Chapter XXII: WLAV

Chapter XXII: WLAV 

“Next!” Serge yells. A stumbling, blue Galaxian with white eyes reaches around, finds and sits in the chair. “Who- what?” He pages Gorgon, who shows up a few minutes later. “Explain.” 

“Hi, what’s your name?” Gorgon asks the alien. 

“Wlav, Division 2, Ship Number-” 

“No, we don’t need to do that anymore, if you were told differently, then they either haven’t gotten my orders or are ignoring them. So, Serge, Wlav here, is blind. In our species, when the toxin doesn’t mix with the blood during the tadpole stage, the blood stays blue, and in most cases, blindness. About one out of every 1,000 is born with this condition. However, there is an upside: their sixth sense is activated to replace the lost sense of sight.” 

“You’re telling me that Wlav here is psychic?” 

“Would you care to demonstrate? Watch this, Serge, there are many variations of psychic abilities, let’s see what Wlav is hiding. Her eyeballs rotate, as a large, black circle crosses them. She disappears. 

“Up here.” She says from the ceiling. Serge and Gorgon look up, and see her sticking there. Her eyeballs spin again, and she reappears in the chair. 

“Interesting.” Serge says. 

“I can only do it in an immediate area, like, I can’t even teleport outside, just within this room.” 

“I can fix that. Also, how about I install sonar to your occipital lobe, so you know who’s around you. Or, I could implant them onto your eyeballs.” 

“I’ll take the brain surgery.” 

“Welcome aboard, Wlav. Gorgon, interviews are done for today. Tell anyone left to go back to the lodge and wait until tomorrow. I didn’t realize so many people would be interested in this.” 

“Well, you did offer a sweet deal.” Wlav says. 

“Well, we’re almost at our goal number. Wlav, if you want, I can perform that surgery for you now and give you a chance to test it out.” 

“Sure!” Serge pages Nyvar and she’s at his lab when he gets there. They perform the surgery, and Wlav wakes up. “Woah, all I see is two big green dots, and a smaller green dot moving around.” 

“Green dots are friendly, yellow dots are wild animals, and red dots are enemies. The larger the dot, the closer to you they are.” 

“Why are there sticks pointing out of the large dots?” 

“That means you’re close enough to grab us.” Serge extends his hand for a shake, and Wlav shakes his hand with precision. 

“Wow, this is amazing! So now that I know what green is, how will I know what red and yellow are?” 

“That’s why you’re going to go out and give your new powers a spin with ol’ Ballester.” 

“I’m excited!” 

“First, see if you could teleport outside and then back here again.” She rolls her eyes, and disappears. Serge looks up at the monitor and sees she landed in a tree. She rolls her eyes again and appears at the lab. “You landed in a tree.” 

“I know, I guess I need to work on that. By the way, I saw a light shade of the nothingness I usually see.” 

“That’s gray. That indicates obstacles. They show up in the shape of their stereotypical roles. Squares and rectangles are buildings, triangles are trees, anything else will show up as a messy blob.” 

“I’m sure I can figure it out.” Serge pages Ballester, who shows up a few minutes later. 

“What’s up, boss?” He asks. 

“Got a new recruit for you to train. Ballester, this is-” 

“Arizona, call me Arizona.” She says. 

“Why Arizona?” Ballester asks. 

“In the five years I’ve been on this planet, specifically in this country, I’ve come across many names and words, and for some reason, the word Arizona jumped out at me, and for some reason I fell in love with it.” 

“Arizona is so...hot and dry, and it’s down south.” 

“Exactly. Do you know how many Galaxians are immune to our scent? All of them. Because we don’t secrete the toxin necessary to attract a mate, we’re more or less stuck with each other, and since our condition causes sterility, we can’t make more.” 

“I was...just saying that Arizona is pretty much desert...how did that turn into that?” 

“If you knew what it was like, you’d understand.” 

“Maybe you could settle with a human. I’m sure you’ll find one that won’t mind.” 

“I guess I’ll give it a try, but I’m not thinking about that right now, I have a war to train for, are we leaving any time soon?” 

“As soon as you’re ready, Arizona.” Arizona starts navigating the building with precision. 

“Wow, I can see doorways and everything, this technology is impressive!” 

“We’re almost outside, he can’t hear you anymore.” 

“Yes I can, remember?” I remind him. 

“Oh. Yeah.” Ballester says. 

“What’s wrong? Who was that?” Arizona asks. 

“God. He and Serge are linked.” 

“So, he can see everything we do?” 

“Yeah, and he can make you do anything, so don’t piss him off.” Ballester says as he drops his pants and starts jerking his dick. “See? Like that, I had no intention of pulling my dick out.” He says as he puts it away. “He’s an a*****e.” 

“I love you too!” I tell him. 

“F**k you.” 

