseases, the natural catastrophes. . .? How could they believe that the entity that created it all was able to also destroy it all?”

“You, young man, have just issued one of the most repeated arguments there have ever been against the existence of this God,” I praise. “Exactly. How can the same entity destroy the marvelous world he’s created? That’d be the ambivalence of God, the dualism of religion--the good and the bad. To humans, He--whoever He was--could give as well as take, simply because He could. With our past, we can see it cannot be. And, as mentioned earlier, ‘God’ worked, once more, as a way to justify human’s actions that were devastating the Earth. Because, if it was God’s will, who could do anything about it, individually, against this higher being?”

“That--Is that what they thought?”

“I honestly can’t answer that question. Though I’ve tried my hardest to understand humankind’s point of view, I can’t answer for them if I have never held a conversation with any of them.”

A low murmur raises again, everyone speaking with their neighbors, who knows about what. And the subject of the arguments is, indeed, the least worrying thing--at least that’s on the table. I give them a couple of minutes to gossip and discuss before becoming once again the center of attention. Funny enough, I’ve already gotten used to it. And knowing it’s all means to an end, it feels a hundred times better than what I used to do.

“Ladies and gentlemen, we’ve just engaged one of the most critical and heated discussions humankind ever held,” I say, raising my hands. “And not even us can get to a proper conclusion.”

“Yes, we can,” replies a woman, leaning against the wall. “Believing in this ‘God’ concept is complete rubbish.”

“To you, at this moment, it is,” I grant over the discomfort for the inappropriate adjective used to describe the subject. “But thousands of years ago, to more primitive and less reasoning species, it was not. We all agreed it was almost natural they started believing in something superior than themselves.”

“Yes, but--”

I raise a hand to excuse my manners, but interject her either way. “And have we or have we not agreed that it was only natural that that belief was to be spread around the globe?”

“I--Guess so,” grants her.

“So, can we really fight against a belief that millions, thousands of millions of people, shared? Even with their different opinions,” I scowl. “Don’t get me wrong, I’m not saying if we can share it with them; only if we can, or should, fight against a thinking that meant so much to so many people. Bearing in mind that it no longer exists nowadays.”

“Actually, we couldn’t,” says a girl student from the first row. As she speaks, her eyebrows frowned, understandably. They’re beginning to comprehend, even if they don’t see it just yet. “It’d be as if humans would have invaded our Origin Planet and started tearing apart everything we believed in. I don’t think we could stand up for it.”

“No, we couldn’t,” I confirm. “And actually, we shouldn’t. So, why do it the other way around?”

I look around, waiting for someone to raise their hand, but obviously, I wasn’t really expecting an answer. What I was looking for is that silence. That stunned, confused, almost bemused silence that could lead to many other levels. First phase on track.

“So,” I say raising my voice, standing in the middle of the dais to observe everyone present at the classroom. “We haven’t solved one of the biggest puzzles in human history. I’d be greatly surprised if we had, in all honesty, despite our better technologies and higher knowledge,” I laugh, and some join me--it’s been an intriguing puzzle, I guess. Man, surely Jeb would have loved this. No, Jeb would have been the happiest man on Earth if he could be up on this dais with me. “But we’ve somewhat understood, or at least I sure hope I helped you understand, what used to be, to me, one of the biggest mysteries of humankind; which is a great milestone for me. So, who thinks we should start studying human history so we can actually understand the Planet we live in?”

At once, dozens of hands shoot up in the air; way more than I’d expected at first when I popped up the question. I cannot not smile. My muscles loosen and I exhale a breath I didn’t know was holding back; I’ve made it. And I don’t think no-one’s called a Seeker, much less a Healer, unless one of the guests is part of that Calling.

“Okay, then it’s settled, that’s the future of this subject. Thank you all. I invite each and every one of you to join me in these lectures--I hope you enjoy them as much as I enjoyed learning all this.”

I bow my head to the audience to thank them their participation and willingness during the past two hours; if they hadn’t interacted with me, born with me, I’d have been kicked from college for good. As a response, a great applause hovers the classroom, which lasts more than a minute, before everyone stands up from their seats and a million conversations start up at once.

I return to the desk and collect my slides, putting them back into my suitcase, before turning off the projector. By the time I turn around, I’m startled by the dozen people in front of me, a sight I’m not used at having after a lecture. I used to straight back home two seconds after I was done speaking.

“Morning,” I say politely, hanging my briefcase from the shoulder and offering my hand. I start sweating and for the tenth time since I’ve left home, I wish Melanie was here with me right now. Though she’d be panicking worse than me, it’d be easier.

“Wanderer, these are some scholars from this college and others around the States. They are all fascinated by your lecture,” says Curt, introducing them all one by one.

“Your point of view is absolutely intriguing,” confesses the tallest and boldest man as he shakes my hand with much too energy. “We’ve perfected this world, indeed, but I don’t think there’s a Soul on Earth who’s taken the time to try to understand this species like you did.”

“Groundbreaking, really. I’m in awe. Speechless,” assures a short man with glasses. “I can’t wait to spread the video around. This morning I couldn’t even consider taking any kind of consideration to humankind beyond the fact that I’m in this host at this moment. Now, all I want to do is lock myself up in the library and start studying by myself human history.”

“Well, I hope you don’t have to retort to that, sir,” I laugh. “You can come to my future lectures and we’ll see if it suits you.”

“I’m sure it will.”

“Truly inspiring,” says a dark-skinned woman with a weak voice. “It seems even us, the Souls, have a lot to learn. Even from a species as brutal and dangerous as humans.”

“Indeed. I was surprised myself too.”

“Curt has explained us--All this comes from your seclusion to the desert for more than two years?” asks the last scholar, a tall woman with a long blonde raid hanging over her shoulder.

“Yes. Yes, it does,” I confirm. “I had troubles with my last host. She--She stayed behind. And she was not pleased, to say the least, with everything we’ve done here. So I took her someplace where we could speak and discuss without hurting anyone. As soon as I understood pretty much all there was to know about the human race, or I thought so, since I’m learning new things every day, I took her to be discarded and asked to be implanted in a much docile host. But the knowledge remains,” I sum up, signaling my head.

“And thankfully, you can pass it to all of us from now on.”

“I surely hope I manage to do that much.”

“Yes, we certainly are very much interested in the future of these lectures,” says a new male voice, approaching us. Everyone turns around and, being as short as I am, I need to step forward to meet the new guests. Five people, three men and two women, stand at a ten feet distance from us--and the main difference is none of them look any pleased with my lecture. I break sweating again and have a hard time swallowing--apparently not everyone displeased and opposed to my line of teaching left earlier. And here I thought I was stepping into my usual comfort zone already. “Or to know what’s your goal with this subject.”

They all expect an answer from me, though for some reason, I’m comforted seeing that Curt and some of his known colleagues seem willing to defend me.

“Not much. Just sharing my interest in humankind and try to expand our knowledge in them,” I shrug.

“Just that?” insists one of the women, raising an eyebrow.

“Why don’t you just tell me what do you expect from these lessons, ma’am?” I reply.

“We hear you had troubles with your previous host,” explains the woman slowly.

“Professor Huber, I don’t think--”

“It’s fine, Curt. I’m not ashamed of that anymore,” I reply, before facing Prof. Huber directly by myself, standing as tall as this tiny host allows me. “Yes, I had troubles with my previous host. She didn’t disappear and lingered on my head.”

“And your solution was to lock yourself up in an abandoned place out in the desert?”

“A very fruit-bearing experiment, as it turns out.”

“You went out of your way to confront her. Not many souls would have done that.”

“Thank you,” I say politely, though the man’s voice clearly indicated that he wasn’t exactly praising me for my actions.

“But it would seem like a lost fight from the beginning,” resumes the third woman. “Trying to fight such a vindictive host as a human--It must have been hard.”

“It certainly was. And as I’ve stated, I didn’t win, that’s why I skipped to another host.”

“How are you sure your previous host didn’t win the fight, then?” asks one of the men, finally putting on the table the important issue. “Didn’t start controlling you?”

“Okay, I think that’s enough,” interjects sharply Curt, raising his voice, and I panic. This is the closest I’ve ever seen on any Planet to a conflict among Souls--excluding my Seeker, that is. And I like it less when I know I’m the reason to it.

“Like I said, I understood I’d lose control to my host if I didn’t do anything before it was too late--and I did. I skipped to this host. My other host was discarded and after the new implementation I still stayed behind for some more weeks, making sure I was myself. I wouldn’t have come back to the society if there was the slightest chance I’d endanger any of you living here,” I explain. “I’m not a threat to any of you, not physically, and my lessons aren’t either. Everyone’s free to drop my subject if they’re not comfortable with it--I won’t pursue them. I don’t want to hammer into our students’ brains what humans thought--I don’t want to start a War. I just want for everyone here to understand the hosts we’ve occupied.”

My words are bold, and I don’t know where they come from. Maybe because I’ve just said them too many times before and have been repeating this mantra for days now. But I owe it completely to Ian, Mel and Jared, and everyone else back in the caves, who helped create my alibi. On my part, I’m just stunned by the opposition I’ve faced and by the remark I’ve managed to utter--after that, I barely notice how the teachers scatter around slowly, a bit awkwardly.

The next four hours pass by in a blur, too, in which I hardly know what I’m doing or saying--I face the same debate and opposition two more times, after breakfast and then again after lunch, with different classrooms and guests and each time feels a little bit harder. My heart sinks to the floor every time someone leaves the room as soon as I introduce the new subject. Thankfully, Curt stays in the front row each time, without erasing a reassuring smile off his face, saying he’s as interested in the subject as the first time I’ve exposed it.

I almost curse out loud when I’m free to head back home, done with all the discussions with scholars and students--some interested, others appalled, others simply outraged. I use the slow stroll back to the apartment to calm my nerves, though my thoughts are filled with the amount of students, as well as scholars, who I now know will drop the subject and never look back. Maybe this idea won’t succeed after all. But all I can think of, and all that’s kept me going through this day was, you’re doing this for your child. For Nick. For your human family.

You can do this. You have to.

I force myself to focus once again when I get home--a strange word referring to this apartment, since the caves still feel more like home than this, seeing that my child is there at this moment--, remembering to drop the keys inside the metallic vase by the entrance, making as much noise as possible. After some seconds, the lights light up and Ian, followed by Mel and Jared, come out from the dormitories, his faces weary, looking around in case my signal for “all clear” wasn’t real. When they notice I’m all alone, they step into the hall, worry written on their faces as they let sink in my crestfallen disposition. I sigh deeply, letting out all the stress of the day.

“How’d it go?” they ask cautiously, surrounding me. Ian hugs me from my shoulders and I lean into him, controlling my shivering, as all the nervousness of the day leaves me.

“Better than I feared,” is the most truthful answer I can say.

“I’m sure you did great,” replies Ian, kissing me gently on the cheek.

“I did my best,” I confirm. “I certainly wasn’t expelled.”

“That’s great news!” exclaim the three of them. Just this means a great deal to all of us; I can continue my classes and spreading my thoughts, humans’ thoughts. It’s a huge milestone; at first we thought I wouldn’t make it through day one.

“But I don’t know if that’ll be enough,” I reply coldly to their enthusiasm, throwing a bucket of frozen water to all of them.

Surely my depressing state of mind was the last thing any of them wanted to hear upon my arrival--hence, they don’t let it linger for too much.

“Well, however it was, you’ve made it through the day. Now let’s eat something and we can discuss tomorrow’s lectures,” suggests Jared, signaling for the kitchen.

“You’ve been cooking?!” I demand in a shriek, as the smell of food hits me. “This is not what we agreed on!!” I look at them all in turn, expecting to see shame and remorse, but they’re nothing but. They don’t seem to understand the risks. “Come on, you break the rules the first day back? How can you expect me to trust you at all--?”

“Please, Wanda, take a breath,” begs Ian, squeezing my hand. “We only thought you’d deserve to have dinner ready by when you came back after a rough first day. I don’t think that deserves a capital punishment.”

“You said that no-one would be checking your ins and outs,” reminds Melanie. “I’m sure there isn’t a Seeker coming this way.”

I’m too beat to keep this discussion on, so I just let it go for today. I really am starving and having an argument with my family was the last thing on my mind when I arrived at the apartment. Noticing how I give up, Mel grabs my briefcase, Ian takes off my coat and Jared moves to the kitchen to finish dinner. In the meantime, I go take a shower and change my clothes before sitting down on the living room, most lights off. We eat lunch in silence, all of us sinking in our new reality: just the four of us in the middle of a city filled with enemies. No more humans. The usual racket and bickering gone. And above all, no overexcited Jamie. He’s probably the one we’re all missing the most.

Jared and Ian offer to wash the dishes to come back ten minutes later to the dining room, where Mel’s already spread all of my material and bibliography on the table from the suitcase. Finding as well the USB Curt’s handed me.

“What's this?”

“Sorry, almost forgot. Someone videotaped today's lesson. I thought you might want to watch it tomorrow to kill time. And I'm guessing I'll have some material from almost every lesson, so you'll have plenty of DVDs to watch. And take notes in case there's something I can improve, to your point of view.”

“I'm sure it was fantastic,” says Ian, leaning to brush my hair with his nose, squeezing my hand.

“Ian, please stop sugarcoating everything at all times,” begs Jared in a growl.

“And stop lying. This is the most important task I've ever encountered and I need all the possible help as not to mess it up,” I reply sharply, taking his hands away from me--because if I don't, we won't be getting any work done tonight. At the dining room, at least, that is.

“So, where do you want to start off tomorrow?”

“Well, the plan is to give a spectrum of all humankind's past, so I guess I should be starting at prehistory.”

Ian nods, grabbing the notes we made with all our family about that historical time, along with the few rare text books I could find on our way here.

“I wouldn't spend much time on it, though,” advises Jared. “It's not one of the most interesting periods of our history.”

“You mean it's not as thrilling as the World Wars?” I reply coldly. I notice at once I’ve slipped by the stunned silence that follows my words--only out of exhaustion and a full day’s exhaustion. I sigh deeply, dropping my head. “I'm sorry, Jared. After being all day with souls and talking about so different aspects of the human world--”

“You have nothing to apologize for,” replies Mel sharply. Sometimes I’m still surprised when she defends me over her boyfriend--guess after all, a family bond is closer than a boyfriend.

“Besides, he was right, don't linger too much on this or you'll lose the few people who're interested in the lectures.”

“Are you kidding? They'll love it, I know they will. It's the beginning of everything. They'll understand all about you humans that much better once we tackle this one area, your thought process, your development. The evolutions from primal primates to partially reasoning beings, the thought process of using tools for the first time--”

“Oh my God, you sound like my old history teacher. Stop talking before I start hating prehistory even more than I do.”

“Sorry. I guess that for teaching humans and all your past, I had to love your whole history, not only the evolutionary fortuitous miracle you all are,” I say, looking at Ian fondly, squeezing his hand.

“Only you can love us enough to study our history that much,” sighs Ian, pinching me tenderly on the cheek. Him, Nick, Mel, Jamie, Jeb, Jared, everyone else... Maybe he’s right on this one.

“For now. With a little bit of luck, I won't be the only one for long.”

“Well, let's see if we can make them love prehistory as much as you do,” suggests Jared, leaning forward. “In any case, don't waste more than two lectures with this, or you'll get out of track for sure.”

“Okay, I'll try.”

Though I'd already planned the syllabus, it's good to revise it all with my human family; and to have help me decide how to engage and focus the issue. We could probably spend the whole night in talking about it, as used to happen back in the caves, and as I'm guessing will happen at tomorrow's lectures, but after a couple hours the three of them command me unanimously to go to bed. I shouldn't be tired for my lessons and they're confident I'll be fine. Ian prepares me a hot cocoa cup before drifting off to bed. Noticing my palpable exhaustion, he just wraps me up from behind, allowing me to use his shoulder as my pillow, and I'm asleep within seconds.

Next day we have breakfast going over today's lectures, before I remind them all of the rules. Only Curt joins me to walk me to college, talking cheerfully about the amount of souls who've contacted him about my lectures, or the students who want to transfer to them--without mentioning those who've decided to drop it, and I don't ask it either.

I sense the expectation from the moment I step foot into the room. Full classroom again, which is good, because I aim to attract the attention of as many souls as I can, even if it's by outraging half the world. Though very few faces I recognize. It soothes me to see again some of my old students, smiling broadly at me. The rest are waiting eagerly for me to start. I don't make them wait for too long--I set my suitcase and the projector.

“Good morning everyone, and welcome to the study of human history. I see some new faces today--I hope I don't have to repeat myself and explain why this subject will be focused mainly on this Planet's story for the imminent future.”

My rather sharp voice surprises everyone, including myself, but it gets the job done. No-one speaks and even, some of the new assistants shake their heads. Good. They all know what they're in for. It'll make things easier. I sure as hell hope. I don't think I could defend my plans a second time.

“Thank you. Now, let's start at the beginning. Prehistory.” I turn on the projector so four questions are shown: is there a difference between human history and prehistory? What marked the beginning of prehistory? And the end of prehistory? What distinguished primal humankind than other primates back then?

“Now, some easy questions, as I always start off with," I joke to ease the mood once more---and some people do laugh, easing the mood as effortlessly as that. “Could somebody answer any of these questions? As you know, there's no wrong answer. I'm asking for what your hosts remember, information which sometimes isn't easy to access, I'm fully aware, don't worry. Anyone, please?"

After some seconds of deliberation, a female student raises her hand. Back when I taught the souls history I found this to be quite the successful way to lead a lecture: issue some questions, letting people answer what they thought as to make them more comfortable, then making some corrections and ending by explaining the details. Now that we're talking about something none of us has lived, but thankfully some of them will end up loving, seems like the correct and easy path to follow. As easy as it gets when I'm attempting something like this.

