Salience

Chapter 1: The Crash

With a keen grin filled with malice, a silhouetted figure watches a sedan travel down Highway One. A mother and son are enjoying the weather after a day of shopping. They’re telling jokes back and forth to see who will become embarrassed first.

“When does a joke become a mom joke?” she asked.

“When you tell it?” he asked back.

“When it becomes apparent!”

“Ahhh, that’s so stupid!” he said giggling and rolling his eyes. “What do you call an angry carrot?”

“Hmmm, carangy?” she said.

“Steamed veggie,” he laughed.

“What do you call a boomerang that doesn’t come back?”

“Broken.”

“A stick!”

“What do you call a pig that practices karate? MOM!” he shouted.

A bright blur of color flashed before them crashing in front of their car. Screaming as their car began somersaulting through the air scattering oil and debris. Their car lands in a perfect gymnast pose before toppling over leaving the mother crying for her son.

“Acher, Acher, ..Acher, …Ach–er,” she said weakly. Her once bright sapphire eyes now look a dull gray searching for Acher. Their eyes met for a moment before she gasped one final time. Acher reached for his mother, his arm vibrating with purpose unable to reach her hand. It seemed the world itself was holding him down and a shooting pain climbed into his chest.

“Mom! No no no, MOM! HELP!” he screamed. He looked into her eyes searching for a sign of life or hope only to find nothing. A blank stare. The heat in his chest grew as he reached for her hand, the hand that soothed him when he was sick. The hand that carried him up the stairs after a long day. A hand that said, “You are not alone in this world, you will always have me”.

“Please, Mom, just reach for me. Mom! I’m coming! Almost there,” he said.

The world grew dim for Acher as he touched the fingertips of his mother. Thrashing about he moved as if in a swamp surrounded by sludge. A blinding light hit his face and stole his focus. A bright blue-orange figure stood amid the light as he pulled him out of the wreckage.

“This kid needs a hospital stat or there will be more than two casualties today. Runbun, can you get him there safely?” The bright blue-orange man asked.

“Roger that Shooting Star, I’ll have to go a tad bit slower to make sure the metal rod doesn’t tear more through his body,” she explained. She picks up Acher carefully into her arms bending forward then launching herself at an incredible speed. Leaping gracefully through the forest and highway roads, she arrived at a hospital closest to the crash site. A medical team was already outside waiting for their patient, they quickly glided his body onto the stretcher and rush him into the emergency room. Runbun talked with the team about the final details and looks sadly at her outfit, her once nice brown pantsuit-style outfit is now covered in the blood of a child. She took a moment to squat down, rub her temple, take a deep breath, stand, and return to the crash site.

Doctors were hard at work by the time Acher’s father arrived with his daughter. One hour after Acher's arrival, things were looking grim. One of the medical team doctors tried to explain the situation to his father.

“Sir, your son is in critical condition. He lost a lot of blood, though the surgery to remove the metal rod went well. Due to the impact of the crash and the delivery method your son has internal hemorrhaging to his organs. At this point, there isn’t much we can do and the likelihood of his survival is very slim. Uh, there is something we’d like to try, but, we need your permission. It’s a new stem cell research drug to help rebuild the human body at incredible speeds. The problem is that it’s very new and in the alpha stage, so we are unsure about side effects or whether it would work. The drug itself may even kill him. What would you like to do?”

Acher’s father grabbed his chest and stroked his stubbly beard. He paced back and forth with tears tracing his steps. His daughter clung to his leg like a koala bear sobbing onto his pant legs.

“There’s no other way?” he asked.

“None that we can foresee for the moment, sir”

“Without this, he’ll die?”

“It’s too hard to tell, but we believe his best chance of survival is with the trial drug,” the doctor said.

His pace became increasingly fast and his daughter fell from the frantic changing of directions. His gaze followed from the floor till their eyes met releasing a choked agreement to the drug. The doctor grimacingly nodded their head and left to continue the operation. The next few hours were torture for Acher’s father and little sister. No one knew what would happen and his vital signs remained steady without improvement. The whispers of the nurses saw this as a good sign at the very least.

Acher’s father, Colton, was in a chair with his head lying against the wall with his daughter, Astrid, cuddled up into his neck. She breathed slowly while her dreams took her far away from reality as a doctor approached them. She wiped her brow before addressing Colton, “Sir….” she whispered, “Sir, it’s about your son.” His eyes flicked into reality taking a moment to adjust to his surroundings remembering the horror of the day, he stared at the nurse in stillness.

“Yeah?” he asked.

