The Tale of Zaharos

Chapter 17: The kindness of strangers

(This chapter is about a lot more than the kindness of strangers and they are not really strangers but who cares? It's a cool title anyway!)

Faint sounds of birds singing were dimly registered as Axel slowly opened his eyes. He examined his surroundings as dreams were gradually separated from reality and the memories of the impossibly strange Friday settled in. He was wide awake but he decided against getting up. Elpinix would certainly ask for answers and in order to answer any questions he first had to understand what was going on himself.

Yesterday morning Veronica had more or less told him that she remembered his secret and that remembering his secret was important for solving a difficult problem. What's worse was that she had done it in front of the whole class. Then, yesterday night he had received a phone call from Veronica. She had spoken four words. No 'hi, how are you?', no building up to the reason she was calling him, just four words that spoke worlds about all the events that had come to pass and all that has yet to come. Just like she often did, with four words Veronica had said all that needed to be said, leaving him with a difficult decision and more questions than he would ever be able to answer.

'Dean has unquestionable proof,' she had said and that had been enough to sent Axel's mind reeling.

Her meaning was obvious, Axel remember her warning all too well: 'As long as humans don't have unquestionable proof of what they call impossible, they won't believe it.' What hadn't been obvious was what had to be done. Rectangle had heard the call, so when she asked, Axel had told her the truth. He had promised to be careful and he wasn't going to take any chances with the town's most well-connected person. 'Rectangle, Dean knows about us. Delete anything that seems strange or out of the ordinary for a human, but try not to leave many gaps in his memories,' he had said.
When Rectangle had asked about Veronica, Axel had ordered her not to do anything. Antonio and Elpinix had been there too, but they hadn't talked, trusting Axel to handle things. Before they had time to ask any questions, Axel had said he was tired and left, but once he was inside his room he couldn't stop thinking about Veronica's notebook. It was a long time until he finally managed to fend off to sleep.

Now he had to decide what to do next. He wanted to help and if half of what was written in Veronica's notebook was real, then this town was really going to need all the help it could get. He remembered Veronica's parting words after she had caught him looking at her notebook. Her face had paled and she had looked into his eyes for a long moment before saying, 'see you soon, I suppose.' Veronica might be the only person who could provide answers, but... Veronica had painted a quite horrible image of Eliana with her notes. There was no way that could be true. Or was there? He shook his head, trying to clear it.

He wanted to learn the truth about the magical creatures; He was going to talk to Veronica.

Axel was about to open the spaceship's door when someone knocked. Someone was standing outside. Axel paused, not knowing what to think of it.

"Rectangle, who is that?" he asked, trying to hide the fear from his voice.

"Your classmate, Veronica," Rectangle replied.

Axel was confused; how had Veronica known that he wanted to talk to her? He put the questions aside for the moment and opened the door.

"Good morning Veronica," he said in what he wanted to believe was a welcoming manner. "What brings you here?"

"The fact that tomorrow Zaharos is going to turn into a bloody battlefield which will probably have a domino effect and soon start wars all over the Earth," Veronica said in a neutral tone, walking through the door without any invitation.