The monsters seemed less interested in meeting another cosmically misplaced entity and more interested in getting out for a few hours. For beings that lived outside of time, they had a peculiar tendency toward restlessness.
“Sharon’s going to be there?” asked Vom.
“Yes.”
“I’m out then,” said Smorgaz.
“What? You guys have been bugging me for days about getting out of the apartment.”
“I don’t like her. She makes my head buzz. And not in a good way.”
“Well, I’m in,” said Vom after a bit of thought. “I can put up with the buzz if it gives me a chance to stretch my legs.”
“Me too,” said Zap.
“You don’t have legs.”
Zap glared. Sparks of lightning danced around the edges of his single giant eye. “Har har.”
“Are you sure you don’t want to come?” she asked Smorgaz.
“Pass. Don’t worry about it. I’ll keep myself company.”
He budded a full-grown spawn and plopped on the couch. “Want to get us some popcorn, buddy?”
“Why me?” asked his identical spawn.
“Because I’m Smorgaz prime.”
“That doesn’t give you the right to boss me around.”
“Have it your way.” Smorgaz prime snapped his fingers, and the clone dissolved into a puddle.
“Hey, watch the rug,” said Diana.
“Sorry.” Smorgaz budded off another clone. “Now are you going to get me some popcorn, or are we going to have a problem here?”
The clone lumbered into the kitchen.
“Have fun,” said Diana. “And clean up your mess.”
“We’ll get right on it,” promised Smorgaz.
“I call shotgun!” shouted Zap.
“I always get shotgun,” said Vom. “Right, Diana?”
“Sorry, but he did call it.”
“Ah hell.”
Vom sulked in the backseat, and Zap played with the radio on the drive to the alley.
The moon was glowing tonight. Transference from Zap had given her supernatural sight. She could perceive auras around people and objects now. Not all people and not all objects. Not even every monster she passed on the street had an aura, and the auras would sometimes disappear. Vom always had one. Zap never did. And Smorgaz prime was usually encased in a soft yellow glow, while his clones tended to be wrapped in purple.
The moon always shone like a light. Threads of luminosity stretched from the silver orb to Fenris, its eternal pursuer, who himself always glittered almost as bright. The two auras were so bright that they were a pair of virtual midnight suns. Except that the light they spread across the night sky was a prism of colors, many of which humans had not invented names for yet.
Diana was getting used to this stuff, but the night sky unsettled her. It was like gazing into a kaleidoscope that showed the end of time. She could accept that the universe was finite, but she didn’t like the idea that there were things on the other side. Horrible things. Unfathomable to mere mortal minds and to inhuman creatures like Vom and Zap alike.
Zap put his tentacles on the dashboard and looked up at the sky. “That Fenris is up to no good.”
“I could’ve told you that,” said Vom.
“It’ll happen soon,” said Zap.
“What will happen soon?” asked Diana.
He blinked. “I don’t know. It’s too hard to see it from this point in the space and time, but something is going to happen.”
Vom laughed. “You’re like a bad psychic. Could you be more vague?”
“Mock me if you must—”
“Oh, I must.
“Hardly surprising,” mumbled Zap, “considering that you are nothing but a pair of mouths on legs with the perceptual capacity of all that requires and nothing more. I, on the other hand, am a cosmic observer birthed from the very first star to bear witness to the universe.”
“Guys, can we knock off the bickering?” asked Diana. “At least for a few hours. I don’t want to make a bad impression with these people.”
The entities grumbled but agreed to do their best to play nice.
At the bowling alley Diana had to rent three pairs of shoes. They didn’t have any in Vom’s size, and Zap didn’t even have feet. But the man renting the shoes insisted. She still hadn’t deciphered how human minds transformed the monsters into something ignorable, but she’d stopped trying to figure that out.
“What am I supposed to do with these?” asked Zap.
“Just carry them, I guess,” she replied. “You have plenty of arms.”
Sharon’s monster wasn’t what Diana had expected. She’d come prepared for something bizarre, and instead found a man so ordinary that she wasn’t sure he was a creature at all. Calvin did have a weird aura, a crackle of light like tiny sparks were created as he dragged himself across the surface of reality. If she looked hard, they seemed like rips in the universe, but they disappeared almost immediately. Even these weren’t readily visible or constant. They only seemed to manifest with sudden movements.
Introductions were passed around. Diana noticed Calvin didn’t offer his hand to shake. Vom and Zap went to pick their bowling balls.
“Been forever since I bowled,” said Diana.
“We go all the time,” replied Sharon. “I’m still pretty lousy, but Calvin is fantastic.”
“She’s exaggerating,” said Calvin.
“Don’t be modest.”
He lowered his head and smiled. “I do all right.”
Vom and Zap returned. Vom had selected a thirteen-pound ball, but only after he’d eaten several others. Diana had seen him do it. She elected not to say anything. Zap’s ball was only six pounds, but he was having trouble levitating while carrying it. He might have been privy to secrets of the universe, but he wasn’t very strong.
Vom grinned. “Need help with that?”
“I got it,” Zap grunted, swaying a bit.
Calvin bowled the first frame and scored a strike.
“Whoa,” said Vom. “Looks like we have a ringer.” By the third frame Calvin had a clear lead. Vom trailed in second. Sharon and Diana ended up knocking over a few pins, competing for third place. And Zap, barely able to push his ball down the alley, had a score of three. He sat in a hard plastic chair and grumbled.
Cosmic monsters were an immature lot, mused Diana, having come to this conclusion several days earlier.
Vom offered to get some snacks, but she told him to stay put. Diana and Sharon went to the vending machines. Diana didn’t have any change. Then she discovered a handful of quarters had materialized in her pocket. As reality-altering slips went, she could live with it. She started dropping coins into the slots without much thought. Whatever she brought back would be fine with Vom.
“So Calvin is nice,” said Diana.
“Oh, yes. He’s probably the nicest guy I’ve ever met. Wouldn’t hurt a fly.”
“Hard to believe he’s one of… them.”
“I know, right? I’ve never met a guy who was so levelheaded and sweet. Maybe it’s because he’s been around forever, but he never loses his temper. And he’s thoughtful and intelligent. And funny, too, though you have to get to know him to find that out. He has some stories about the Ice Age that’ll make you laugh until your sides ache.”