I feel rather good after my first lecture, since I haven't met with nearly the same resistance as yesterday, and so do the two other lessons I have after lunch. I know everyday there’s still a very long, tedious way to go, but I have to acknowledge every lesson I manage as a success, if not I’d be out of this city in no time. And so the feeling grows, and the schedule repeats day after day. It’s kind of reassuring to find a pace in which we all feel kind of comfortable--something to lean on in the midst of a strange city.

Things do not get easier, though.

Through my classes I try to share my own love of this Planet--and their rightful cohabitants--to other souls, but not too straightforwardly, so they don’t start fearing the aim of the lessons. What I get as a result are some pretty normal and uneventful lectures, once the ones who’re really interested in what I’ve got to say stick around and the rest leave, which leaves me as if I’m doing nothing but explaining human’s history the best I can, with no ultimate goal, when my aim was to get to everyone out there, get their attention, their interest and, eventually, their commitment.

Ian, Mel and Jared try to reassure me every evening, telling me we knew from the start this change wouldn’t happen overnight, and that I just couldn’t drop everything now that the plan was engaged. Despite the fact that during some breaks between classes, I do want to quit. Only two things keep me going forward: the fact that every day, the same students and scholars--plus some very few additions each week--await for me excitedly, expectant on my new lessons; and knowing that I'm doing this for my child, firstly, and so many other people out there who rely on me.

Though we don't speak about him out loud, Nicholas' always ever so present in our every thought. He's the one who makes me quit this whole plan to go be by his side and love him and take care of him to prove him he's got two loving parents who are away because of this love; but he's also the one that everyday gives me the strength to wake up and go to class. Our blessing and our curse, at the same time. Once again, the weird ambivalence of this world and its feelings strikes me--a contradiction only existing here on Earth that only now I’m beginning to understand.

So we kept preparing my lessons every night, hoping that we do achieve something else than to give an overview to human’s history, because for what I manage, it seems like any of my family members could have done the same probably better than myself; Jamie’d be up to it.

Even with all their help and the preparation I had back in the caves and every evening at our little apartment, I realize soon enough the subject is way too extensive to cover it all simply with my lectures. Few weeks in, when I’m finished talking and commenting with some scholars my latest lecture, four more students, three females and one male, come to meet me at the dais as I was packing up my stuff. I stand and look at them with a warm smile.

“Afternoon,” I say, as they all look a bit flustered.

“Wanderer,” says the male one.

“Please, call me Wanda,” I reply, shaking their hands as they introduce themselves as Mark, Lilies Francium, Trensie and Marlene. “Can I help you with something?” I ask, noticing their books and folders.

“Actually, yes,” answers Marlene. “We have some questions about the syllabus and we thought you could clarify them.”

“Of course,” I say, leaving the suitcase back on the desk. “Do you have some other classes today?”

“No, this was our last one.”

“Perfect. Then please, pull out some chairs.”

“There’s a lecture next on this classroom,” replies Mark before anyone moves an inch.

“I see. Okay, if you’d like, let’s meet in fifteen minutes at the library, shall we?” I suggest. “It’ll give me time to settle a couple things.”

“That’d be lovely. Thanks,” appreciate the four of them, beaming, before leaving hurriedly the classroom. I gather my things and follow them out, nodding at the next lecture’s professor and students, who’ve been waiting patiently, standing on the hall waiting for all of us to leave.

My first stop is at the public phone booth at the college hall. Even though I’m sure no-one would ever eavesdrop a teacher’s conversation over the phone, I make sure to shut the door close and to hide the numbers I dial. After five signals, Jared picks up the phone--I understand their concern as it’s the very first time I’ve called home, but I’m the only one who knows the number, so it couldn’t have been any other person.

“Wanda? Everything OK?”

“Yes, fine, really,” I assure him, breathing deeply in an attempt to speak slowly and calmly and not put them on edge. “It’s just--I’ve agreed to meet with a couple of students now. I’ll be a bit late, but don’t worry, nothing’s wrong, is that understood?”

“Perfectly. No red flags, then?”

“None at all.”

“OK, then. Have fun.”

“Thanks. I’ll try,” I scoff. “Are you alright over there?”

“As good as we can be,” he sighs. “Do you want to speak with Ian?”

“I’m really not in the mood,” I confess. “Tell him I had to hurry. And not to worry, like I said--”

“Everything’s fine,” he repeats. “Message understood. See you later.”

“Remember the rules,” I remind coldly, even though I know I shouldn’t have bothered, before hanging up.

Knowing I’ve lost way too much time, I forget all about my second errand and go straight to the library, where, being honest, I haven’t set foot in before despite my months of experience at teaching here. Trensie, Lilies Francium, Mark and Marlene are already waiting for me in an unoccupied table by the entrance, the area where talking is allowed, their books and folders spread out in front of them. And in front of the free chair--a cup of coffee. I smile as I sit down, appreciating their kindness, since that’s what I wanted to stop by to get before arriving.

“Thank you,” I say, leaving the suitcase by my side and taking a small sip of coffee. “And sorry to keep you waiting.”

“By all means,” replies Mark, dismissing it all with a wave of his hand.

“So, what did you want to ask me?”

“Well, after last week’s lecture on Ancient Greece, we came down here and researched some of the philosophers you mentioned. Out of curiosity. There was this one book of Plato, “The Republic”, and we saw this one text quite interesting, though we didn’t understand it fully.”

“Wait a sec, please,” I beg, raising a hand. “You say you found a human book here?” I ask surprised.

“Yeah,” confirms Lilies, taking one book from her suitcase and handing it to me. It’s obviously not an original, it’s too brand new for that, but it’s indeed a copy of Plato’s “The Republic”. I’m actually quite dazzled to see it in my own two hands--I’d have thought we’d discarded everything relating to human’s knowledge and culture. “All college libraries preserved most of human’s books.”

“Guess it seemed wrong to throw them all away,” murmurs Trensie, shrugging.

“Possibly,” I agree, still staring at the book, flicking through its pages. Too mesmerized for the treasure in my hands--thinking about what would any of my family members say if they knew this still existed.

“You can keep it, if you want,” suggests Lilies after some seconds.

“I’m sorry?”

“The book. You can keep it.”

“Oh, no, that’s not--I didn’t mean to--”, I try to give it back to her, but she refuses to accept it back. “We all took a copy and I don’t need it. Please,” says she.

Acknowledging we’re not progressing at all, and deep inside thanking her for allowing me to borrow this book at least for a couple of days, I leave “The Republic” on the table and clear my throat to get back on track.

“I’m guessing you read the “Allegory of the Cave”, then?” I ask, that being the only one text I truly mentioned at last week’s class. “It does make you think, doesn’t it?” I laugh after receiving nods as responses. “OK, why don’t you start telling me what you understood by the text and then I can solve your doubts?”

They look alternatively to each other for some seconds, before Lilies breathes in deeply and starts speaking. I have to thank my family for having explained this Allegory to me so clearly; even if it was months ago, I remember it quite well. And the four students do too, and by when they’re finished talking, I’m surprised they couldn’t answer their questions on their own, since they pretty much understand all of the analogy. The Soul’s reasoning ability is that much similar, if not better, than humans.

But in any case, since they’ve asked me personally and they seem willing to listen to anything I have to offer on that matter, I try to break it down not only for the three of them, but the dozen other students who’ve gathered around the table, attracted by something they've never heard before--human culture. And not anything, but human’s old allegory. How the interior of the cave would be the material world, the exterior open air of the cave the world of the Forms or Ideas; the shadows, which are merely a false representation of the truth, hence the Sun is the only real knowledge, and the ascension to that philosophical truth represents one’s overcoming, seeking answers beyond the cave, beyond one’s senses.

“May I ask--is that true?” asks then one student I’ve never seen in my life, looking just a little bit afraid. “All we see and hear and touch is unreal?”

It’s at this point when I realize there’re at least half hundred people standing around our table, listening, again, to my every word. Unintentionally I’ve created a small informal lesson once more. It strikes me almost harmfully how similar this is becoming to those late night informal lessons back at the caves. I have to remind myself that none of the people surrounding me is one of my human family members--none of the students is the ever-overexcited Jamie.

“I think Plato’s goal was just to remind us not to believe whole heartedly all we see, hear and touch and sometimes stop to question all that surrounds us and take some time to reason peacefully,” I calm down with a warm smile. “There are no absolute truths.”

“Then, were they truly prisoners?” asks a colleague scholar I’ve barely talked to throughout my whole academic experience. “Humans? Were they chained, seeing only as far as the ends of their noses? Are we, since we inherited this Planet?”

I smile politely at him and consider his questions for some long seconds. Hadn’t brought myself to do so before and it thrills me as much as when I was first told about it.

“Well, in human’s case, that might be so. They were born on a Planet they didn’t choose, in a society they hadn’t chosen, which chained their possibilities and aspirations; they lived in a fastened social structure with concise ideologies, languages, thoughts, habits and traditions. At some level, they could think that they were indeed chained onto this Planet and by their emotions and senses. But, are we? What do you think?” I ask, turning to face the close to the almost seventy people crowd.

“For what you’ve been saying, I don’t think we are,” says a woman scholar, slowly, as everyone’s stares turns to her. “None of the things you’ve said applies to us.”

“Indeed,” I confirm with a smile. “We chose this Planet on our own free will. We practically created a new society to live in. Sure, there’s an established structure we all abide to, if you want to phrase it like that, but do you feel chained?”

“With all due respect, I don’t think any of those men in the caves felt chained--till that first one left,” replies a student, eyebrows frowned.

“Have to grant you that one,” I agree. “But, I don’t know if you were here to listen to the whole story--they were chained because they didn’t see nor wanted to learn anything beyond what was right in front of them, since they felt satisfied the way they lived. To put it in one word--they were blind. Do you feel that way?”

“Of course not,” replies immediately the same student and I nod at him.

“Because we’re not,” I confirm. “It’s simply in our nature, really. We’ve accepted to live this way, because it’s who we are. Peaceful, harmonious creatures with all the possible tech and knowledge within our grasp. We’re nothing like humans, except for our physical appearance. Hope that answered all your questions,” I say, looking around.

Most people look content, but some, who’ve come later, ask for information about where all this human allegory comes from. Thankfully, my students can spend a couple minutes filling everyone in--and when they’re done explaining my classes core, it seems like quite a few Souls are willing to enroll into my lectures, though some others leave grudgingly the table area. That fact surprises me enough to make me spill a bit of the coffee I was drinking before I can compose myself again.

“Any further questions?" I ask, looking around. None of our guests have any other, it’d seem, but it’s clear as water that Marlene, Trensie, Mark and Lilies have some, as they look at each other nervously and blush slightly. I smile broadly, giving them time to phrase their question through.

“We did a little bit of research on Confucianism too,” confesses Trensie.

A slow, surprised hiss rises around the table. On my part, I’m dazzled by their dedication that’s been brought up thanks to my lessons; I barely spoke of that one religion during my class--the reason, probably, why they looked it up. The rest of my audience is simply confused by her words and I turn towards them again.

“Care to fill our guests in, Trensie?” I beg.

She smiles and gives a brief introduction about human concept of religion and God to our audience a subject that is met by both amused and shocked outbursts. But no-one leaves the table--as a matter of fact, more and more people are gathering around--nor I’m forced to reason again why I’m explaining such issues on my lectures.

There isn’t much debate on this matter, thankfully. Confucianism must be the religion closest to our natural beliefs and ways of thinking: compassion, love, mercy, honesty, righteousness, property and correct behavior, wisdom, fidelity, sincerity. It’s no wonder, really, why such traits formed the basis of the Chinese government for centuries. The main issue here is, actually, why such kind and selfless nature didn’t preserve and spread throughout the globe--humans would have had a much nicer existence then. It all comes back, I say to them, to what I said at my very first lesson: different opinions. They all know the way humans acted. Could such peaceful and harmonious ways of thinking and living truly stand out and be maintained at a global level, considering how they were? None of the students and teachers dares to speak up, but the answer is pretty clear to all of us.

I shift into my chair and look again at the three students sitting before me. “Something else you wanted to ask me?”

“Well, it’s not from us, exactly,” whispers Mark.

“One of our friends wanted us to ask you this--he was too shy to ask you himself,” explains Marlene with a smile.

“Go ahead, please.”

“You’ve explained us all quite a bit about the ancient cultures that existed in what’s now Asia, north Africa and eastern Europe,” says Lilies. “But, what about America? North or South. I don’t think you’ve mentioned this continent at all until now.”

I lean forward slowly, the smile never disappearing from my face.

“Please tell your friend to speak up more during my lectures. He’s right, of course--I’ve left out for now most of America’s history up until now. But there’s one simple reason: some ancient cultures lived here, but were never as developed or evolved as the ones I’ve told you about. They never created enormous cities or golden empires. Never hold the known universe knowledge in one library. That’s why I haven’t mentioned America’s cultures before, but if your friend, or yourselves, are interested--”

“Wanderer?” asks a voice behind me.

We all turn, a bit puzzled by the abrupt interruption, since no-one’s interjected me once before. Such manners aren’t usual of Souls and for a horrible second I fear if some of my family’s come to fetch me--but it’s only Curt.

“Hello, Curt,” I greet politely, standing up. “Hope everything’s OK?”

“I should be the one asking you that. May I ask why have you engaged another lesson down here at the library?” he asks, chuckling softly, tilting his head. I turn again and I realize there must be about a hundred and twenty people, both students and scholars, standing or any way at all around our table, interested in what we were talking about.

“Sorry. I was just answering some questions to four of my students and I guess things got a little bit out of hand.”

“I can see that,” confirms Curt. “Next time you should think about booking a classroom.”

Only now, because of his words, I realize I’ve been holding a new lecture without even realizing it myself. Four classes in a day sound exhausting, even to me, and for some reason the tiredness strikes me at full force, feeling out of strength all of a sudden.

“OK, that’s enough for today. Class dismissed. She’ll explain everything at class tomorrow or some other day. Go home,” decides Curt a bit sharply as he grabs me by the arm.

Everyone starts moving away from the table at once, but I see on almost all of their faces the same excitement I usually meet from all my students at class. Marlene, Trensie, Mark and Lilies stay behind to thank me for my time and my answers and bid farewell expressing their anticipation for next class. I smile at them all politely till they’re all gone.

“How long have you been down here?” asks Curt then.

“I’m not sure,” I confess, taking a look at my watch. I gasp as I see the hour. “I completely lost track of time. I didn’t realize--” Ian, Mel and Jared must be nuts by now. I should have called home again ages ago.

“Let me buy you dinner and walk you home,” decides him, already dragging me out of the library. “No fuss, please, Wanderer, this fourth lesson wasn’t on your job description.”

“As I’ve said--”

“Come on,” he interjects me, opening and holding for me the cafeteria’s door.

Realizing I’m starving and don’t want to fight anymore, I get in. The place is almost empty, but I gratefully settle for a cold sandwich and a Coke, same dinner as Curt, which we both eat within minutes. We prefer not to linger anymore and he walks me home, without mentioning this late-night class, but without having any real conversation either during the fifteen minute stroll. He only addresses me when I’m at my building’s door, looking for my keys in my bag.

“Am I about to be scolded?” I whine when our eyes lock. I know that’s what’s expecting me up there and I’m really not in the mood for two lectures in a row.

“Not exactly,” says Curt, shaking his head. “I just want to tell you to take it easy. That--lesson, or whatever it was, isn’t part of your job. However excited it makes me for so many people to be interested in what you have to say, they can listen to it at your lectures. You have way too many classes every day--you don’t need the work-up. Just take it easy.”

Though it should have been pretty clear to me by now, it surprises me how much Curt really cares about me. As much as any other soul in the city, I guess, since we’re only linked through Cathy and the college classes, but he hasn’t truly proven it to me this way. And it feels comforting. And horrible. Since I’m trying to get him and everyone else out of this Planet.

“Thanks, Curt, I’ll try,” I say in a whisper, though I know I won’t. People’ve approached me with their questions, how could I tell them to meet me some other time?

I don’t say it out loud and enter the building, climb up the stairs and get into my apartment, remembering to leave the keys at the right place. I was expecting lights to lit as soon as I’d set foot into the apartment, but they don’t. I don’t hear a thing.

They’re all fast asleep in mine and Ian’s room; he’s on the bed grabbing my pillow, Mel’s crouched in what seems an awkward and uncomfortable position in the couch, and Jared’s simply laying on the floor. All of them are still dressed. Clearly they’ve been waiting for me till they couldn’t stay awake for a second more. I don’t want to wake them up and I’m debating if going to sleep in Mel’s and Jared’s dormitory.

Somehow, Ian notices my presence. He opens his eyes and jumps out of bed in an instant, grabbing my hands.

“Wanda?” he asks, sleepy voice full of concern.

“Yes, it’s me,” I answer. “Sorry I’m late.”

“Late being the operative word,” he scowls, completely awake now.

“Please, let’s not do this right now,” I beg, exhausted.

“Do what? Express my concerns? If you haven’t noticed, we’ve been climbing up the walls here, Wanda.”

“Well, in case you lot haven’t noticed, I’m working at college on behalf of you three and all the remaining humans out there, so you might want to quit right now assigning blame.”

Our brief conversation wakes up Mel and Jared, who stir still half asleep as they stand up, stretching their arms, and turn on the lights.

“Come on, guys, please, let’s go back to sleep,” I beg, covering my eyes with my free hand. But I realize that won’t happen: they’re all standing up and surrounding me, worry tainting their faces, muscles tense.

