“Space Camper?”
Myria stared at the label on the can I’d just handed her. I settled into my chair and cracked open my own before pouring it into my Pinejay tumbler. “You know, cause you’ve been camping in space for awhile?”
She rolled her eyes and took a big drink. “I am going to need a lot of these before that’s funny.”
“Well damn. Thought I was onto something.”
Her cigar lit up of its own accord and she blew a smoke-heart. “That’s something.”
“That’s just you showing off. You know they’re not good for you here. The cigars.”
She shrugged as she examined her cigar. “Something deadly. You know, as a treat. Quit staring at me.”
I was staring. The buzz had started to kick in and I was sitting next to a literal goddess. It was hard to keep being nonchalant about it. “But you’re so…perfect.”
“I just look that way right now. And it’s not really me, but a manifestation of my perfectionism. There’s still a part of my brain that demands I be flawless at all times, and so I end up looking just…a little too. Perfect.”
“The expectations of being a…deity? probably don’t help with that. I assumed you were better than us, I think that’s why I got so mad when…well…when you weren’t.”
Myria chugged the rest of her can, crushed it into a metallic sphere, and tossed it aside. “You got mad at me because I messed up, Harold. That’s how it should be. The gods, the deities, the sorceresses, the superheroes, everyone acts like they are beyond reproach. But we have consistently fucked things up because we never face any consequences.”
“Issat what you’re doing down here? Punishing yourself?”
She grabbed another can and opened it, then tapped on the label. “That’s what I was doing up there. Got real fucking lost along the way.” She said ‘fucking’ like it was a word she’d never had to pronounce before.
“Hell, I’ve always been lost. This is my…” I had to pause to count on my fingers. “…twenty-sixth appearance. You get past ten and it’s sort of frowned upon. My world did celebrate change, but it also celebrated moderation. But nothing ever felt right. This is the longest I’ve stayed in an appearance.”
“Why? There are plenty of other universes with similar or even better fleshshaping technology.”
I bit my lip. I was hoping she wouldn’t ask that. “Well, I…to be honest. Um. The way I looked when I left MCK is all I have left of it, other than this cup.”
“Oh.”
We sat in silence for awhile. Drank beers, smoked. The night enveloped us.
“My mother’s name was Seraphina. My dad’s was…was…I can’t remember. They had just arrived here. In my Shannon County, I mean. They wanted to help build something. That was Eminence. But their daughter was a lot. There was always magic on my world, that wasn’t the problem. I was just way too good at it, way too fast. My parents didn’t have a lick of magic between them, so it took them by surprise. And of course, people in town started getting suspicious. There was a fight…a fire. I watched her die.”
“Fuck.”
She fell silent again for awhile, smoking her cigar intently. “My mother would always say the line. ‘Show em how you shine, girl.’ Every day before school. Every day. She encouraged me, nurtured me. And when that was ripped away, I lost it. It just burst out of me. Raw, untethered, unspeakable power. It blew a hole in the world that became Lake Winona. I found out later it sent quakes throughout the multiverse. New Madrid?”
“Yeah, I remember reading something about that. 1811?”
“1812. I was nine. I rebuilt Eminence in their memory. Made it thrive in their memory for decades. And then everything, everything got ripped away again.”
I was probably too drunk for this particular conversation. “I didn’t realize that. So we’ve both…”
“…lost our worlds. It’s probably why I couldn’t bear to tell you about yours. I know all too keenly how painful it is.”
I nodded, a tear streaming from my left eye. “Fuck is it ever.”