“Your son is stable and miraculously has healed completely, we are going to monitor him for a little while longer but you may take him home today. A nurse will be by to finish up the paperwork. I’m sorry that we couldn’t save your wife but we are happy that we could be there for your son and your family,” she said as she touched his shoulder softly. That touch would linger momentarily as the words of wife hit his ears. No longer would he have one, his love and his life had vanished.

The drive home was the longest drive of their lives, nothing ever felt as far of a stretch as the road home did. Silence covered the air as blank stares and whispered sobs stained the car. When they arrived at their house, Colton immediately put the car up for sale, Astrid ran to her room, and Acher lay in the car, closing his eyes willing himself to reach his mother. Every time his eyes closed he could see her face looking through him with her cold eyes, knowing those were her final moments burrowed further into his mind. Tears streamed down his face knowing she would never come home. Colton stood beside the car as the sun began to rise and the day was beginning as if their tragedy was nothing but another moment passed. The birds sang a happy tune and Acher covered his ears. His father ushered him into the house and there Acher lay on his bed staring at the ceiling, knowing that the world would continue without his mother. Why was she taken away? Because some Salient Person crashed in front of their car. He took his pillow punched it as hard as he could and screamed until the whole room shook.

“I hate them, I hate them all! Stupid ass SP’s. They think they’re above the world. So mighty with their special powers while we normal people suffer from their bullshit abilities. I wish they would all die!” he continued his rant while his father shuffled in the kitchen taking out a bottle of whiskey and filling his glass. He finished the glass in three major gulps, numb to the burning sensation, and poured another, retreating to his bedroom.

Acher walked to his sister's room, looking to see if there was movement or not. She was asleep, she’d never admit it but she snores softly like their mother. He remembered the times they would sleep on the couch on weekends playing tag with their snores. Their mother snored so loud once that it woke both of them up and they wouldn’t say who caused it for the life of them. Wrapping each other together they would slowly fall asleep telling one another not to snore so loud because ladies don’t snore and the joke wasn’t funny. He sat down beside her bed listening to the melodic sounds of her breath as he cried into his knees. Never get to see her grin at his dumb jokes he spent more time than he should researching how corny they could be. He felt his childhood slip away in a moment. Who would he become now? What would he do in her absence? Would anything be okay after this? His thoughts swirled with questions about the past and the future. The room around him grew dim and his dreams took over. Though dreams would have been more welcome, these were more of reliving the moments over and over. He had to stare at his mother's eyes again as they faded. This time he wouldn’t reach her hand and she would be yanked away from him and discarded like common trash. He fought the SPs that pulled him out of the car, their eyes glowing red and bloodlust covered the air. He knew he was going to die and that the SPs enjoyed their torment against him. He gasped out loud finding himself lying under his sister’s bed with a pair of feet looking at him.

“Why are you under there?” the voice asked.

“I’m not sure how I got here?” he said.

“That isn’t fully true is it?”

“Well, I woke up like this.”

“But you know that deep down you wanted to hide.”

“Shut up, I’m not hiding, I was sleeping and then I was under here,” he said.

“Things will change and you will know why. Don’t hide from it. Embrace it,” the voice said.

“Leave me alone, I don’t want change, I want my mom,” he said.

“Change is inevitable. As for your mother, who said I am gone?” she said.

“Mom?” he asked. He crawled from under the bed to find his mother standing before him.

“But how?” he asked tilting his head to the side.

“You see me because you want to see me, so, here I am,” she said.

He reached for her finding himself moving through her ghost-like body. His eyes swelled and he tried again with more speed and intention. Nothing. Her eyes frown and she gets down to her knees.

“Son, I need you to know that the world is unfair but you have to move forward. Not just for me but for our family. They need you and you don’t know it yet but many others will need you too,” she said.

“I don’t care, I just want you back,” he cried.

“I know son, but that can’t happen, it’s unfortunate but I need you to know that I love you and that you are more than you give yourself credit for. Smart, strong-willed, kind-hearted, and most importantly my son. Now it’s time for you to wake up and live your life. I will always be here for you even though it might seem that I am far away. Take care of your father and your sister for me. I love you dear, I will always love you,” she said as tears fell down her face.

“No! I’m not ready for you to go! Wait wait wait wait, please. I don’t want you to go,” he yelled.

“Life is a mystery my dear and now you must solve that mystery as to why and what you will do because of it. I know you will find the right answer,” she said.

“But I don’t want any of this.”

“I didn’t want to leave you either my son or our family but this is life. I must go. Be strong. Tell your father and sister I love them dearly,” she said. Her form became more transparent as the light faded from the room. There Acher stood, alone, his sister's snores again singing to him. Real or not Acher turns to his sister and whispers, “Mom said hello and she loves you.”