“What happened?” demands Jared.

“It’s quarter to one,” informs Mel, as if I didn’t already know that.

“You said you were only going to answer some questions of your students,” says Ian, and he’s probably made Jared repeat my exact words over the phone a thousand times this afternoon.

“I know, and that’s all it was,” I explain slowly. “It just got out of hand.”

“You should have called us if you knew--”

“Hadn’t planned for it to last that long,” I reply. “We really just lost track of time. I know, it’s not a good excuse--I should have checked the clock now and then. It’s just--So many people showed interest in what I was saying--”

“You mean--You’ve attracted the attention of more Souls?” asks Mel, moving past the worrying and into the excitement.

“More than likely,” I confirm, nodding my head. “I just don’t know how they’re gonna come to my classes. There’s no more space and I’ve got no more time.”

“Let college worry about that,” suggests Jared, still tense. “Or rather, don't worry about that at all--it's not your concern."

"And please don’t do this to us again. We were worried sick,” adds Mel almost in a whine.

“I understand and I’m sorry,” I repeat, “but like I’ve said a million times, I’m not in danger amongst us the Souls.”

“We understand, but still,” interjects Ian. “We can’t be sure of that. And when you didn’t appear or call... We feared something had happened. I’m sorry to put more weight on you, but you’re the only one out there, our only source, our only salvation. If you lose contact with us, we’re bound hand and foot. And the only thing left for us to do is something crazy--”

“No!” I shriek. “Don’t you ever do anything crazy out there. You’ll be endangering all our family. Even if I don’t call you or contact you in any other way for hours, you will not do anything reckless. That was a rule you vowed to abide.”

“Yes, we know, relax, please,” sighs Mel, caressing my tense shoulders. “We were just trying to explain how nightmarish this afternoon was to all of us.”

“Trust me, I got the idea,” I scowl, shaking my head, trying to control the shivering of my whole body just by thinking about the three of them out in the streets and being noticed by other Souls. “I’ll repeat it, I was perfectly fine all afternoon. I’m sorry I worried you. But on the other hand,” I reach for my suitcase and grab the book I borrowed from Marlene, “I thought this would interest you too.”

They take the book and stare at it for some long seconds before they understand what it really means and their eyes open wide, their mouths hanging, keeping the book on their hands without daring to open it.

“You’re kidding.”

“Nope.”

“A human book? Is this legit?”

“Absolutely. It’s a copy of an old human translation, of course, but it’s the real text.”

“Where in the world did you find it?!”

“One of my students did, actually. At the library college,” I explain, finally relaxed now that their attention’s diverted to other issues.

“You have human books at college?”

“We do, apparently. It’s true Souls could never have thrown away your culture like that. I didn’t have time to investigate the library, but a fair estimate is there can be a true treasure trove down there.”

“Bet there is,” grants Jared, still looking marveled at the book.

Now that the major issue of tonight’s been solved, or at least, I’ve diverted the attention to something else entirely, is my only chance to get out of this mess. “Please, can we go to sleep now? I’m beat and I’ve got an early morning,” I beg.

“Of course,” says Ian at once, either not being able to deny me a wish, or already having forgotten the problem. Whatever reason, he sends away Jared and Mel rudely, though I don’t apologize as they leave, and pushes me gently towards the bed. Neither of us bothers to change into our pajamas at this point; and within seconds, I’m sound asleep.

For the first time in my whole life here on the Earth, next morning I have a very hard time finding strength to wake up. Ian almost has to coax me out of the bed--and when I do get out of my room, I’m surprised to see Mel and Jared also awake, greeting me in yawns, following our usual routine. They could have slept in, I know I would have if I had the chance, but I understand they’re doing it all out of consideration for me; after all, they can go back to bed when I’m gone. And I can’t lose more time or I’ll be late in the end.

I hit the shower and change my clothes in record time. Even so, I run to the kitchen, knowing it’s later than planned, knowing we’ll have no spare time to go over today’s lectures. I’ve got barely seven minutes to eat breakfast before Curt’s appears on my doorstep again.

Knowing my schedule, they’ve prepared my breakfast, so I drink a full cup of coffee in one sip and start eating a croissant. Sleep in their eyes, their actions slow, but the book ever present on the sill. I can’t help but smile.

“Did you say it were students who picked it up from the library college?” asks Mel some minutes later.

“Yes,” I answer. “Why the interest?”

“Not much,” shrugs her. “It’s just--another difference between you and us. This kind of dedication would be shown by a very few handful of students.”

“It was a very few handful of Soul students who’d looked for it at the library,” I contradict.

“Yet you stayed for a late-night lecture,” reminds Mel. And I know I can’t deny the fact that my lessons do seem to be interesting to a fair amount of Souls. A greater achievement I never thought possible, if I’m being honest.

“Right. You know I had to do that,” I try to reason.

“You don’t have to explain anything to us, Wanda,” Ian stops me. “Just--next time, give us a call.”

“Though you probably shouldn’t do that a second time,” warns Jared.

I stare at him right in the eye, simply outraged by his insinuation. “I will if I’m asked, Jared, that’s my current Calling--I cannot not answer to it.”

“Don’t take it like that. I was only saying--”

“I’ll stop you right there,” I interject sharper than I wanted to. “I’ve got no time for this discussion. It probably will happen again; the only thing I can promise you is that I’ll give you a heads-up when it does.”

Jared raises his hands, dropping the discussion before any of us gets angry. Or as angry as a Soul could ever be, of course. But it seems the discussions aren’t over for this morning.

“Can we talk about something else for a second?” asks Ian, caressing my back gently, as if begging silently for me not to get exasperated so early in the morning.

“What now?” I fear.

“If these informal lessons do keep on,” he starts, slowly, remarking the conditional tense so as to show he’s not getting ahead of himself. “If they do, could we go? It doesn’t seem way as dangerous as assisting your normal lectures. And we’d love to see you working on the flesh.”

“Absolutely not!!” I shriek, standing up abruptly, knocking off some cups. Coffee and milk spill all over the table, staining their pajamas--thankfully I was out of range, I don’t have time to change again. “Do not suggest that idea ever again. What were my terms when we came here?”

“That we shouldn’t go out of the apartment,” say the three of them with already tired voices. I couldn’t count the amount of times I ordered them to repeat me all of the rules.

“And not to be reckless. And not to distract me during my lectures. And not to go looking on purpose for the Souls.”

“We remember them, Wanda,” dismisses Mel in a scowl.

“Not enough, apparently! This crazy idea would break more than a thousand of them!!”

“OK, it was just an innocent suggestion,” soothes Ian, raising his hands to make me stop yelling, clearly not in the mood for a discussion this early in the morning. “We see you don’t agree with it.”

“No, I don’t and I won’t agree to it,” I confirm. “Don’t bring it up again.”

Ending the discussion, I grab a towel from the drawer to dry the table. But my first attempt only makes matters worse, spreading further away the liquids, so now there’s a small pool on the floor too. “Goddammit--”

“We’ll clean it up, don’t worry,” calms Ian down, caressing my arm, beyond the exhaustion and being fed up. “Just go.”

I don’t say a word; I drop the towel and run to our bedroom to fetch my suitcase. By the time I’m back at the kitchen’s door to bid farewell, Mel hands me a thermos filled with coffee. I kiss her on the cheek as a thank you, go to the hall to grab a scarf and gloves, kiss Ian briefly on the lips and leave hurriedly, locking the door behind me. Not giving them any other option to talk about that idea ever again. I can’t have them out of the relative safety of the apartment. I can’t have them at college, in the midst of the smartest minds in the city, or the State. If they were to be at my lectures, I couldn’t concentrate on what I’d be saying. No. That’s out of the question. There’re a million reasons why they shouldn’t come to these informal lectures, even if they do take place again--and that’s, probably, a very long shot. Too many risks. If something bad happened, our real family would never forgive us. They wouldn’t stand a chance against the army of Souls who’d come their way.

To my greatest surprise the news of my informal late-night Q&A have spread around college. As I set foot into the building, students, teachers and other scholars I’ve never seen in my life greet me with broad smiles and nods of their heads--I’m apparently the most famous teacher at campus, though maybe, more than probably, not the most well-liked. Curt stands by my side, which means a great lot to me at this moment. Especially when I see the classroom is as full as my very first day and everyone seems just too excited to hear me today.

I take a deep breath and focus on today’s schedule; medieval ages, with the questions: why was that period so-called “Dark Ages”? What were the Crusades and why did they take place? Can someone explain the concept of “lowborn”? As usual, after some minutes of silent consideration, a few students--I always ask teachers and scholars not to speak during the first minutes should they know the answers--start raising their hands.

By the end of the day, it is decided that those informal Q&A sessions should take place two evenings a week, on Mondays and Fridays, since on Tuesday and Saturday my lessons start a bit later than any other weekday, and their core should be a weekly advanced lectures based on the bibliography I recommend on usual sessions. They ask the students who are interested to really dig in their questions and recommended bibliography in order to assist; after all, those aren’t classes I’m contractually obliged to give and some previous preparation for them is expected from anyone wishing to assist. With a sigh of relief, I see that the majority of students present seem willing to dedicate even more time to my subject.

Maybe, only maybe, I’m doing things right.

Which reminds me of this other issue that hovers me all day long, as remorse ends up eating me alive by the time I’m supposed to leave college. Resigned, I call home and warn them about a twenty-minute delay before I get home, though I don’t tell them the real reason why--that I need to stop by a close by pharmacy.

I get home absolutely beat and bed being my only thought on my mind. Or almost.

When we’re eating dinner we comment, just a bit out of our usual comfort zone, the obvious, tangible interest student and teacher Souls show concerning my syllabus, enough to create this out of the ordinary lesson, and I notice how the three of them tense at remembering those, and just know I have to bring that subject up, as much as I hate to do so.

“So,” I say, resting my fork on the plate and leaning back on my chair. “These informal Q&A lessons. . . Are you still interested in attending them?”

Three heads shot right up to stare at me in disbelief. I don’t usually change my mind, they should know, and my voice and my face should indicate them that I just did.

“So?” I demand.

“Of course,” says Mel at once, eagerly, almost wishing to get out of the apartment this second.

“Why? Are you saying--?” asks Ian, a hand raised, as if on its way to touch me but not daring to do so in case I’d changed my mind.

“I’m guessing we could come to an agreement on that one too,” I explain slowly, each word leaving my lips painstakingly.

“Why the change?” demands Jared, a little bit suspicious, fearing if there’s a hidden agenda somewhere. I didn’t expect anything different coming from this man, but I don’t know how can he think that of me. I’m not like that--I’m not human.

“I understand staying inside this apartment 24/7 must have been hell for you,” I try to explain. “You’re humans, you’re people of action. You need fresh air--even if it’s freedom in your enemy’s nest. And you’ve said since Day 1 that you’d want to see me on my lessons. These lectures would be the least formal and safest ones of them all, so I guess we can try it out. Can you get my suitcase, please?” I ask Mel.

The girl jumps right out, letting out a loud squeal, and almost runs towards the living room, where I left the suitcase, on one of the sofas.

“Of course, it’ll happen only if you abide to some rules,” I warn sternly.

“Of course,” accept Jared and Ian, as Mel comes back and hands me the suitcase. I take from one of the outer pockets what I bought at the pharmacy and put it on the table--they all lean in to look at it.

“It looks like contact lens,” says Mel.

“Because they are,” I confirm. “Kind of. There’s a new fashion going on around Souls at the moment,” I explain in a deep sigh. “The strange gleam on our eyes is something unavoidable, but some people are trying these contact lens, which imitate the gleam, but in other colors.”

“For real?” demands Jared, genuinely surprised.

I shrug. “It offers physical variety.”

“Because it seems like a trend humans would engage,” confesses Ian, one eyebrow raised at me.

“I don’t know, I’m not exactly majoring in Soul’s studies. Well, try them on.”

They comply at once, filing one at a time to the bathroom. Ian has a harder time putting them on, maybe due to the excitement, though they seem quite uncomfortable and painful to the three of them. Can’t really fix that one.

“You’ll have time to wear them and get used to them,” I say, “because you’ll have to be comfortable wearing them if you’re going to go outside.”

“Another one of your rules?” asks Jared, blinking fast as if trying them. Ian’s lenses are blue, though not his natural, adorable, entrancing color; Mel’s are plain brown and Jared’s, pitch black, though with the strange gleam, you can still distinguish the iris from the retina.

“One of many,” I warn. I lean on my chair and they sit down again, understanding it’s time to negotiate the terms. “First, you will not speak directly to me as if you knew me. You will not greet me, not bid farewell--you’ll act politely like any other student, nothing else. I’ll provide you keys of the apartment so you won’t have to wait for me to get in and out, but you’ll have to promise me you’ll only go out for these Q&A lessons. Only one of you will attend these classes each week. You will not speak during these lessons, nor engage any debate or participate in the discussions, or do anything else that might attract the Souls’ attention towards you; just stay there quietly and listen. Can you abide to those norms?” I demand finally, looking alternatively to them.

With all the cards on the table, they don’t look as certain as five minutes ago.

“Talk now or the whole thing’s over,” I warn.

“Just one of us each lesson?” asks Jared. “It’ll be our only chance to get out of the apartment and you’re telling us--?”

“I don’t want to worry for more than one of you at a time,” I reply. “You can figure out by yourselves the order you want to come, but that’s a ground rule. And I won’t turn a blind eye if you disobey this time.”

“It’s starting to feel less and less like a negotiation,” scowls Mel.

“Hey, I’m doing an effort here; you could do the same.”

“We know, we’re sorry,” replies Ian at once, grabbing my arm gently. “I guess we had bigger expectations.”

“Well, you shouldn’t have. You’re still in danger simply by being stuck in here. That’s my offer--the terms won’t budge. Leave it or take it, I don’t really care,” I snap.

I leave my napkin over the table with a hard blow that wobbles bottles and glasses, raise from my seat and head towards the dormitory. Ian and Mel yell my name behind me, but Jared orders them to stay put--and Ian confronts him about me. Not wanting to hear another discussion, which seems to be everything we do lately at home, I loudly slam the dormitory’s door, change my clothes and get to bed. It’s not only a mean of getting away with the three of them and their disagreement and to avoid speaking with Ian when he gets back; I need a good night’s sleep too.

And I get it. I don’t even hear or notice when Ian gets in bed with me; I wake up next morning thanks to my alarm clock. I turn it off as quick as I can, but when I stand up, I see Ian’s eyes locked on me, his jaw clenched tightly, his muscles tense. He doesn’t even try to lean and kiss me as every morning, which hurts me, but I don’t want to let them off the hook so soon. It’s not me who’s supposed to apologize.

“Go back to sleep,” I order, though I doubt he were truly sleeping, before turning to grab my clothes. He doesn’t say a thing or makes a noise and I leave the room.

Jared and Mel don’t wake up either, so I shower and eat breakfast by myself. Thanks to that, today’s one of the first days when I’m so punctual that Curt doesn’t have to wait for me. He also acknowledges the extraordinary event.

“Everything alright?” he asks.

“Yeah, fine,” I snap, not being able to stop myself. “Just had a quarrel with my partner.”

I notice how he’s surprised by my tone of voice and answer, but I don’t wait for him to snap out of it and start walking towards college. I have a hard time focusing on today’s lecture on the Renaissance and engaging the usual debate, but luckily nowadays it doesn’t take that much effort on my part--as soon as I fire the initial questions, I let the audience argue for some long minutes, participating only to mitigate some heated discussion, and then I simply talk straight on for about ten or fifteen minutes about the subject at hand, which isn’t as challenging as it seems: I remember it all by heart, thanks to the time I spent in the caves discussing these same subjects with my human family, and sometimes with Ian, Mel and Jared at the apartment. So all in all, no-one notices my strange state of mind, though not a student comes to see me after the lecture, as they so usually do.

The one Soul who meets me at the hall when I leave the classroom is Curt, whose bated breath and sweaty face puts me on edge as soon as I see him.

“Wanda,” he calls me, louder than is respectful at college. “There was a call for you during your class. Your partner.”

“What?” I shriek.

“I told him that you were busy, but promised you’d get back at him as soon as you’d finish your first lecture,” he resumes, excitedly, not realizing that I’m freaked out by the fact they dared to call me at college. He only knows I had a quarrel with my partner and pretends to help me solve it--doesn’t understand anything as he pushes me towards the college’s phone box. “Come on, he sounded quite desperate.”

With no other option than calling home, I dial the numbers very slowly. At least they had the decency to be the first to ask forgiveness.

They answer within two seconds, barely enough time to prepare myself for it. Though I don’t think I would have been any nicer had I had the time.

“Wanda?” asks a concerned Ian as a greeting.

“Hello, Ian, I’m incredibly busy here teaching. What do you want?”

“Please, Wanda, I beg of you, can we talk?”

“That is what we’re doing, I think. Communicating and exchanging ideas through--”

“Since when are you such a resentful Soul?”

“Since when are you such inconsiderate and selfish humans?” I reply back, hiding how his words have hurt me. I’ve never been called like that, not in my eight lives out there, and certainly, not by Ian. I have to fight back some tears as I reply colder and meaner than I never thought possible of me. “Oh, wait, scratch that one, I think I have a vague idea.”

“Please, Wanda, don’t act like this.”

“Not until you can promise me--”

Someone scoffs and scowls in the background and pushes Ian away from the intercom, presses speaker and then Mel talks with a loud, categorical, firm voice, almost deafening me.

