Thunderous, Chapter Four

Candlelight and heaps of plenty had transformed Joe’s usual space-lounge into what looked to him at least like a Harvest Festival. Hamburgers of every shape and size were piled on platters atop each table, and in and out of the friendly flames his circle of supporters moved busily to their first encounters with sliced cheese and tomato ketchup and the like. Joe suspected he had overdone it, but everyone looked happy. Maybe this was some kind of consolation for his having no message from Neetra to share with them instead. Joe gazed out on those who had put their faith in him and his cause, and mustered a small sad smile.

This was the tableau Flashthunder beheld as he stepped into the doorway, Cherry by his side. One by one, faces began to turn from the comradely candles to the stark oblong of electric light in which the newcomers were framed, and a corresponding hush quickly fell. Most of the assembly consisted of Mini-Flashes, all of whom knew what a stickler for proper conduct Flashthunder was. An entrance like this was the last thing any of them had expected, but none of these youngsters’ gawping expressions could compare with the astonishment Joe evinced on sight of the slight slender boy in his brown pleated tunic quivering at the threshold of this Bohemia.

“Careful, Earthling,” Contamination said tonelessly to Joe. “He has a dangerous look.”

So this was Flashthunder. Joe for long seconds could only stand and return the stare of the Mini-Flash Neetra had known to be ready when he himself was not. Our hero had been face-to-face with rivals and potential adversaries before, but this was something different. All those furtive inquiries about him, a whole private project to know everything there was to know about Flashthunder, and yet never had he been in the boy’s presence until this minute. Suddenly it occurred to Joe that Flashthunder might have somehow found out about his prying, and was here to demand an explanation. Was he going to have to confess his insecurities in front of the whole meeting, after having already turned up with nothing to show for the occasion but hamburgers?

Flashthunder stared back, terrified. Oh, this was awful. He knew he shouldn’t have come. All these eyes on him couldn’t have been more excruciating if he’d decided to forego the tunic and strolled in here with just his pants on. What was more, why was Joe himself surveying him so strangely, in a manner so unlike anything Flashthunder had anticipated? Did he even look apprehensive somehow? Why would the single most frequently frightened Mini-Flash to have ever lived make Joe of The Four Heroes feel like that? Oh, he wished he’d never come. It was worse than when they’d had to confront all those Vernderernders amid the ruins of the Arcology. It was worse than finding that giant space-slug in the storage-hold. Actually no, it wasn’t quite as bad as the space-slug.

Flashthunder guessed he’d better be the one to say something though, seeing as Joe obviously had no plans. So in a voice which trembled but stayed more or less under control, he blurted forth:

“This doesn’t mean I’m joining. Advice is advice. But Cherry wanted to come, has business with you I believe.”

“Then you are our honoured guests,” Joe said at once, sounding to Flashthunder somehow relieved. “None follow my cause under compulsion, nor for any reason other than their choice. Please,” he added, inviting the visitors to sit. Cherry remained standing while Flashthunder took his place at table, and Flashtease hurried over with burgers for them both.

“Not too highly seasoned,” that one assured his friend, who he knew to be a fussy eater.

“Thanks,” ventured a somewhat awed Flashthunder, to Flashtease, to Joe, and to the lounge in general. As he did so he found it was not only the polite thing to say, but that he meant it too.

“And should either of you desire to one day be a greater part of what it is we do here,” Joe continued, still with that odd note of caution Flashthunder didn’t understand, “then know there will ever be a place for you.”

“We will,” Flashthunder promised. “We’ll bear it in mind. Both of us will. Very happy together, Cherry and I.”

There was a forced robustness about the tremulous tones, and Joe was not oblivious to it. His attention lingered curiously a little longer on this Mini-Flash in his midst, though he was also starting to smile. Some sort of unspoken reconciliation had apparently come to pass. It was time to stop asking around, anyway. For if Flashthunder was prepared to make such a declaration that Neetra was behind him, then Joe’s respect for the gesture was due.

Most of the attendees by now had shifted their focus to Cherry, some because of her mysterious purpose which Flashthunder had alluded to, and some because of her beauty, and others because this known name at the drive-in and Mini-Flash nightclub had never before graced one of their humble gatherings. She was the most famous person thus far to attend. Joe had saved the galaxy, but he came every week, and Cherry was a pop-star.

“Cherry, I’ve got so many questions,” Petunia enthused. “First, do you think I’ll ever make the big time like you, and actually that’s my only question.”

Cherry’s smile was radiant, indulgent, courteous. Then paying her fans no further heed she walked to the jukebox. Unlike her boyfriend, Cherry knew exactly what to do when all eyes were on her, and no click of her heels nor any swish of her celestial locks would have failed to silence a packed auditorium. She made her selection, turned back around, and her dark eyes pinned Joe with a most significant stare as the first strains of music began to play.

It was the song. There was no mistaking it. Next moment our hero was on his feet, returning in bewilderment Cherry’s level gaze.

“This era? And this galaxy?” he exclaimed. “That to which we are listening now should not rightly be! How were you able to achieve this?”

Joe’s followers were baffled to a man likewise, but in their case it was by his reaction.

“You mean the song?” cried Flashtease. “It’s one of Cherry’s old ones. I thought you knew! You’ve been singing ever since Eshcaton!”

But even if it was not a chart-hit from 2596 as Joe had assumed, that still left one conspicuous impossibility for his mind to grapple with. For he had been correct about the feelings associated with the song, all of which were now awakening in him under its full instrumental arrangement. More than sentimentalism, more than that species of fond reminiscence on an absent loved one for which any suitably wistful composition would serve. The rhythm of these throbbing chords pulsated with memories of love as a lived experience, love physically communicated in ways Joe had only lately learned to do. Nor was he much yet on talking about it, but he saw well enough that this was never going to make sense without some attempt at putting the enigma into words.

“Only after Neetra and I parted,” Joe began slowly, “did I venture to your galaxy’s civilized regions. Prior to that, the foul domain of Empress Ungus was the sum of my acquaintance with this sector. No opportunity exists whereby I might have learned such a song, or been familiar with it during my last hours in Nottingham. How could it remind me of Neetra thus? Unless…”

To the girl he never met before tonight Joe continued in a whisper, while the truth emerged before him concurrent with his speaking it aloud.

“It was you,” he breathed. “At that time, you were singing the song. And somehow, through Neetra perhaps, I heard you. Even as she and I cherished our final moments together…!”

“Please, human, people are trying to eat,” put in Contamination.

And no sooner had Joe made contact with Neetra since then, no sooner did he glimpse that model starship on its shelf in the temple on Eshcaton, than he picked up the song right where it left off. At last Joe understood why. Not himself, not Dylan, not Flashthunder, and not any member of the Neetkins family. It was Cherry Neetra had looked to, Cherry who through the mysterious connection they had forged became party to Neetra’s most treasured secret, that which she had shared with Joe, and from which a certain intergalactic serenade was now and forever inseparable.

The girl in question killed the juke and set off towards our hero. He, moving as if the tune had lulled him into a trance, brought out the miniature Daylight Jewel and laid it gently on the table. A heartbeat later guests and regulars and host alike were packed into a mass about that spot, hamburgers forgotten, as the lounge held its breath as one. Cherry stooped so her lips were over the sapphire orb, and into the silence softly sang.

The Daylight Jewel’s wings sprang out from their housings within the rim. And then its dome began to open.

NEXT: 'NEETRA'S MESSAGE'