“That’s crazy, you know your god is real, you interact with him, and you hate him?” Arizona asks. 

“Yes.” 

“So, where are we going?” 

“There’s a section of woods Serge has reserved for training purposes.”  

“I see a small cluster of red dots getting bigger as we get closer.” 

“Scotts.” 

“Wait, now they’ve changed color.” 

“To what?” 

“I don’t know.” 

“Probably went from yellow to red.” 

“Ah, that makes sense.” 

“Because Scotts are like wild animals, they show up yellow until you’re close enough.” 

“They’re getting closer, are they attacking?” 

“Yup, if it’s flashing, they’re attacking.” She notices a stick coming out of the red dots. She grabs the Scott in that direction, picks him up, and slams him head first into the ground, killing him. “Nice.” 

“Why am I so strong?” 

“Everyone gets a strength boost with their experimentation. I’m the only one who can lift million pound barbells, though.” He kisses his biceps. 

“Oh please, shut the f**k up and help me.” 

“Not my job. My job is to supervise, and so far, you’ve only killed two out of ten.” A Scott comes running towards Ballester, who shoots him in the head. “C’mon, I can’t do all your work for you.” He caps another one. “Now we’re tied, let’s go!” Arizona grabs a Scott, teleports with it to the roof of the barn, and hurls him to the ground. She grabs another Scott, and ends up teleporting him to the sky above them, he splatters when he hits the ground. 

“I can teleport others? I’ve never been able to do that before!” 

“Guess Serge really adjusted your psychic abilities, knowing him, he amplified them.” She teleports one Scott inside of another Scott, making the outer Scott explode, and she transfers that Scott in the air. 

“Shoot!” Ballester shoots the Scott in the air as if he were shooting skeet. The Scott explodes and rains blood and entrails on them. “Ok, we’re tied, I gave that one to you.” Another Scott shows up out of nowhere. “I have an idea, watch this.” She teleports one half of Scott on one end of the field and the other half at their feet. “Cool! I was wondering how I was gonna use teleportation offensively.” 

“Welcome to the team, Arizona.” 

“Glad to be here, that was fun!”  

“Alright, let’s head back to the lab and give your progress report.” 

“Ugh, sounds boring.” 

“It is, but it doesn’t take long.” They head back to Serge’s lab. 

“So, how’d it go?” Serge asks. 

“Oh please, you already know how it went.” Arizona says. 

“Excuse me?” 

“Your buddy Ballester told me everything, you know that too.” 

“You’re good, you’re very good. Still, I wanna hear YOUR perspective, that’s the point of these progress reports.” 

“Ugh, fine. I found out I can teleport other people, and I can also use it to rip a hole in space/time to sever body parts with.” 

“See, now was that so hard?” 

“Can I go now?” 

“Just tell me first, did you enjoy it?” 

“Yes, I’ve never felt so powerful before. After a lifetime of feeling helpless, I finally can do something positive for the world! Thanks for upgrading my powers. Serge.” 

“You can call me ‘boss’, or ‘Ultimate Ruler’, but you haven’t earned the right to call me Serge.” 

“I’m- I’m sorry, boss.” 

“It’s a’ight. Tell your blind friends, I’ll hook them up too.” 

“Uh, ok, thanks?” She leaves. 

“So, do you think she’ll make a good addition to the team?” 

“Oh hell yeah! Once she figured everything out, she was unstoppable!” 

“Good, if all goes right, we can have an army of her kind.” 

“Taking all the help we can get, huh?” 

“Basically. But, it depends on the individual.” 

“How?”  

“I place people based on their skills, just because someone wants to be something else depends on whether or not they can. For example, tough, muscled, ex military will be under your supervision. If a wimpy guy wants to join your division, I can’t, his increased muscle mass will only equal that of a normal muscular guy, so I’d have him in the office filing papers or something. If we really, really need him to fight, I will, but it’ll be harder for him to keep up with you than your altered soldiers.” 

“So what if a disabled with missing limbs or a bum walk or something wants to help?” 

“I just gave a blind woman a job, I can do anything through the Lord Scorpious, remember?” 

“All right, whatever, I’ll see you in the morning for the next round of interviews.” 

“Yeah, I guess it’s getting kinda late.” He walks over to the loudspeaker and makes the announcement: “Attention! This concludes today’s round of interviews. Screening will continue tomorrow, and remember to save your spot, otherwise you’ll gonna have to wait longer.” A collective groan comes from the crowd outside. Ballester makes his way back to his room. 

“Hey babe.” 

“Hey, how’s it going?” Gorgax asks. 

“Some promising talent is coming through.” 

“Any of my species?” 

“Yeah, as a matter of fact, I didn’t know anyone blind could be a good warrior.” 

“It’s their sixth sense.” 

“I know! I have a good feeling about the upcoming battle!