“OK, let’s stop being stupid for one minute,” she begs. “We called to apologize, Wanda, so drop the cold, resentful act already. We know we were jerks yesterday night. We’ve been too much time on our own locked up in here and we didn’t see the possibilities nor acknowledge the effort you’d made. We’ve been talking and we regret it all completely, from our hearts, and agree to all your conditions. We’re more than willing to see you at these informal classes--it’d be a privilege.”

I sigh deeply and have to fight back the tears, which would only frighten everyone around me, both physically present and through the phone. Trust Mel to find the exact words I needed to hear to fix everything.

“Settled, then,” I murmur.

“It is settled,” agrees her. In the background, two male deep voices show their consent and thank me once more. “We’ll see you tonight. Have fun and--”

“Be careful, you too,” I finish for her. “Bye. Love you all.”

I hung up and, realizing I’ve barely got ten minutes to have breakfast, run towards the cafeteria, full of students and teachers. It’s different from when I used to teach here before--most of them recognize me and greet me warmly and even, some of them join me to chat briefly with me. I don’t mind it that much now, knowing that things are fine at home, or as fine as they can be, that I’m not facing another fight when I get to the apartment and that things are solved; I chat with them for some minutes, till I say I’m running late. They don’t pester me unnecessarily and I make it to my second lecture in time, with renew energy that keeps me going for the rest of the day.

So next Saturday, provided with a new set of keys, the contact lens and my rules hammered into his brain, Ian comes to college to assist my very second Q&A. My heart skips a beat when I see him among eighty or ninety students and a third part of the staff in one of the private study rooms of the library, but I force myself to breathe and not to greet him--and I don’t think anyone notices we know each other.

Despite my fears, he behaves admirably and superbly. He’s as mesmerized as some Souls by my lecture and everything that’s explained and discussed over the two hours session, even though it’s his own history. But it may be true when he says he’s never attended a class like this--we occupied and changed his whole life before he got a real chance at college. It’s an advanced class based on the recommended bibliography I mention in class, that is, any kind of human culture, including but not limited to books, paintings, sketches and drawings, music and, sometimes, architecture too.

That means that the educational materials people have brought in for today consist in books on Calvinism, Henry VIII, Martin Luther’s 95 theses or the Crusades, and paintings of Da Vinci, Michelangelo or Raphael; since the key questions I asked at class, and asked for people to ponder for this lecture as well, were: which factors drove to the change of values from Medieval Ages to Renaissance, and how the Catholic Church’s role had changed from the medieval period.

Surprisingly or not, the first student to raise his hand asking permission to speak is holding a photography Leonardo Da Vinci’s Vitruvian Man. I nod at him and await till he’s issued his question and explained his doubts in detail to answer him with yet another query to make him reflect on it all: to talk to me about the time period when that sketch was made and what was happening in art and broader history at that time. I haven’t put him between a rock and a hard place; he has to know, he attended my theoretical lecture two days earlier.

Ian disappears as soon as the lecture’s over, which gets me all nervous and sweaty while I talk to some scholars till I remember he’s done exactly what I ordered: head straight back home without waiting for me.

When, half an hour later, I get to the apartment, Ian looks as excited and thrilled as the minute the lecture started. He looks like a child, bumping from one foot to another, explaining with incredible detail the lecture to Mel and Jared--as mesmerized by it all that they’ve even forgotten dinner, a luxury I was getting used to by now. But I can’t really complain; they want to experience it all too.

“You want to come back, I take it?” I ask as I sprawl indecently on the couch.

“Are you kidding me? I’d love to come to all your classes. I know, I know, I can’t and I’m not asking to,” he says at once after glancing at my direction, “simply stating a fact. Man, how I wish I’d had someone like you as a history professor back in the day. I would have majored in human history.”

“So you really think I’m good?” I ask. One of the only reasons I wanted for him to see me in the flesh on one of my lectures was to make sure I was doing OK with my method of teaching.

“Wanda, you are great,” says Mel. “We haven’t seen you yet, but we know you’re doing a hell of a job. If this idea doesn’t work out, we know we can’t really blame you.”

“She’s right, you know,” agrees Ian. “And you are, you’re magnificent, Wanda.”

“Thank you,” I barely manage to whisper. Though I’ve been praised by quite some teacher at this point, it means a whole other world to receive such kind words from my human family, for whom I’m doing all this.

“Well, can’t wait for next week’s class,” confesses Jared, stretching his arms. “Now, what do you say we eat dinner?”

“Let’s,” I beg, jumping to my feet at once.

That night I enjoy with Ian a nice, delicate and magical round of sex, for the very first time since I started classes--and being honest, I was beginning to miss it too much. It seems I have just liberated the poor man in more ways I could imagine.

“So,” I whisper when I’m resting comfortably against Ian’s shoulder after our third round of the night, “do you reckon it’ll be worth it? We’ll manage our goal?”

He takes a deep breath, me raising and lowering with his chest. And just by his doubts I know before he utters the first word that for once, he’ll be truthful with me.

“You’re really good,” he praises me, slowly, measuring his every word. “You know you've managed an acceptance greater and warmer than we'd anticipated. Your lessons are going better than I’d imagined. In time, I don’t see why not,” he concludes finally. “In any case, it’s our very first step, Wanda, just relax and let things be. Don’t put much pressure on your shoulders--there’s enough already as it is.”

Jared and Mel's presences at my Q&As are way better and calmer than the first one, since Ian set an impeccable track record and I know what to expect from the lecture. Of course, they're not Ian, and I'm proven that fact early enough when the two of them, on their separate occasions, take an early part on the discussions, heating the arguments an unnecessary notch. Since not a Soul is surprised and, even, they engage the debate as eagerly as a human class, I try my best not to make a fuss about it when I get home later those days. And so, easily the Q&A classes and my closest family's presence fall easily to the everyday routine too.

I find myself sometimes missing their soothing presences and points of view during my lectures--and even looking for them when I know they can not be around, as that was one of my ground rules. At least I got them out of the house before they started killing each other.

Until one day, two weeks in, when there's more than one of my family members present at my Q&A informal lectures on the 1789’s French Revolution.

I spot him close to the end of the lecture, which scares me a bit because something like that I should have noticed right away. Sitting comfortably on one chair, without speaking, just enjoying his time. Not Ian, him, I could've spotted him within seconds in a crowded concert. His manners, his gleam, his smile, are just irresistible and impossible to miss.

But Burns--he looked like an ordinary student, like the dozens present today. It takes me quite some time to realize he’s actually taken part in the initial debate on what did Europeans, or occidental culture, define progress and if ‘progress’ ended up being beneficial for all the different societies and cultures involved.

Though of course he’s not just a student, he’s like family. He gets me smiling for the rest of the lecture and, when I'm done talking with students and teachers after class, I almost run to his arms, where he receives me without thinking.

“Oh my God!! Burns!!”

“Hello again, stranger,” he laughs, caressing my hair.

He grabs me by the arms, broad smiles plastered on both our faces, till I recall Curt and Kathy are still standing there on the sidewalk, looking at us with quite dazzled looks--more surprised by this than by anything they've ever heard me say during one of my lessons, I'm sure. I apologize as I step away from Burns, blushing slightly before moving on to introducing them all.

“Is he your partner, Wanderer?” asks Curt, who's taken quite some interest in my private life since I had that quarrel with my family.

“No, we're not,” answers Burns, laughing at the occurrence.

But then I'm faced with the issue of explaining our warm greeting.

“Actually,” I signal for Ian, who's waiting for Burns as well at the other side of the hall and approaches worried, “as a matter of fact, this man is my partner. Ian.”

The four people surrounding me are startled by the announcement, Burns and Ian more than anyone else, but the latter one is a human--he can recover easily and fast. He puts on a broad, warm smile, nods both at Kathy and Curt and shakes their hands politely, as he hugs me by the waist, don't know if it's to keep him or me safe or if just to prove our close relation to the two Souls in front of us. Whatever the reason, Cathy and Curt don't find it at all add.

“The photographer?” asks the man as he leads the way outside. We can do only but follow, though I squeeze Ian’s hand tight, asking forgiveness, begging him to change the subject or give an excuse for fleeing.

He caresses my back reassuringly and does nothing of that sort.

“That's right. I've just come back from the Niagara falls,” he confirms, thankfully acting like the human being he still is and lying without any hint of remorse. “Such amazing scenery. I've never seen something like it in my--well, two lives. But I was blind on my previous existence, so you can very well understand why I'm dazzled by this beautiful world," he laughs.

I’m not the only one dazzled by his talk. I’d never imagined he could do this: joke with Souls, remember at a time like this all those late lessons where I talked about the other Planets, back in the caves, all that time back. Although I put him on the spot knowingly, he's doing remarkably well, so well in fact, that to any bystander viewer this would look like a friendly chat amongst Friends, nothing else. Guessing it's been a long time since Ian feared us Souls, and a longer time still since he hated my species and felt disgusted at the very sight or hearing of us.

“We sure can,” says Curt.

“Actually, we've never left the state,” replies Kathy. “It'd be grant to see some of your photographs to know a little bit about this world. All the wonders Wanderer's been telling us about. . .”

“Well, I assure you, once you see them, you'll completely fall in love with it,” says Ian, avoiding my eye--probably so I don't try to pipe in, and also attempting to withdraw the attention from my horror-struck face. “That’s what happened to us. So, please, come by the house anytime you want--I'll give you an exposée.”

“Oh? You planning on staying, then, Ian?”

“For a long time,” he nods, hugging me by the waist. “I've been away from this amazing woman long enough. You’ll get tired of seeing me at her lectures. I’ve heard they’re spectacular?”

“They are,” confirms Curt, mesmerized. “You’ll be as dazzled as everyone else.”

“And we have a lot to catch up with Burns as well,” I say, trying to get on some safe topic, as we arrive at our apartment’s doorstep. "Would you mind terribly if we left you--?”

“Of course not,” replies Kathy instantly, smiling broadly. “I'm sure you two have a lot to catch up on. We'll see you tomorrow morning, then.”

We wait till the door closes behind them both and they disappear into the darkness of the night before I turn and face Ian.

“What was that all about?” I shriek, hitting him painlessly on the arm.

“What did I do now?” he demands, truly blind to the risks he’s put ourselves in.

“Inviting them home? Promising to show them pictures we don’t even own? Giving yourself the liberty of saying you’ll be attending my lectures?” I enlist, my voice raising by the second, echoing inside the empty and cold marble walls of the building.

“Calm down, it’s not that big of a deal,” replies him calmly, not letting my panic drag him too, holding the elevator’s doors for me. “We wanted to make acquaintances with your old friends. We can take the pictures from Internet easily--some that aren’t too known so they won’t see again. And I do want to attend your lectures--that was part of the plan too, wasn’t it?”

I can’t really argue against that logic when he’s completely right. Man, sometimes a small part of me hates humankind and their capacity of twisting everything to make all things fit. But I can’t stay mad at Ian--the words ‘I love you’ to make up are already on the tip of my tongue when we’re at the second floor.

“May I know why am I in the spotlight when Burns has come to visit us?” he demands, signaling the man behind me, who’s smiling politely at us despite having been witness of our small, unimportant bickering.

“Jesus,” I scowl turning to face him, as if noticing his presence at this point. “I’m so sorry, Burns,” I apologize as we leave the elevator.

“It’s OK,” replies him, laughing loudly.

Ian unlocks the door and as soon as he drops the keys on the plate, shouts at the top of his lungs, “Guys! Green flag, but we have a visitor!” Despite the assurance that everything’s alright, Mel and Jared don’t come out for almost a whole minute, in which time we’ve all turned out the lights and left our coats and my briefcase in the wardrobe and the chest of drawers.

“Burns!! Hey, man!!” they yell as soon as they recognize him, approaching.

We all embrace again, happy to see anyone of our family again. Though after the greetings, we don’t let him breathe for more than two seconds--it’s been too long.

“Why didn’t you tell us you were coming?”

“How was the trip? You tired? Hungry?”

“Is everyone in the caves safe and sound?”

“How come it’s you who’s here? Where’s Denny?”

“Why--?”

“Guys!” I yell after some minutes, noticing how rudely we are treating the poor man and that he’s just a little bit intimidated, without time to answer to any of our questions. “Guys, come on, where’re our manners? Can’t you offer the man first a place to sit and something to drink before pestering him like this?”

They all breathe again, concerned, but Burns dismisses it all out with a low chuckle and his usual cheerful manners.

“Actually we were making dinner,” says Jared. “You hungry?”

“Famished,” says him, following us to the kitchen. “Have been on the road all day long, actually. Got the truck full; I hope that no-one notices and calls the Seekers.

“I’m sorry me or Denny couldn’t take the time to visit you all sooner. We were busy attending the two human cells, you know, in the caves and in the mountains, and also taking care of some other things.”

“No, don’t apologize,” I reply. “You’re here now, that’s what matters.”

“What other things?” demands Mel, as we come and go from the dining room and into the kitchen to set the table.

“You know, this and that,” replies him, shrugging.

Mel waits until the man has set the plates on the table to face him with her usual amiable, calm façade. “Hey, you show up here after months without any news and with that riddle?”

“Come on, Mel,” I beg, setting the cups, standing by her side. “Let him be.”

“No, I won’t let it go,” she replies, without breaking eye contact with Burns, who in turn, avoids her cold gaze. “I want to know if my family’s in danger. Because if that’s so, we’re calling it quits. This whole thing is for our and their sake, we’re not pursuing this plan if for whatever other reason they’re not safe and sound in the caves.”

Her harsh though complete truthful words attract both Ian’s and Jared’s attention, confusion and fear, as the two of them leave the kitchen and approach us, standing at both sides of me and Mel, flanking us, tensed, as usual men of action, prepared to do anything at any costs to protect those they love--including those who’re at some miles away.

“What’s happened?" they demand.

“Nothing happened, everything’s fine. I promise you,” says Burns. “Everyone in the caves is safe and sound--Jamie, Nicholas, Jeb, Kyle, everyone. I give you my word. The only thing is, for the sake of them all, Denny and I decided to organize some outs.”

“Outs?” I repeat, my voice a panicked shriek, afraid of what that means.

“Allow them to breathe in clean air outside of the caves now and then,” he explains.

“You mean, as in excursions,” interjects Jared, anxious despite everything. They used to work out to the nearest millimeter every re-supplying mission they did, it cannot to be easy to allow them all happy and careless picnics whenever they want.

Burns nods. “That’s exactly what I mean. Not missions, not kidnappings of any kind. Just some hours outside the caves. Let me tell you, the spirits have risen to the skies.”

We all take a second to breathe in too, knowing they’re not taking either unnecessary risks. Can’t really blame them for getting out of those sometimes claustrophobic caves, if that helps them all.

“It’s great, then,” whispers Ian, after looking at Mel and I and making sure we’re okay with the idea. With a little brother and a kid at home, we could have raised hell. And for some brief seconds, I’ve given it a thought.

Moved past that small, tiny detail, Burns reports to us everything there is to know about our human families in the caves and in the mountains. Over dinner he speaking more than me during one of my lectures--talking about anything and everything. According to Doc, they’re all healthier than ever thanks to the food we Souls can get them. Few of them are still anxious around Denny, even though he’s given them no reason to suspect of him; in fact, he’s the first one to volunteer when anyone needs anything at all. Guess trust doesn’t come overnight and that in present times, we all have to make an effort; we don’t have the luxury of wasting precious time with such an unimportant matter. If we don’t trust those by our side we’re completely alone in an enemy world. And that’s a very depressing thought.

After dinner it’s show time. Denny’s brought some pictures of our human family and shows them to us--so we can keep them. He also gives us some letters from Jamie, Jeb, Kyle, Denny and some others. We, in return, show him a couple of my lectures in a portable DVD player I bought some weeks earlier, with the idea of taking it all back to the caves so they could also take a look at my lectures.

However, time indeed flies when we’re having fun and before any of us would have wanted, Burns says that sadly, he should be on his way and stands up from the couch.

“Don’t you want to stay overnight?” suggests Ian, though he’s on his two feet too.

“I’d love to, but, no, thanks,” replies him. “I promised I’d give a report on you all tomorrow.”

“You could still leave early in the morning and be back in the afternoon as not to break the promise,” acknowledges Mel, with just the smallest of grins. How they love to twist the rules to still abide them all.

“No, really, I must be going,” insists the man.

Knowing, despite everything, that nothing would be able to change his mind--on the stubbornness matter, I’m starting to think all Souls are alike--I fetch Burns’ coat from the entrance hall’s cupboard.

“OK, let me walk you to the truck,” I suggest, handing him the coat.

“Thanks.”

He bids farewell to Mel, Ian and Jared with hugs, kisses and promises of keeping our family safe and coming by soon to report any news on both human cells, takes all the DVDs we’ve given him as well as the many human books I took from college library for our family, including some for Nicholas to start learning to read, and then we leave the apartment.

Surprisingly or not, as soon as we set foot into the street we don’t say a word, as if the topics of conversation had worn out up in the apartment. Though that’s not accurate at all--for some reason we’re just making time till we approach some more difficult topics.

When we get to Burns’ truck, three streets down the road, the windows tainted so no-one can look inside the vehicle and see the many boxes and bags filled with non-perishable food for our families, we lean on the vehicle, side by side, staring in front of us, without saying anything for some seconds. Then, Burns turns to look at me. I notice his amiable, comfortable glare.

“So?” I ask. I need to know a Soul’s opinion on my lectures, a Soul who knows what I’m doing and why am I doing it.

“It’s grand,” he confesses, marveled. “I’ve been in your today’s latest lecture too and you’re amazing, Wanderer. Every Soul is as dazzled by your stories as your human family back in the caves. What you’re doing, you’re doing it more than fine. I don’t think any of us could’ve done what you’re pulling, Wanderer.”

“And do you think--?”

“They wouldn’t be Souls if at least half of your students and colleagues don’t end up loving this Planet and its citizens as much as you and I do,” he promises. “I think this might just work.”

“Great,” I whisper, nodding my head.

I lean onto the vehicle, relived shivering from head to toes, now that I have the confirmation it hasn’t been futile. I’ve been weary.

We fall into an uncomfortable silence, staring at the close night. Domestic lives surround us all around, such as some random TV channel, families having dinner together--we even get a glimpse of those lives peering through the open windows facing the street, although we don't stare for too long, because that's incredibly rude. Some minutes later, Burns turns to look at me again. There’s still one more question hanging over us that I’m waiting for and he seems resilient, for some reason, to ask.

“So, how’s it going?” he asks caring.

I sigh deeply and answer in a whisper without looking at him. Not daring to talk looking into his clear eyes.

“It’s harder than I imagined. Not the lectures per se, I’m surprisingly good at them, it’s just--I didn’t expect it all to hurt this much or feel this bad. It just feels wrong, Burns. I’m trying to make them all,” I wave my hand to vaguely signal the dozens of Souls walking up and down the street at this given moment, “leave this Planet. A Soul can’t do that to another Soul.”

At my side, Burns sighs, throws the DVDs inside the truck through one of the windows and stands closer to me, to rest his arm around my shoulders. It’s the first time I’ve said these words--and the last time I do. I’ve never dared to confess my true feelings to Ian, Mel and Jared. They’d probably just say all I’m doing is for a greater good--they wouldn’t understand me like a Soul can. I can’t do with them the way I can open up with Burns or Denny, who all know what I’m trying to do, what’s at stake, what’s the goal.

“I feel like I’m betraying once more my kind,” I confess finally, fighting back the sobs.

“Hey, hey, come on,” begs Burns, caressing my back. “Don’t say that. You've betrayed no-one.”

"I think every single Soul on this Planet would disagree with your statement."

"Well, I don't. Doesn't that count?"

Not nearly as much as he hopes it could help, I want to scowl. However, trying not to alienate the one Soul in the world who can, partially, understand what I'm going through, I bite my lower lip. That's the thing, isn't it? No one can truly understand me. No one's been in my shoes before. And however empathic and sensible we Souls are, by nature, all that Burns can give me are empty promises and flat assurances. He doesn't know, or realize, the toll it's taking on me.

“You couldn't understand. You're not the one teaching those classes with an impure reason. You have no idea of what I’m doing,” I scowl.

“Come on, when we met, we both said we’d only ‘turned’. We didn’t fit in the Soul’s society--we were expatriates. We’ve found our place in humankind’s side and we’re helping them, because it’s the right thing to do. We’re not doing any harm. You’re not doing anything wrong.”

“This is their place too,” I reply.

“Earth is humankind’s Planet,” he interjects almost rudely.

“But I’m trying to make them all leave for the wrong reasons. That is treason. Or would be if other Souls apart from you and me understood that term. I’m creating a whole new specter of negative feelings and feud among Souls, one that shouldn’t exist, on behalf the few remaining humans still on this Planet. Is that truly the goal here?”

“The goal is just giving humankind a chance at surviving.”

“Look,” I demand, signaling with a nod of my head at a Soul family, two fathers and their daughter, walking up the street laughing at something, eating an ice cream. “This is their world, their lives. I’m trying to destroy that.”

“No, you’re not. They could have the same at any other Planet out there.”

“You know that’s not true. Every Planet’s unique in itself.”

“What link all Planets are the bonds amongst us Souls. Tell me it isn’t,” he dares and, of course, I can’t refute his argument. “Everything else is replaceable. And I’m telling you, that same family?, you could find it at any other Planet. In its own form.”

“And that’s what I’m telling you. Taking that away from them all--it’s horrible. It’s treason. It’s not what a Soul’s supposed to do.”

“Come on, have we ever met with the ‘average Soul’? Who says what’s a Soul supposed to do or not to do?” he laughs.

Though his humor disappears as quickly as I raise my head and pierce him right through with one stern, rude look. He sighs deeply and stands in front of me, maybe to cover me from the eyes of passerby Souls, or to stress his words.

“I hear you,” he promises, to let me know my words and feelings aren’t falling into the void, “I really do. I understand you feel like you’re betraying every Soul who lives in this street, this city, this country and this Planet. But you’re not. Really, you aren’t. You’re helping them see the truth--what honest and noblest cause is there?”

Through my sobs, I let those words sink in. Obviously I’ve never considered the job I’m doing from this point of view.

“Think about it,” suggests Burns warmly as he notices he’s managed to hit a nerve, squeezing my arms. “And get back to me, if you want, or need to.”

“How--?”

He’s entered his truck and rummages the dozens of backs in there for some time. I stand aside not to bother him and finally he jumps out and hands me a device. A brand new cell phone, still in its box.

“Just in case,” says Burns. “I don’t know why we didn’t think about it earlier. We do need some way of communicating among all of us, in case you need something from us or us from you, instead of waiting for me or Denny to show up. Or use it even if just to check up. Both human cells have one already.

“The only contacts in the phone are Denny’s and mine, so you won’t exactly get lost if you need to call us.”

“Thanks,” I say, not being able to deny its usefulness. “How much did--?”

“Don’t finish that sentence,” interjects Burns with a chuckle. “It’s not important. So, I hope you’ll be fine?” he asks to distract me from this cell phone issue, stepping again closer to me.

“Yeah, I will be, thanks,” I promise. “Thanks for stopping by.”

“My pleasure,” he says, kissing me on the cheek. “See you soon. Be safe. Stay low.”

“Drive safely,” I beg as he jumps into the driver’s seat and turns on the engine. “Say hello to everyone from us.”

I stand in the roadside till the truck’s rear lights disappear into the darkness before going back to the apartment, where they’re all ready to turn in for tonight. I briefly explain where I got the cellphone and we have to refrain ourselves from calling to the caves--they probably don’t even have connection.

Lying on the bed with Ian, we contemplate for hours the pictures of our son, marveling and also getting scared as hell at them all. They’ve taken their time with portraying Nicholas: we have pictures of him sleeping, eating, bathing, crawling around the cave, getting check up at Doc’s office, getting checked up with Denny at a Soul’s hospital, him drawing with the other kids, pestering around while the adults are doing laundry, cleaning dishes or any other task, or playing football.

“Can’t believe he’s already eleven months old,” I whisper, leaning against Ian.

“Me neither,” he confesses, a small smile on his lips.

“Time flies,” I say, my voice breaking at that moment.

Ian sets aside the picture and holds me tight against his chest.

“Don’t feel bad about it,” he orders softly. “You’re doing this for him. He’s way too young to remember his two parents weren’t there for his first months of life--as you can see, they’re taking good care of him in the meantime. And maybe, when he starts to be conscious about everything around him, you might have changed already this whole world for him.”

I nod, trying to agree to those words, to acknowledge the truth in Ian’s and Burn’s words, and wipe the tears from my eyes with Ian’s sweater. I have to stay strong. I have to keep doing what I’m doing--I can’t quit now. We knew there’d be no going back. So in the morning I wake up and force myself to get back to college and continue my lectures.

Three months later I finally, blissfully, see some beneficial results in what I’m doing, something I never expected to happen before I engaged the lectures, something I was beginning to fear would actually never take place in this lifetime. Which paradoxically brings us as well to the very first time we use the cell phone Burns left us--although despite of that, him and Denny do make an effort to come by the apartment from time to time.

After quite the interesting lecture on Africa’s colonization throughout he 16th century, led by the paradigms of “Gold, God and Glory”, I notice that among the students who want to discuss or comment the debate with me there’s this one young boy, not that much taller than me, looking anxious, out of place and distraught--I’ve seen him during the semester but I couldn’t put my finger on his actual name, or if he usually participates or not in the debates. I look at him while I speak with scholars and colleagues; he doesn’t talk to anyone, doesn’t seem to be in his comfort place exactly, and every time a new student or teacher comes along to talk with me, he steps backwards to let them all go first.

One of two: or he’s extraordinarily kind and is in no hurry, or wants to discuss something with me without anyone else hearing it. The second option would mean an exceptional situation and I get almost as anxious as the boy, but I force myself not to cut short any of the prior conversations with students and colleagues.

So I just stand tight and am patient until everyone else has scattered around and he and I are the only Souls in the classroom.

“Hello,” I say, approaching with a warm smile the red-headed, avoiding my eye anxious boy. “I’m afraid I don’t know your name.”

“Matthew’s fine,” he whispers staring at his feet, before clearing his throat.

“So you kept your host’s human name,” I point out absurdly, because I think this single detail means a lot in itself.

“What other choice could I have,” he scowls under his breath, before correcting himself, “Yes, I did, yes.”

Noticing something’s really bugging this poor young man, I decide I should offer him something more than a simple conversation inside the classroom. After all I’m beginning to see he doesn’t exactly have a doubt about today’s lesson.

“Would you like a cup of tea?” I suggest, grabbing my suitcase.

“I’d appreciate it very much,” he answers.

I lead the way out of the classroom, switching off the lights before closing the door behind Matthew. He doesn’t say a word throughout the journey to the cafeteria and sometimes I look above my shoulder to make sure he’s really following me and hasn’t vanished into thin air.

I order and pay myself for two cups of tea, though I notice he’d like something much stronger, and choose a table fairly away from the cafeteria’s entrance, so we won’t be constantly bothered by the comes and goes of students and teachers.

Matthew carries on the silence till he’s half-finished with his tea. Then it’s the first time he dares to look at me directly--with his clear, amber eyes beyond the Soul’s gleam.

“Thank you,” he says, pointing at the cup, though we dismiss this subject soon enough. “And I wanted to talk to you about one delicate topic. . . I’ve decided to leave the Earth.”

Drinking at the time he was speaking, I almost choke on his words. With shaky hands I put the cup back on its plate and stare blankly at Matthew, who hasn’t realized the real reason of my surprise. I’m just hoping I’m not getting my hopes up.

“Though I’m flattered, may I ask why have you informed me of your travel plans?”

“Because I owe me leaving this Planet to you,” he answers simply.

Without losing the reassuring smile, I lean forwards and cross my arms.

“I’m confused. Could you explain, please, Matthew?” I ask politely, slowly.

“Of course, I’m sorry. I meant. . . With your lectures, you convinced me to leave the Earth.”

“How?” I chuckle. “I don’t think I’ve ever mentioned a massive departure in any lesson.”

“No, you didn’t, not specifically, that’s for certain,” he agrees. “But you did manage that goal, whether intentionally or not. You said it on your very first lesson--you wanted us to come to terms to this Planet, to understand it, to--to love the Earth. And I do. I love this Planet more than anyone else in this world. You’ve made me love this Planet, their history, their geography, their economy, their politics, their citizens. . . To a point where I don’t think I can occupy it any longer without remorse eating me alive.”

“Matthew, hold on, please,” I beg, raising a hand. “Why would you ever leave this Planet if you love it? How can you love something and decide to leave it behind?”

“That’s the problem!” he cries. “I love it so much; I don’t think I can stay here.”

‘I know the feeling only too well’, I think, though not a word escapes my lips as Matthew keeps rambling on and on.

“It just feels wrong. You’ve said this is the only Planet where we Souls faced a defense, a confrontation. Humans were the only species who never agreed to our staying here, who called it all an invasion, the Apocalypse.”

“That’s because they just couldn’t see the benefits of us staying here in the moment,” I reason. “The other species did and welcome us in. Humans didn’t.”

“And there’re still some human cells out there,” he acknowledges.

“Very few harmless rebels,” I reply.

“Who still feel their world was taken away from them and would like to have it back, if possible,” resumes him. “How could they not, really.”

“I guess,” I grant. “But there’s not much we can do.”

“No,” he agrees, “we can’t exactly ask Souls to leave this Planet back to humans.”

“This is our Planet too, now.”

“I understand that and this is exactly the reason why I want to leave. No--the reason why I need, have, to leave. I must do something on a personal level, if I can do nothing else at this given moment. But I can’t live with myself here any longer knowing I occupied a harmless human and their entire Planet.”

Since Matthew’s raised his voiced a notch and his breathing’s a bit too fast, avoiding my eyes once again, I give him a full minute to keep his composure, making sure he’s not regretting the words he’s saying.

“You do know, however, that we perfected this world? The environment is healed, there are no wars, no poverty, no hunger, no conflicts?” I ask.

“The place you’ve just described isn’t the Earth,” he replies, glaring furious at me. “Different opinions--that’s what humans were. We’ve changed this world upside down. We shouldn’t take the advantage of keep calling it Earth. Surely we should’ve left after we repaired their world.”

“Speaking from a time period way after the invasion, I guess they didn’t even consider that option. We’ve never left a world after occupying it and perfect it--why would the Earth, as troubled and damaged as it was back then, would be any different?”

Matthew nods a few times, knowing I’m right. “It’s been a long time and the advances have been extraordinary. If we left the Earth to humankind, I’m sure they’d be fine.”

“And what if you’re wrong?” I demand. “What if we do leave the Earth to its rightful owners again and within a century or so the Planet’s as damaged as it was before we arrived? Or worse? Imagine what a Third World War would cause, with all the advanced technologies we’ve provided them.”

“They wouldn’t do that,” he replies, scandalized.

“Have you met humans?”

“No, of course not, but I don’t think they’d risk endangering this Planet again.”

“Says who?”

“Common sense!” he declares. “Even humans can’t be that stupid.”

“Imagine they were. Imagine they destroyed everything all over again. What do you suggest, that we appear here once every century to repair their world so they can keep on destroying it over and over and over again, assuming we’ll grant them all the chances they want?”

“Oh, please, it’s just me who’s decided to leave the Earth--not the ten billion Souls living on this Planet. Earth won’t be condemned because of one Soul leaving this ecosystem! And even if you managed to convince them all that the right thing to do was leave this Planet, it wouldn’t happen overnight--we, as a species, would stay long enough to ensure we leave the Earth in capable hands.”

“You’re speaking on behalf of ten billion Souls,” I remark. “What makes you think everyone would follow your lead?”

“May I know what’s your problem?” he demands, outraged.

Everyone in the cafeteria falls dead silent because of his yell and harsh words, not usually heard in college grounds--or any grounds where Souls live, for that matter. He drops his head and I do the same as a couple teachers and the dean come our way and stop two inches from our table.

“Hello, Wanderer,” greets Richardson, one of the teachers.

“Matthew,” says the red-headed boy in front of me after receiving the stares of the three male adults.

“Hope everything’s fine here?” they ask, looking only at me.

“Yes, we are, thank you,” I reply politely. “Difference of opinion.”

The three men, strong opponents to my lessons and way of teaching from the very first day, frown at my words, as if what they’ve just witnessed was yet another reason why I should be fired from college at once. Thankfully, they aren’t keen to engage this debate as of now.

“This is a place of study,” says the dean. “I urge you to keep your voices down and don’t bother the other students and teachers.”

“We will,” promises Matthew, without really looking at any of them. With that, they leave our side and go sit down on a table thirty feet from us. Slowly, conversations and the usual racket returns to the cafeteria and I face Matthew again.

“Didn’t want to bug you,” I apologize. “Just trying to have a debate to make you see all point of views on this argument.”

“I’m not really in for a riddle, Wanderer, with all due respects,” he whispers, head still dropped.

“Guess you’re right. I’m sorry. But explain to me why you want to leave this Planet.”

“Haven’t I already told you that?” he replies exasperated.

“Humor me,” I beg.

He breathes in deeply and sits straighter. “I guess--it feels like the right thing to do.”

“At the time, World War I also seemed like the right thing to do,” I reply.

“Oh, come on, please! I can’t do this right now.”

“I’m just trying to make you see that even before we came here, some humans saw what humankind had done to the Earth. It was a green, resourceful Planet before they started exploiting it all from north to south and east to west. That’s all in the past now, but what makes you think things will be any different if we hand the Earth back to humans?”

“Experience, perhaps?” he suggests. “They’ve lost this world once; all they want is to get it back. And keep it.”

“You guess,” I interject.

“Yes, of course, in my own personal opinion, but it’s a fair estimate to guess I’m right,” he acknowledges exasperated.

“Right now, on Earth there is no communism, no capitalism, no dictatorships, no poorer or richer states, no rivalries among countries, everyone’s considered and treated equally, women, men, black people, LGBT people, no distinctions or discriminations of any kind to any person. At all. Without going as far as mentioning a World War or the destruction of the environment, inequality could arise again.”

“As of now, every remaining human’s at the same spot--they’re barely surviving the Apocalypse. Hiding somewhere, with no prospect of getting their lives back. I’m sure their bias, were they were to get back their Planet, will be gone by then,” he replies. “And look, Wanderer, if you please, bottom line is that I just think they should at least be given the chance to get their Planet back. And since that is impossible for now, I must leave.”

“And what do you think your leaving will mean?”

“I’ll be at peace with myself,” he sighs, seemingly truly tired of it all. I can understand him only too well--a few months back I was at the same exact crossroad where he is right now, and it is not a feeling we Souls are used to, much less comfortable with, in any conceivable way. “It’s just too strange not to be at ease with my own mind.”

“But, what will it mean to the Earth?” I insist.

He ponders my question for some long seconds. He hadn’t actually thought about anything else beyond leaving this Planet.

In the end, he shrugs, not as nonchalantly as he wants make me believe.

“Nothing?” he asks in a whisper, beaten. Certainly not what he was expecting to realize out of this conversation. “It wouldn’t make a difference.”

“Do you want it to make a difference?”

“Yes,” he answers at once, but seems distraught about what he’s said right the next second. “I don’t know,” confesses finally, dropping his head again. “What about you?”

“What about me?” I repeat in shock, hiding a panicked, condescending chuckle. This conversation was about Matthew and him alone.

“You said you came to love this world too. Didn’t you want to leave then?”

He seems genuinely interested in that story and, given what he’s dealing with, I see no rational reason not to tell him. Or at least, the bit he can hear about at the moment.

“Trust me, I wanted to. For some time, I wished nothing more and I even tried to flee.”

“What stopped you?”

I grin. “The question is who stopped me.”

He nods, as if I’d just said exactly what he was waiting to hear, and for some reason doesn’t ask me about the person who made me change minds. Thankfully, I might add, since I wasn’t prepared to talk to him about Ian.

“So you stayed and decided everyone should understand what kind of world we inhabited. Spread the word--the love.”

“Kind of, yeah,” I confirm.

Afterwards we fall silent again and Matthew finishes his already cold tea without looking at me. But I know exactly what that look means, what he’s thinking, what he’s planning to do. The conversation hasn’t budged his idea one inch--if anything, I’ve convinced him further. However, that’s what I wanted, more or less. To prove to himself and to myself that leaving the Earth is what he truly wanted. That it wasn’t the whim of the moment, because he could regret it for the rest of his long existence.

I lean forwards to catch his eye.

“You are leaving this Planet, no matter what I say, aren’t you?” I whisper.

He just nods as a response, his hands shut in tight fists. No point in making it look like I’m against that idea--he could have just told me half an hour ago and I wouldn’t have pretended for this long, making both of us mad.

“Where are you planning on going?”

“Not sure yet,” he replies, as if dismissing this important decision.

And I just realize the biggest problem of them all. He maybe wasn’t here with me to engage a debate after all--hence his anger earlier. That was the last thing on his mind today, probably. He didn’t wake up and decided to talk to me looking for my approval, help or anything of that sort.

“You haven’t been in any other Planet, have you,” I marvel.

“No,” he confirms after some long seconds, his voice breaking. “I was born in this Planet. And I can’t stay here a minute longer, the way I love it here. The way my mother loved life here so much she didn’t want to be anywhere else. See my problem?” he demands, only a bit frightened.

“Of course,” I promise, reaching a hand above the table to grab his. “I understand it completely. Let me help you, then--do you know anything about the other Planets?”

“Some things,” he shrugs.

I order the waiter for two more teas and wait till he’s brought them to the table before starting speaking at great length about the eight Planets I’ve been in. I also mention the three Planets I’ve only heard about; because this young, brave man deserves to know every possibility he’s got. All the doors are open for him--he needs to make the best decision, or at least the closest one, after a twenty-two year magical, unparalleled existence here on the Earth.

When I’m finished, he takes his time before he speaks again. “I’ll think about it. Right now I’m a bit confused.”

“I can understand that,” I chuckle, drinking a sip of my tea.

“Wanderer?” he asks very slowly, without meeting my eyes, clearly nervous and blushing because of the idea that’s on his mind. “Could I ask you for something else? It’s not in your job description and you could obviously refuse, but--”

“Just say it,” I reply encouragingly. After what he’s done and said, I’d grant him anything.

“I’ve scheduled the extraction in a week from now,” he informs. “It’ll give me time to settle some things and make a decision. But, that day--Could you--? Could you--?”

“Come to the extraction?” I finish for him, seeing he was struggling finding the words. “Of course. If that’ll make it any easier for you--Anything you may need.”

“Thank you,” he whispers, a single tear on his cheek. From what he’s been telling me, or he’s all alone here on the Earth, or the few friends or family he’s got would never understand him or do this for him.

“In return, could you do something for me?” I ask.

“Me something for you? I don’t think there is anything I can do,” he chuckles.

“You’d be surprised,” I reply. “You know there was a time I wanted to leave too.”

“Do you want to join me?” he asks surprised.

“No, that’s not it. I’m here for good--trying to get Souls to see reason. That’s why I wanted to ask you if you could leave a note, or a recorded message, explaining the reasons why you decided to leave the Earth,” I suggest. “It could help others that might be in your same situation. And it certainly could help me some time in the future.”

Matthew ponders it for some terrible seconds when I fear he’s gonna say no, but he finally nods. By the way he’s looking at me, he wouldn’t refuse me of much. “I’ll have it prepped next week.”

“Thanks. Appreciate it.”

After this, there isn’t much left to say, and yet we stay in the cafeteria one more hour, talking about everything and anything. We comment some topics about the Earth, but also some of the other Planets out there. About staying, about leaving, about the life in other ecosystems. I must say, outside my classroom, this is one of the most interesting conversations I’ve had in a long time. The last person who challenged me this way and made me consider things I hadn’t before was probably, Jeb.

Finally we bid farewell according to meet within a week’s time. The boy’s already dropped his subjects at college, the only one he truly regrets missing, Human Studies, or so he says.

I’m still dazzled by the conversation by the time I get to the apartment. I don’t believe my lectures actually worked. Matthew’s the first Soul to understand what I was trying to explain and actually doing what we were hoping for. It certainly lifts my spirits.

“Hello!” I greet when I get home.

Jared, Mel and Ian are waiting for me in the living room, laying any way at all around the couches, not bothering anymore to go greet me at the entrance hall. I stand in the middle of the room, under everyone’s eye, still looking for words. Though I know the best way of setting them in motion too.

“I have a job for you.”

At once, the three of them are already on their feet, surrounding me, willing to do almost anything for me, knowing it’s necessary for the cause. And they’re just eager for some action; not for a second they fear there’s any harm hovering over them or myself. When actually, there is, ever since the moment we step foot into this city and I went back to college.

“When do we start?” asks Jared, preferring to know the when than the what; preferring the plan to the prize.

“Hold your horses--not so fast,” I reply, stepping away from them. “It’ll be hard.”

“When isn’t it,” scoffs Mel, diminishing it.

“It can be dangerous,” I insist.

“As usual,” dismisses Ian. “We’re used to it. Just name it, Wanda.”

“If we’re caught, it’ll be the end of this whole plan.”

“We won’t,” they promise. And I know they’re not reckless and that I need them--this is something I couldn’t do by myself, even if, inside this host, I can do more than I ever thought possible or hoped for. “Now, tell us.”

So I explain the situation. And after the outburst of surprise and joy to see our efforts haven’t fallen into the void of forgetfulness, we start preparing a plan. It’s grand to realize at least one Soul among ten billions is ready and prepared to face the enormity of leaving the Earth, leaving his host. Which will eventually be occupied by some other Soul if the Healers keep the body--so we need to fetch the body, in case the human’s still alive, and take it to the caves or the mountains, it doesn’t really matter, where they will be out of harm’s way and will enjoy as a human the rest of their life.

That will be possible, of course, if only the human Matthew occupied is still alive. The pessimistic thought runs through all of our minds as soon as we’ve agreed to a plan of action. We’ve had our share of unwanted unresponsive humans and we wouldn’t want our very first case to be like that. It’d just destroy everything we’ve done up until now.

Instead of considering that scenario, Jared stands up and goes to the dormitories to fetch the cell phone to contact Burns or Denny--we will need them. At least there’s still a week’s time.

A period of time that turns out to be way shorter than we’d first expected.

I have to keep up not only my busy schedule, but also the usual standard of heated debates on the lectures, so no-one notices there’s something that’s changed my existence inside out once more, reason why I let Jared, Mel and Ian come on occasion, so they give me an unsuspicious hand now and then at the lectures. Matthew doesn’t show up at all the next seven days, but either way we’re busy on his behalf, contacting Denny and prepping the “body retrieving operation”, as Mel, Jared and Ian insist on calling it, which includes taking the human body out of the chosen hospital, getting a vehicle, deciding a location and memorizing the safest and shortest route to the hiding place.

In the meantime, we have to deal too with Kathy’s and Curt’s curiosity concerning Ian’s allegedly pictures. On my orders, since I had no possible time of doing it myself, Mel, Ian and Jared spend a full day choosing pictures on Internet and take them to a copy shop to print them in an amazing big size--even I am impressed when I get back home. Also means their visit at our place, when Jared and Mel have to stay hidden in their dorm all evening and throughout dinner.

Nevertheless, Ian and I take our time every night to stare for I don’t know how long the pictures of Nicholas. It’s so nice from Denny and Burns to bring more every time they visit; we can see through them, even if it’s not in person, how our son grows up. And with Matthew’s situation, every night, before falling asleep, I repeat myself that my goal, my child’s sake, is closer by the minute. Or that’s what I’d like to think.

On D-Day, I meet with Matthew at the hospital closest to college, as we’d agreed before, joined as well by Ian, Mel and Denny, who I introduce as my partner, my sister and my dearest friend of all times--unnecessarily. Matthew does nothing but greet them politely before returning sullenly to his own thoughts. We walk in silence through the hospital till we reach what used to be the Operation Room, now only used in the extractions and insertion of Souls in and out human hosts.

The Healer Gottfredsson’s already waiting for us all. He lets me be in the room with Matthew only because he himself asks for that kindness, but sends Denny, Ian and Mel rudely away to the observation panel above of the OR. Also abiding Matthew’s wishes, who’s noticeably anxious about this whole ordeal, he allows us ten minutes alone before starting the procedure.

I help Matthew get comfortable on the bed. Once he’s lying there, facing the ceiling, arms crossed as to hide the shivering I will not be mentioning out of respect, we stay in silence for some long seconds, I standing two feet from the bed, pondering if I should reach for his hand.

“I don’t think I’ve ever felt this way before,” confesses Matthew all of a sudden in a nervous chuckle.

“On the other hand, you’ve never faced a decision like this one before,” I reply politely.

He nods. Shifts again on the bed, trying to get more comfortable, which isn’t exactly possible, since he’s as comfortable as it gets--soft blankets and mattress, a pillow under his head.

“Tell me the truth,” he begs, looking at me. “This is what you wanted when you resumed your classes at college. That’s really why you came back.”

In fright I look around in case someone’s heard him. But the only people close enough are Ian, Denny and Mel, and it seems they can’t hear what’s being said in the room, so we’re safe. Only when I’m certain of it, I step closer to the bed and lean in carefully, to whisper close to his ear:

“I’d be lying if I didn’t want the best for this Earth and humankind,” I confess.

When I step away from the bed, Matthew’s grinning, as if he’d known the truth many weeks ago. I’m guessing he did even before he understood he wanted to leave the Earth.

“Look, all I want is to give humankind what we wrongfully took from them and is rightfully theirs,” I explain. “I want to get people, humans, involved so that they’ll know how far we’ve come and how far they can get, so we don’t lose everything all over again. To get people appreciate the endeavor of life and the universe in general, to get them focused on discovering and going forward so we actually care about it this time around.”

Matthew raises a hand to make me stop. “You don’t have to explain it to me, I get it. If I could, I’d stay and help you--So don’t worry, I’m not going to say anything,” he adds, upon seeing my panicked face. “I won’t betray humankind either. And speaking of which--the tape and the note you asked me for are both in my back. Please use them as you see fit.

“Good luck, Wanderer.”

“I’ll probably need it,” I sigh. “Thank you--for everything, Matthew.”

The Healer returns at this point, killing our conversation for good, as I step further away from the bed, without breaking eye contact with Matthew. I would’ve liked to tell him how brave he is, how grateful we all are for this chance he’s given to humankind, how inspirational he hopefully will be to many, many other Souls--but there’s no time left, and I’m okay with just sending all those feelings through my gaze. He somehow knows what I’m trying to tell him--only too briefly. The Healer puts him to sleep within seconds.

And the extraction procedure itself takes place in less than one minute. Before I’m fully aware of it, I’ve got a bluish cryotank in my hands, freezing my fingertips, with Matthew’s soul, while the human body’s resting unconscious on the bed. It feels so strange that something as groundbreaking for all of us and humankind has started with such a small, fast, unnoticed gesture. As the wise man said, it’s a small step for a man, but a giant leap for mankind.

“Thank you,” I say to the Healer. “So what are you gonna do with the body now?”

“We usually keep him for twenty-four hours, in case a Soul wants to be inserted, before sending it to a major hospital in the state so they can keep it in better conditions,” explains the man, without suspecting at all. “I’ll see you out,” he adds, signaling me for the door.

I’ve explained things earlier with the Healer and so he lets me take the cryotank with me, so I can send him away from the Earth. That gives me some time with Matthew, to hold him like I didn’t dare to do earlier--like a mother--thanking him for his gigantic and meaningful gesture, trying to tell him that he’s incredibly brave and pure, that he’ll find happiness again, promising him that I’ll keep doing my best at my lectures so he won’t be the only one to come to love this Planet.

By the time I meet with Ian, Mel, Denny and Jared in the truck outside the hospital, the afternoon’s already transforming into evening. Most Healers and nurses are leaving the center, chatting along with their companions around the parking lot. That means we won’t have to wait for long.

Less than half an hour later, with time to spare to send Matthew to the Fire World, on his own desire, the comes and goes diminish drastically and, considering this is a small, non-urgencies and non-teaching hospital, it’s safe to assume the center will be almost empty at this point.

So we jump out of the truck--Jared stays inside, in case we need to make a run for it, though he pulls over closer to the exit. I could have very much stayed in as well, since they all know where the OR with the body is, but I just don’t want to leave Matthew alone. He deserves to have a friend by his side now. And, moreover, it’s not as if this is going to be hard, as when we abducted souls back then--it’s just retrieving a body to save him from an insertion, something he’d never agree to, were he asked.

Knowing, without a hint of remorse, that this time around we’re doing something good, I don’t hesitate for a second when we get to the OR, Ian makes the human inhale a little bit more of chloroform and I help the three of them--or rather, bother them--to take the body and carry it to the rear entrance, where Jared’s already waiting for us.

We’ve come prepared, of course. At the back of the truck we’ve created a small, home-made bed, made of a carpet and some sheets, where we put Matthew as gently as we all can, put a pillow under his head and cover him for some blankets. After making sure he should be comfortable--and checking he’s still breathing--we jump into the truck, buckle our seat belts and Jared drives off, headed for the outskirts of town for the first time ever since we came back to the city.

“Did someone see you?” he asks, looking at us all by the rear mirror.

“Nope, we’re good,” answers Ian. His calm-looking face, relaxed position and normal breathing assure Jared of how smoothly the mission was.

“Okay,” he nods. “Well, ladies and gentlemen, get comfortable. We’ve got an eighteen-hour trip ahead of us.”

As he speaks, he reaches for Mel’s hand, sitting by his side, who smiles back at him. It’s been quite some time since I’ve seen them this relaxed and also, thrilled. This mission and getting out of the city will be beneficial for us all too.

Since we’ve got nothing to do and a long trip ahead of us, I reach for Matthew’s bag and find the portable DVD player and listen to the message he’s left me--probably the second to most important task we had to do tonight. Ian and Denny scoot closer, interested too, and Mel turns around to be able to hear it properly. Even Jared seems interested, looking at me through the rear mirror, though he’d never allow himself to be distracted from the road and the journey.

We listen to the message once and then we fall dead silent for some minutes, letting the speech sink in our brains, till I can’t stand the silence anymore.

“What do you think?” I ask finally. Someone, speak, I want to beg.

“He said everything,” whispers Denny, in awe, not daring to talk any louder. “Exactly what I thought, what I went through, what I felt. Couldn’t have put it in better words myself.”

“It’ll work,” agrees Jared, holding tightly to the steering wheel.

“Honestly, if it doesn’t, I don’t know what could,” replies Denny, still mesmerized.

Ian and Mel also agree that this videotape, at this given moment, is almost like the Holy Grail, which is exactly the same thing I thought not ten seconds into the speech. Matthew’s done an amazing venture to us and the whole humankind--it’s time, then, that we should pay him back.

As everyone wants to rest, or they’re not interested still in the videotape, I grab some headphones and listen to Matthew’s words over and over and over again till I lose count. I really cannot understand why my family members don't want to do as me and listen to Matthew's speech a second time, then a third, then a tenth--I don't think I can ever tire of it. Because it is everything we could have hoped, because I never thought I would be able, just through my words, to make someone see what took me so long to realize on my own.

“I’m Matthew. I introduce myself to you by my human given name because the Earth is everything I’ve ever known--I was born here. And yet, today I find myself at the crossroad of deciding to leave this Planet. I know such a choice is usually personal and I don’t have to explain myself as to why I’ve decided to start my second existence after only twenty-two years here on the Earth, but on this instance, I must give an explanation. I owe it to so many people--to the ten billion Souls who are currently living in Earth, and also, to the few remaining human cells surviving out there.

“Now, I want to make myself clear before moving on. I’m not a traitor. I’m not a pariah. I haven’t been brainwashed. I’m still a Soul, like you. The host I was implanted in hasn’t started controlling me. I’ve just seen the light--Wanderer, my dearest teacher at college, has helped me to see reason. I beg of you not to blame her for this either.

“Different opinions, was said once, was what made humans human. That’s certainly what led to poorer and richer societies, varying political systems, Wars, and many other things we despised about humankind. But that’s not true anymore. The remaining humans out there--because let’s not pretend, luckily we haven’t committed genocide on the human race yet--aren’t divided beyond the geographical disaggregation necessary to survive. On the contrary, they’re united against what they see like a greater enemy. And that’s us. The Souls.

“I don’t see Souls as my enemy. I don’t see humans as my enemy. And yet I find myself not belonging to either of these groups. It is true that we came here, invaded this Planet, took it away from its rightful owners and in the process, we almost wiped out the whole human race. I’ve been told, because I haven’t had the pleasure of witnessing it with my own two eyes, that our procedure upon discovering a new Planet is the following: we arrive, we conquer and occupy it, perfect it, swear our allegiance and live happily all the existences we wanted.

“Think for a moment, I beg you--does that sound like what happened when arriving at the Earth? No. Because it didn’t go that smoothly. We found opposition. No-one agreed to our staying here. In fact, they wanted us to leave, and didn’t doubt into showing their point of view through violent, criminal acts. I am fully aware of the most sad, outrageous deaths of the first Souls who came here. I’m not justifying nor condoning them.

“What I am doing is, rather, advocate for what we Souls should have done. We should have left. We should have never stayed here after finding opposition--we occupied all those thirteen Planets because the species living on all of them accepted our presence and invited us as their guests. We didn’t receive this treatment here and, though it may seem impolite and rude, we were the guests--humans were and are, in the most literal sense of the word, our hosts. We should have abided their wishes. And even if we’d stayed behind long enough to fix their world, their ecosystem, poverty, hunger and every other wrong thing on Earth, because as a Soul community, couldn’t have left a Planet destroy itself on its own when we knew we could help them, we should have left afterwards.

“I love this Planet. I’ve come to love everything about the Earth--its nature, human’s way of living, thinking, communicating, surviving. And that’s why I can say with one hand on my heart that what we did was wrong. We had no right of taking this marvelous Planet we’re staying in and we all love, from its rightful citizens. That’s why I’m leaving the Earth, effective immediately and irreversible, long before anyone hears this. I can’t stay in a place that I love knowing I’m here for all the wrong reasons, causing in the process more pain and damage than I can bear.

“That’s why I’m recording this. I won’t be returning to the Earth, but I will be waiting for any of you Souls who find themselves at the same crossroad as I did and decide to leave Earth too. I pray that you all will eventually come to understand the world you’re living in and come to love it as much as I did to join me in my next Planet, the Fire World.

“So understand this: this is not a trick or a scheme. This message, and the lectures by our wonderful Wanderer, is not looking for Soul genocide. We just want Souls to see the truth, realize for once that we did something really, really wrong--and hope that you have the courage to fix it, the same way we had the nerve to perfect every world we’ve occupied before without even asking.”

Mel shakes me urgently to snap me out of Matthew’s message halfway through. Realizing both Denny and Ian are gone from my sides, I take the headphones off and throw them on the floor along with the DVD player, turning around without giving a damn if they’re broken, glancing over the seat. The headphones have blocked me for enough time from the alarmed high-pitched yelling, scandalized shouts and loud, violent bangs coming from the back of the truck. Matthew, the human, has awakened. Not only that--he’s having a panic attack or a seizure, trying to get away from us; the five of us, all of whom he sees as enemies, both human and Souls. Guess that takes off our shoulders the anxiety to know if he was still alive.

To Denny’s request, Jared’s pulling over to one side of the ditch, but that seems to be just the wrong idea: as soon as he’s driving slowly enough, Matthew opens the back doors and jumps out of the vehicle, to the darkness, the cold and a complete unknown Planet.

“NO!” I yell, trying to follow him. Mel stops me from behind, as usually, knowing I will be no good out there till the situation’s solved, as Ian, Denny and seconds later, herself, follow Matthew’s suit and jump out of the truck.

Understanding I must be cautious, I wait until Jared stops to leave the vehicle as well. God’s bless, it’s pretty late and there aren’t many cars on the road; the nearest lights I see must be over a mile away from us, heading away from this show, so we’re safe.

By the time I get to Matthew, Ian, Denny, and Mel, panting already, my previous student’s being held against the floor by Ian, lying almost completely over his body, to prevent him from escaping again, restraining his hands behind his back. Despite being forced to use physical strength to stop and control him, Ian talks to Matthew slowly, quietly, and smoothly on the ear--if I were on Matthew’s place, I wouldn’t be able not to trust Ian. Feelings for the man unattached.

“Stop fighting me!” he begs. “We don’t want to hurt you. This is for your own good, can you trust me?”

But Matthew, as he is human after all, with their natural way of being, doesn’t stop budgeting, trying to get free from the restraining hands--he doesn’t want to listen. And so Ian’s efforts to keep him at place increase.

“Please, don’t make me tackle you again,” orders Ian, a bit more sharply due only to the effort, not anger towards Matthew, I know, sweat dripping from his forehead.

“No, don’t hurt him!!” I beg, getting closer.

Mel, Jared and even Denny all try to stop me, afraid of what Matthew could do if he got a glimpse of me. But, opposite to their fears, as soon as I’m within visual field of the man, Matthew relaxes at once within Ian’s surprised arms. Stops fighting against Ian and stares blankly at me as I kneel two feet from him, reassuring smile on my lips beyond the nervousness and anxiety.

“Hello, Matthew,” I murmur.

He seems surprised that I should know his name and in spite of having recognized me, his first instinct acts again and for some seconds he tries to get away from me in particular, frightened by my eyes--but Ian doesn’t let him.

“No, look at her,” he orders kindly, forcing him to stare at me. “Look at her in the eye. It’s OK. Don’t be afraid. It’s alright. You’re not scared of her. She’s not your enemy. Souls aren’t your enemy. And humans aren’t, either. Can you trust me? We’re not gonna hurt you. We aren’t. Please.”

Matthew hasn’t broken eye contact with me and so, I nod once, reassuringly, to confirm Ian’s words. After some seconds, the fighting stops for good and both men rest tiredly on the road panting slightly. Matthew nods back, as if understanding. With an enormous sigh, Ian moves away from him and lies on the pavement, catching his breath, though still tense, ready to act if I need protection or Matthew tries to run off again.

“We’re your friends,” I say, sitting down by Matthew’s side.

He nods once more, standing into a sitting position, shoulder to shoulder with me, coughing. One side of his face is completely filthy, filled with lose stone from the road and red, but I don’t dare yet to touch him. Luckily, Denny hands him a handkerchief and Matthew, with shaky hands, takes it. But doesn’t know what to do with it and keeps staring at me.

“I know you,” he says in a whisper, still disbelieving everything he hears, sees, says and touches by his own human senses. “Wanderer?”

“Yes,” I confirm, puzzled that he remembers such details. Every human we manage to save is a surprise in itself--we never know how if they’ll wake up, or how much will they remember. “I was a teacher at the college your Soul attended to.”

He shakes his head. “No. You’re the teacher who convinced him to leave the Earth,” he replies, slowly, as surprised as I was, “to leave--me. You’re the reason I’m alive. Thank you so much. I owe you my second life.”

I can’t stop myself and I don’t even think twice about it--I lean forward and hug him, tears falling from my eyes. And though this is the very first time he and I have met, he answers back, resting his head on my shoulder. He probably was aching for some real, affective human touch as much as I did.

“I think we’ve had enough conversations together to know you owe me nothing,” I whisper.

“Guess that’s true,” he says, his laughter reverberating all through my body.

“So, you’re there? The human you?” asks Melanie in shock, forcing us to break our embrace. A question that in any other circumstance wouldn’t make much sense amongst any other group of interlocutors, but one that is very much important on this instance.

“Oh, yes,” confirms Matthew with an exhausted, painful sigh. “I never disappeared. I remember everything, from my past life, to the coexistence with that--”

“Soul,” provides Ian with a scowl before Matthew unintentionally insults the race he could do nothing but hate at this point.

“Thank you really to all of you,” says the man, shaking hands with Jared, Ian and Mel, the three of them as surprised, marveled and touched as Matthew or myself. “I am fully aware of what you risked by taking me out of that hospital. You--?” he doubts upon seeing Denny, his glimmering eyes still making him uneasy.

“I ‘turned’ too,” confirms Denny, smiling politely, offering the word Matthew was struggling with, as they shake hands. “Don’t worry, neither Wanda nor me, or any other Soul, will hurt you anymore. I promise.”

Matthew nods some times, looking alternatively between Denny and me, who nod back at him, till he believes us--believes the words he never thought he’d hear again.

“Okay, nice and all, but we really should get back into the truck,” suggests Jared, visibly tense, signaling for the vehicle. But he’s right: a couple cars have already passed by us; we can’t risk any of them to stop by and try to help us.

Mel stands up and takes his hand to ease him; no need to be rude either, says her gaze. And to abide her suggestion, Jared heads off to the driver’s seat after nodding one last time to Matthew’s general direction. But either case, he’s right, so I stand up--helped by Ian--and Denny extends the same courtesy to Matthew. Seeing the man taking almost without second thought the hand of this Soul he’s just met, as a sign of peacefulness for everything done and said, gives me more hope than I’d dare to admit.

“So, where’re we going?” asks Matthew as we head back to the truck.

“Let’s talk inside,” orders Ian, holding the doors open for him.

Though I understand Matthew’s a bit uneasy still to get inside the vehicle so soon, I do see also the need to be cautious right now, so I just take his hand, smile encouragingly and lead him inside, by the second row of seats. Denny, closing the doors, gets comfortable behind us and Ian.

Only when Jared’s started driving again and we couldn’t be distinguished from any other Soul driving up the Interstate, we feel safe enough and answer Matthew’s question--the first one of a very long interrogation concerning our family and way of living that will keep us all awake most part of the trip.

“We’re taking you to one of the rebel cells you’ve heard about and feared so much while that Soul was inside of you,” says Mel, a smirk she can’t hide plastered in her face. “To our human family.”

Though we don’t know it at the time, half a day later Matthew would be received at the caves with the same glory Emperors would at their return to Rome after a victorious conquer. Every member of the family welcomes him as if they’d known him for ages--and he instantly feels as if this had been his actual home from the moment he was born.

Thanks to Matthew--the Soul Matthew--and the encouragement of not only my human family, but also, unaware, from Curt and Kathy, within months I see myself giving conferences at various prestigious colleges around the States and even, a couple in Europe. Lectures that are recorded to later be distributed and displayed up and down and side to side of the globe. After more than a year, my message is slowly heard around the Earth, but I fear it’s limitedly understood and much less, acted upon.

Or so I thought until a year and a half after starting the lectures, I’m invited to the Congress, the highest public institution remaining, formed by a total of eleven Souls, with one-year endurance on each of the seats. All of them interested also in what I’ve been teaching the young minds of the future and, apparently, with a lot to say back to me.

“Humans aren’t scattered around in solitude,” I begin to talk as I’ve grown used to do in these two-hour sessions outside college. “We, the Souls, have united them all without realizing it. And though they’re defenseless--”

“I’m sorry, Wanderer, let me stop you there,” interjects Congresswoman Sattira. “We’ve requested your presence here today because we’ve seen up to this point a few of your lectures and wanted to discuss them with you.”

“Of course,” I say, a bit taken aback. At their signal’s permission, I gather up my papers, switch off my computer and sit on one of the still empty chairs, facing the Council, feeling much more intimidated than during my very first lesson back. God, I miss those days. They were easy. “What is it you wanted to ask?”

“You say humans are uniting,” says Congressman Panrola.

“To my point of view, yes, sir, they are. At this moment they all want just this one thing--”

“The Earth back,” interjects Congresswoman Bickons.

I nod at that and Congressman Panrola resumes talking.

“So, humans are uniting against their enemy--against us. Do you consider them dangerous?”

“No!” I yell at once, shocked and outraged. I realize too late I’ve been just too much open and passionate with my feelings and take two seconds to calm down before speaking again, smoothly, low voice, calm, as Souls do. “Please, Congressman, we still outnumber humans one to millions, and they must be pretty much weaponless and almost resource less. There’s no way they’re a threat.”

“At the beginning of the invasion--”

“They’re not a threat anymore,” I reply. “Trust me, Congressman; I know the Earth’s history.”

He nods back and, as if taking over, the Congresswoman by his side, Punich, launches the next question.

“So they’re united against us, but they aren’t a threat. That’s what you’re saying?”

“Yes. No,” I contradict myself within seconds. “It is not. What I’ve been implying for months is that humans are united, but not against Souls per se, united only in their goal--get their Planet back.”

“Back from the species who took it from them,” replies the woman. “Us, the Souls.”

“They just want their lives back.”

“You talk as if you knew them, Wanderer.”

“I’m sure you know my story,” I reply, exhausted, leaning back on my chair. This seems a way too important moment to repeat once again my excuse for the two-year disappearance.

“And by staying out in the desert for months you got this big insight of humans, of what they are like, what they want?”

“What I’ve tried to teach at college is all I’ve learnt,” I explain. “Nothing less. But I assume nothing and, certainly, I don’t speak for humans. I have never seen or talked to any human.”

“So, we have nothing to fear?”

“Of course not,” I scoff, fighting the urge to roll my eyes. Now more than ever I must be a perfect Soul.

“Not from humans--?”

“Certainly not.”

“And not from your lectures?” he insists.

I bite my tongue before answering without thinking and stare at Congressman Marcus, who smirks in a cold, politely way at me.

“If you’ve really been following my lectures, you know what I’m trying to do. To get Souls to know the Planet they’re living in, to understand it and to love it.”

“To, ultimately. . . Leave this Planet?” replies the Soul.

I raise my eyebrows at him. “That sounds close enough to an open accusation, Congressman.”

“You know it’s not,” dismisses the man, waving his hand, though he doesn’t break eye contact with me.

“Are you really that afraid of some lectures?” I demand in a cold whisper, shivering from fear and, being honest, from rage too. “Afraid of the truth? Because I’ve said nothing but in any of my lectures.”

“Wanderer, please calm down,” begs Congressman Chavall. “And sit again, please. We’re amongst friends--we’ve always been. No need to get angry with each other.”

I comply only because we’re both right; and we know it. I take my seat again ever so slowly, looking at the eleven Congressmen and Congresswomen, some of whom refuse to lock my gaze. But I keep silent, staring at my hands, for some very long seconds.

“Would you care to answer the question, Wanderer?” demands, rather than ask, Congresswoman Panrola.

Not that I haven’t forgotten it.

“Mind me answering with a question of my own?” I reply. “How many Souls could have possibly left the Earth at this point to make you all this anxious? Surely not that many.”

The eleven Souls in front of me look around themselves for some long seconds, as if debating who should break the news to me, and all of a sudden, start chuckling, something I wasn’t expecting even before they began the more serious part of the interview.

“My dear, you really have no idea?” replies Congresswoman Sattira.

“Am I missing something?” I demand, forcing a chuckle, holding tight to my chair. I may have gotten better at discussing and proving my point, but fear still paralyzes me. There’s no way I could make a run for it if the need arose.

“Twelve hundred Souls overall have left the Earth only in the past six months,” says Congressman Marcus, handing a folder, which changes hands with six people before it gets to me. “The stats are uploaded for public knowledge.”

“I really haven’t got the time to check them,” I reason.

“All massive lefts from every country coincide with the arrival and distribution of your lectures on DVD,” explains Congressman Chavall. “Without fail. And another addendum: overall, the first Souls to flee were those who first arrived here.”

In utter shock, I take my time flicking through the folders, though there are too many pages and figures to focus on anything, really; and also, I’m certain the stats are true. And that’s why I was invited to a private meeting at Congress, or why they’re all so nervous, more than myself.

Taking a deep breath, I set aside the folder and raise my head, ready to get at it again as best as I can. I no longer know what to expect from this meeting. The worst has already happened, but I do not dare to wish for the best. Only one thing stays in my mind: it makes sense that the first Souls to conquer this Planet, to see its devastation and the many things that have changed since then would be the first ones to understand my message, feel remorse and leave the Earth. How I’d like to contact them and talk to them.

“So? What do you have to say?” demands Congresswoman Bickons.

“Do you expect me to answer for each and every one of those Souls leaving?” I chuckle, signaling the folder with my head.

“Only to explain the basis,” replies the woman, smiling humorlessly.

“Choosing to leave one Planet is a personal decision, Congresswoman. I wouldn’t dare to speak for any of those Souls.”

“But you do encourage on your lessons to leave the Earth, don’t you?”

“When have I said so?” I demand, raising my hands in the air. “Really, tell me. Have I ever asked a single student to leave the Earth? If that’s on the videotape you saw and plan on accusing me for, please, I beg of you, show me your evidence.”

“Wanderer, Wanderer, please, let’s not make a fuss,” whispers Chavall. “We’re not accusing you of anything. This is not a trial.”

“It’s starting to feel like such,” I scowl under my breath, consciously wanting them to hear me.

“You’re here today only to explain the aim of your lectures.”

“Let me ask you, Council; if it was the reverse, if humans had invaded our Origin Planet and we were the almost wiped out species, wouldn’t you like someone to speak on your behalf? To explain to humans what they did was wrong and that they need to leave our Planet?”

“Our Origin Planet wasn’t as destroyed as this one,” interjects Congresswoman Reelja.

“Forget that bit,” I demand. “Compare the current Earth to our Origin Planet. Humans invade us, almost wipe our species and conquer our Planet, on the pretense that they’ve perfected it all. Would we stand for it?”

“The definition of ‘wiped out’ can be a bit--”, chuckles Congressman Chavall.

“We erased their way of being, thinking, acting and communicating. A very small amount of humans have got their memories left after the Soul who inhabited them fled--If that’s not erasing someone from existence, I don’t know what is.”

“But we kept their memories, their knowledge.”

“And as I’ve explained on my lectures, leaving that part is almost as good as leaving nothing. At that point they ceased to be humans--what about their thoughts, their feelings, their senses? Don't they make humans, human? You were all inserted into a child’s body, weren’t you? How much of human’s history do you remember?”

“Let’s not drag into it,” demands Congresswoman Sattira. “This is not a time for an exam.”

“Oh, but I think it is,” I reply. “It’d prove exactly what I’ve been trying to teach.”

“The only reason why we appropriated this species’ bodies and changed them was because they were brutal, vindictive, resentful, prone to aggressiveness, immoral--”

“They were humans, Congresswoman,” I interject. “That’s who they were. All of the above, yes, but they were also nice, kind, cheerful, passionate, strong. . . Couldn’t have one without the other.”

“Oh, please,” scoffs Marcus. “We Souls could.”

“Very well put,” I agree politely. “A complete different species, who’ve evolved and learnt things very differently, and taught those values to generations and generations to come, could.”

“The same way as the spiders, dragons, dolphins and--”

“Come on, some of the actions perpetrated daily in the Fire World are considered by we Souls as brutal and prehistoric. And we haven’t banned them because they’re part of the way they live. Couldn’t destroy them, could we?”

They finally don’t have any smart comment or answer to give back and stay quiet. As silence lingers, I take a look at the folder, reading some hazardous words, giving them time to sink in everything I’ve just said. I’m surprised with myself; I never thought I could win this debate with the Congress as well. Maybe I am doing this just fine.

After more than three minutes, I guess I’ve paraded around enough as it is and entwine my fingers, addressing the Congressmen and Congresswomen again.

“Look. Speaking with one hand in my heart now--if we’d been truthful to our beliefs, we’d never have stayed in a Planet who saw us as enemies and didn’t welcome us here. And yes, we’ve fixed the Earth, everything’s perfect here--we can start giving prizes and pats on our shoulders if you want to. That is, if recognition is what we’re looking for. But that’s not why we’re here. Traveling to other Planets is a means to an end; to create allegiances, to learn about other ways of living, to evolve and develop further. Not to make enemies. Not to engage wars. And certainly, not to conquer for the sake of adding a number to the list of known and perfected Planets.

“I’m giving these lessons because I’m right. Because it is the right thing to do. And all those eleven hundred Souls--”

“Twelve.”

“With all due respects, don’t interrupt me, please,” I beg, sharper than the poor man would have deserved. “Those Souls saw the truth too, though unfortunately did not dare to speak, maybe because they’d find themselves in my same position, defending their apparently personal and harmless choice before this Council. But, plain and simple, we were wrong. Have been since we stayed here after healing this world and are wrong every minute we remain here. I’m not expecting Soul genocide--we have the tech to leave this Planet. Humans don’t. And by chasing them, we wiped them out. Consistently. Every year there are less and less humans--we can’t allow that to continue. Do we want to destroy their whole humanity? Answer me that, Your Honors.

“I assure you, they’ve learnt their lesson. They’d like to have their lives back. They won’t make the same mistake twice. The Earth won’t be the same Earth we knew. They’re children right now, your Honors; we’ve already taught this generation what they had to know, and now it’s time to allow them to leave their shells and be adults. And I promise you, they wouldn’t use their newly tech to chase us, either--even if they tried, I’m sure they could be persuaded.”

“Wanderer,” interjects slowly Congresswoman Sattira. “You mean--you really want us all to leave this Planet?”

“From the beginning, I wanted us all to love this Planet. Then you will know your answer,” I answer politely, tears filling my eyes. They see it. They’re starting to understand.

“We can’t force them.”

“That’s not what I’m implying--I’d never dream of it. Just, give them time--give yourselves time.”

“And if someone chooses to stay--?”

“No Soul or human would hold a grudge against him,” I promise. “Your Honors, I must inform you, and I hope this doesn’t diminish my original message or my legitimacy in here before you, that I’m planning on staying. I have a partner here that I won’t leave behind. So if the wheels start running, I’ll be here to make sure everything’s in order.”

“We’ve heard there’s no guarantee that a human’s conscience stays within after a Soul’s invaded its body,” says Congresswoman Sattira, showing a remarkable true concern for humankind.

“In that case, one Soul will be welcomed to stay behind to save the human--if they so wish,” I answer back without second thought--it’s out of the question, really. “No more human should die under our burden, and no Soul should be forced to leave, or forced to stay, if they don’t want that.”

“Okay,” whispers Congressman Chavall, though it takes him a full minute to resume speaking. “I think we’ve heard enough for one afternoon. We’ve got a lot to consider and a lot to decide, it’d seem.”

“Indeed,” confirm the rest of the chairs.

I understand what they’re saying before anyone addresses to me. Gathering my papers again, taking the folder with me, I stand up from my chair, grabbing my computer.

“Thank you, Wanderer,” says Congresswoman Sattira, though they all look still too appalled to know what they’re thanking me for. “I’m sure we’ll be calling you again soon. Till then, keep up the good work.”

“I’ll do my best. Thank you.”

When the door closes behind me, I take an enormous breath. When I was first interjected, I feared I’d never leave the room.

And it may be too late still. The door opens again behind me and I close my eyes, waiting to be taken away forcibly to the closest resemblance to a prison there is, but then I hear Congressman Marcus. He’s closed the door behind him, so no-one will hear anything we may say now.

“Wanderer. This partner you don’t want to leave behind--Couldn’t he leave like any of us?”

I force a smile and answer truthfully. I’ve played with the odds this afternoon more than during my entire tenth life, why put a stop to it now?

“No, he couldn’t. Because this partner of mine is human. And so is the child we had together.”

Congressman Marcus’ eyes open wildly and he starts shivering in fear, raising a hand to grab the door’s knob. Funnily enough, this doesn’t startle me anymore.

“Like I said, Congressman, we’ve taught this new generation of humans everything there is to know. They’re smart and as ready as they can be. It’s about time they put it all into practice,” I whisper. And with that a final wink as a goodbye, I head towards the elevator.

I never expected to be able to leave the building on my own two feet, but I do. I even manage to enter the car awaiting for me outside the window, lock the doors and drive off without no-one stopping us. Only when we pull off at a red light couple blocks from Congress, does Jared, the only person I allowed to join me today, look up at me and dares to speak.

"So? How'd it go?" he presses.

"Worse than I'd hoped, better than I'd feared," I answer the only way I can. I'm still leaning against the window, both hands against my heart, noticing its off-key beat after that experience. "But they aren't shutting down my lectures."

"That's good," Jared praises me, finally breathing out deeply now that I've given him a straight answer.

He reaches a hand to caress my knee, uncertain of such a simple affectionate gesture--that's why I immediately fix things ordering him to drive with both hands on the wheel. It is still weird between the two of us, but that's the main reason, I think, why I asked him specifically to tag along to Congress with me. Ian would have had such a terrible time waiting for me in the car; and I couldn't have concentrated on the meeting knowing he was downstairs. Same goes for Mel. Jared's the only one who I know at all times, can take care of himself and won't do anything reckless because of his feelings towards me. That made him the ideal candidate, if they wouldn't let me come alone.

"So, what did they want, if not shutting you down?" asks Jared.

"I think it was just the opposite," I confess, barely believing my words. Looking back to that now, I'm not sure anymore of what I achieved at that meeting, or if I did achieve anything at all. "I'm not sure. I'm glad it's all over now, though," I sigh.

"Anyhow, I'm sure you did great, same with your lectures," Jared encourages. "Relax for now. Whatever happens, happens."

His apparent calm is nothing but a façade, though I listen to him, craving something that'll settle my heart and mind. However, despite such positive thoughts, we do get home without any troubles to find out that neither Mel or Ian, or any of our human families for that matter, have been hurt as a means of retaliation towards me and my lectures. Plus, nobody stops me from attending college the next day; and we get daily reports from our family in the caves and in the mountains that they're not under harm's way.

Only a week after the meeting at Congress I start breathing again without looking above my shoulder and return to my usual self. I keep my lectures at college as usual--more packed, if it were possible, at every lesson. However, from that moment on I do keep tabs on the reports of inhabitants leaving and entering the Planet, confirming, surprised, what the Council told me: more and more Souls are leaving the Earth willingly, some of them my own classmates, students and colleagues. Jared, Ian, Mel, and I manage to prepare four ‘retrieving the body operation’ in the city of San Diego and take them to the caves and the mountains; but we could never afford to save every human left behind--nor are able to, nor either of our hideaways could keep them all in. We never expected this success.

And then, about two months after my meeting at Congress, there’s a worldwide televised message addressed to each and every Soul remaining on Earth. A new Decree has been signed agreed by the highest office of every State on Earth.

The broadcast takes place right when we're in the middle of setting the table for dinner. We all stop in our tracks after the very first sentences of the news, announcing the Decree, hands full of dishes, glasses, cutlery, standing in the midst of the living room as we hear with disbelieving ears the summary of said Decree. Then, the report is welcomed by outbursts of celebration, joy, congratulations and, I'll be honest, tears of bliss. We hug each other and bounce on our feet as the Decree is repeated over and over.

The summary of said Decree: encourage all Souls, though never oblige them, leaving the Earth. Upon recent changes of mind and actions worldwide, they’ve launched, should Souls want it, a special spaceship fleet to come to Earth in different waves, enough for all Souls currently living on the Earth to leave it effective immediately with no repercussions of any kind.

“Is this for real?” demands Jared some minutes in, hanging from Mel’s neck, while she keeps bouncing from one foot to the other, disbelieving.

I understand he’s weary, it cannot be easy to trust some piece of news like this one, but they’ve got no real reason not to trust it--this is legit, Souls would never announce something like this in such a public way for a rouse. That is not what my lectures were for and that's not the impression I gave to the Congress; I'd be very disappointed in us Souls as species if it turned out to be a trick.

“Trust me, I'm as shocked as you are, this is a lifetime occurrence, but yes, it is happening.” I’m buried under Ian’s weight, not that I care about that right this second--I’ve got his hands against my lips, not being able to contain my happiness.

“Bet the rest of the universe has their eyes turned to the Earth right now,” chuckles Ian.

“You wouldn't lose that bet.” I don't need to look at any records or talk to any other Soul to know that this is a one-time occurrence amongst us Souls. It might redefine what we are as species. I’m living history. Making history, actually, as Mel is so keen to remind me, hugging me with tears on her eyes.

“Thank you, Wanda. You've made this possible. We wouldn't be hearing this on national TV if you hadn't come to earth.”

“We were blessed the moment you were inserted in Mel's body, even if it was for the wrong reason,”acknowledges Jared, nodding.

I know I shouldn't be flattered or accept such uncanny words, but what in the world, it's good to receive such beautiful words from my family, and it's been long since I last considered myself a proper Soul. A condition that doesn't matter anymore, now, when it seems Souls and humans will be able to share the Earth, finally.

Clinging onto Ian, wishing not to release him for the next few days, if possible, I know we share the same thought and, a smirk on my face, I turn towards Jared and Mel. For once, I am giving up to my desires and craves--I need this. Nearly as much as Ian. We've been so stressed and worried the past few weeks--the past months--and this news does call for a celebration. A proper celebration, that is, the kind we haven't had the time or intimacy to enjoy ever since we left the caves. Too much pressure on our shoulders, the longing for Nick and our family, the fear of being caught. . . A strange and horrifying combination made it impossible for us to find the time or the stamina. Now, however. . .

“Well, what are you waiting for?” I demand. “Get the truck and go tell our family. We still haven‘t managed to get them satellite.’”

They both frown--clearly I was too subtle. Maybe I need a lesson or two myself as well, about how to properly communicate with humans, to naturally speak of some subjects that are, for me, intrinsically, taboos.

“We aren’t leaving. We want to celebrate, you’ve made this possible,” replies Mel, a bit outraged.

“That’s right, let’s have a toast,” says Jared. “Do we have champagne?”

“Guys, really, I don’t want to celebrate,” I reply sharply before Jared leaves to look for the alcohol that he most certainly will find. “What kind of celebration would that be if our whole family wasn't here?”

“And the choice is leaving you alone?” demands Mel, still not understanding it. “You can't miss classes; what do you suggest, that after hearing this, we just--?”

Ian interjects her at the appropriate time, right when I was about to die out of embarrassment. He clears his throat to put a stop to the absolutely bizarre and beyond belief conversation, more exasperated than embarrassed, as he sighs deeply for Mel and Jared's blindness and for my feeble attempt at express my feelings. Trying to cheer me up still, he rests an arm around my neck, so I can grab his hand, intertwine our fingers.

“You're missing the point. I am not planning on leaving her side. Wanda was just asking nicely for some private time so we can properly celebrate her humongous success.”

They freeze for two very brief seconds before they understand--such a human feature that it's not difficult to acknowledge. Then they start chuckling, cocking their heads, gazing at me, forcing me to look down on the floor as I blush scarlet, holding onto Ian. I could have just explained, their looks say--but they know I couldn’t have.

“Don't say another word,” says Jared, resting a hand on Mel’s back, humor in his voice. “We'll change clothes and be on our way.”

“Stay for dinner, at least,” I ask, feeling bad for throwing them out of our place unnoticed without even having something to eat.

“That's alright. Save it for yourselves, looks like you're gonna need it,” winks Mel and such a comment, that really isn’t that far from the truth, gets me blushing as usual. But instead of demanding some respect or apologies, I can move on without a big of a fuss.

“Don’t worry, we’ll stop at a motel or something,” promises Jared. “We also want to celebrate it our own way.”

“We should probably have thought about this sooner,” I whisper.

“You can’t come up with every perfect solution,” Ian shrugs, nonchalantly, as Jared and Mel hit the dormitories to get dressed. But I know what he’s really thinking--it’s not as if him and I have had many opportunities, or real reasons, to have sexual intercourses during the past months.

Over the days, news keep getting better and better. Ian joins me in every lecture, now, because we can’t just be apart, and he’d be too alone at the apartment. Surprisingly or not, I’m also welcomed and thanked at college by many, many teachers and students. The number of people attending has increased, even, parallel to the number of people signing in for leaving the Earth within the next months; no-one wants to miss my classes, that I’m willing to videotape or televise should they want me to.

It’s better and safer to stop all secrecy, really; no-one should hide their desire of wanting to leave one Planet, and this way, human bodies can be kept safely in hospitals until Healers can be sure they awake, or, rather, another willing Soul should be implanted in. And so, Denny, Burns or myself, and every other Soul who’d ‘turned’ in humans’ favor, stop being a pariah overnight and, instead, transform into a pioneer, a leader, who can talk and help every other undecided, afraid, puzzled Soul who ponder about the message and leaving, or not, the Earth. We make sure not to decide for them--we just offer arguments on both sides.

The message requires too the appearance of some human leader to agree on some peace terms and discuss the development of technologies they couldn’t learn on their own--traveling, healing, food, taking care of the environment. Though it appeared to be a problem at the beginning, Ian, Mel and Jared have no interest in staying in hiding anymore and the day after the message is broadcast I drive them off to Congress--not that dangerous as it may seem, since they were already present at my lectures at college and even taking part in the debates, clearly humans, as a request from me.

First them three, then Jeb, then multiple cells all around the globe--more than I’d dared to imagine--pop out of nowhere and in some historic events, Souls and humans finally hold meetings with each other. Public, peaceful, harmonious meetings, multitudinous from both sides, humans and Souls, with very fruitful and beneficial results. No more humans need to be in hiding--they’re not killed at sight, they’re not feared, no Souls are inserted inside into them. Before I know it, the Soul population’s decreased to a number I never thought possible; and cities are slowly, smoothly, being reoccupied by humans. Hundred percent humans, with their memories, mood, way of being, exactly as it was before.

It is agreed that within a year, all Souls who wish to do so will have left the Earth. It’s more than enough time to instruct humans every piece of our tech and advances needed so they know how to properly preserve their world--so no more Souls need to come here to save it.

One year before normal is known again, we repeat to ourselves after our meeting at Congress. Before Earth turns upside down once more and its history changes beyond imagination--or hope--after the Apocalypse. A period of time that seems too far away but at the same time, is nothing compared to the living hell most humans have suffered ever since going into hiding and running away from Souls.

Three hundred and sixty five days of rejoice and learning everything we can before we see another beginning of our lives, I whisper to Ian’s ear as another day dawns, though we haven’t slept at all tonight, due to another round of magnificent, marvelous, cheerful, congratulatory sex.

Fifty two weeks before the Earth becomes the Earth again, I whisper, holding Nicholas against my chest, as we leave the caves for the last time, headed for the life I always wanted for him. A life out in the open, not being away from or afraid of everything and everyone he should meet outside the caves; in one word, a human life.

One turn around the Sun before this Planet is ours again, we chant as we reunite with all the human cells remaining in a gigantic congratulatory festival that lasts for days, held in what used to be the capital of Netherlands, crying and laughing an exchanging survival stories of each own Apocalypse experiences and, I’ll confess, drinking as well. Old people, young people, black, Asian, African-American, even babies--an entire generation survived the invasion.

Two hundred and sixty more lectures to go, for both Souls and human, before I’ve fulfilled my Calling with bright colors, I repeat myself as we meet with our human family and settle at some apartments throughout San Diego, still quite close to each other, unnecessary, but “just in case”, the remnants of a life looking above their shoulders leaving deep marks not easily forgotten or erased.

Five hundred twenty-five thousand six hundred minutes of settling down before I know what Ian’s and everyone else’s life was like before the invasion, Ian promises me on our way of bidding farewell to one of the leaving waves, thanking the Souls for their effort and sacrifice, receiving in exchange some affectionate and enthusiastic hugs and farewells, seeking forgiveness to humans, thanking me--I’ve achieved a popularity and fame I didn’t want nor deserve--for telling them the truth; promising that in a close future, they’ll all be welcomed back.

But for now, all we want to do is enjoy this Planet that belongs to us, on our own. In peace, in joy, in harmony, in family. At our Earth.