Technocracy: FIRE, Part 2

Ardo’s success at the sewage treatment plant had left him in an excellent mood. He grinned, fiercely and proudly, as he grabbed his plate of orange chicken and white rice, and even picked up an extra crab rangoon—a reward for his success. The cafeteria lady did not seem to notice, or mind.

And he surged through the crowd of students milling about the cafeteria at the start of Lunch. Many of them saw him coming, and gave him a wide berth. Ardo had a reputation in the school by now. He had had a reputation even before his hair had started turning red: his encounter at the sewage treatment plant, and the beating he had received, had branded him as somewhat dangerous, as had his fight with Terry in the halls. Now he was a freak with streaks of red in his hair: strange, crimson red, not a natural redhead shade of red at all. Many a student deliberately walked out of his way. This just made Ardo smile. It was kind of fun to be feared.

He went to the usual table. Terry, Marin, and Saera were already sitting there. “Hey, guys!” said Ardo, slamming his tray down enthusiastically. “How’s it going?”

“You’re in a good mood,” said Terry.

“I did something today I’ve wanted to do for a while,” said Ardo. “I’m in a fucking good mood.”

“I am glad,” said Saera. “Your hair is a bit redder than it was in homeroom, too.”

Ardo took three bites of orange chicken, with some rice.

Then he set his fork down, and his right fingers he snapped,

Causing a hot spark of fire that billowed into flame,

Which Ardo command of took, and modulated some,

Lowering the fire, so it stayed around his hand,

Covering his fingers and his hand in tight, low flames,

Like a glove of fire, that was worn on his right hand.

“Woooow,” said Marin, sapphire blue eyes bulging. “That’s good control.”

“I’m getting better at it,” said Ardo. “I’m really getting a handle on this… you know, this Fire thing.”

“You’re close,” said Marin.

“I am… in awe of this,” said Saera. “Marin can control water. She can control the water in pipes, she can control it in the air, she can control it in rivers and streams. That is one thing. But you don’t just control fire, you make it. You seem to make it appear from nothing at all. What does it burn? How does it burn without fuel?”

Ardo’s face contorted, and the fire on his hand

Went out suddenly—extinguished in a puff of smoke.

“I don’t know,” he said. “I don’t have any fucking clue.”

“Uh, duh,” said Marin. “It burns from you. You’re its fuel. Because you ARE Fire, and Fire IS you.”

“Me?” said Ardo.

“Yeah!” said Marin, smiling, leaning back in her chair and crossing her arms. “You’re like a… you know, a hole, an infinite well, of Fire. You’re basically infinite fire. You can make it burn even if it doesn’t have wood or leaves or paper or something like that. Because the fire burns from you, not from anything else.”

“Oh, come on, fatass,” snarled Ardo, poking at his food and forking bites into his mouth. When he had chewed and swallowed, he said, “If that were true, then you could just make water appear out of nowhere. Because you keep fucking going on about how you are Water. You could make it out of nothing, right?”

Marin took a bite out of her own food, then she smiled.

And she stretched her hand out, showing her sallow-skinned palm

As she turned her wrist around and opened up her hand,

And at once her eyes were gleaming: bright, sharp neon blue,

With those streaming neon blue tears running down her cheeks.

And the other three watched, as a stream of water fell,

Running, gushing, coursing from the middle of her palm

Sputtering and flowing down onto the table there,

Where it spattered, in a puddle that began to grow.

But Marin’s eyes stopped their neon glowing, and her palm

Then pressed down upon the puddle, and the water drew

Back into her hand from whence it came—she sucked it up.

Ardo, Saera, and Terry just stared at where the small puddle of water had been. Marin grinned and crossed her arms over her chest again, and once again leaned back in her chair. “See?” she said.

“Huh,” said Terry. “Well, I guess Marin’s right again.”

“I’m always right,” said Marin. She tossed her navy blue hair over her shoulder. “I’m the best.”

“So,” said Ardo, crossing his own arms. “I guess I can just make fire.”

“Given Marin’s demonstration, that would seem to be the case,” said Saera.

“On that note,” said Terry, “what are we going to do this weekend? We going to keep working on Ardo at my place?”

“Yes,” said Saera. Her silver eyes twitched in her pale face. “I have also had a thought.”

“Yeah?” said Marin.

“Perhaps, this time, we can meet a bit later,” said Saera. “When the sun is beginning to set, and when it is beginning to grow dark.”

“Why?” asked Terry.

“Because I have thought,” said Saera, “and it seems to me that it might be helpful, and useful, for us to build a fire. A campfire. A concentration of fire. Perhaps Ardo could make use of it.” She waved a pale hand. “We have already used the fire-building excuse once before—”

“And it was fucking great, by the way,” said Ardo. “My aunts totally bought it. They weren’t suspicious at all. They even said they’d buy me new gloves and a new coat.”

“But I think, this time, we should build a real fire. An actual fire. A concentration of flames…” Saera tapped her index finger against her cheek. “Perhaps it would serve as a focusing agent for Ardo.”

“That’s not a bad idea,” said Marin. “It was really useful to me, mentally, to have the stream and the pond down in Terry’s woods. To have all that water, right there… it was something to think about. Something to focus on. It helped me understand the true nature of what was going on with me.” She smiled at Ardo. “It will probably do the same for you.”

“Hmm,” hummed Ardo quietly, his brown face bent in thought,

Eyes just gently flickering with hints of neon red,

Like the faintest dying embers of an ancient fire,

Of a fire that has burned for hours, and is now

On the verge of going out, but now it still maintains

Some faint hint, the faintest hint, of its old warmth and light.

“Hmm,” hummed Ardo, again. “Yeah, later is probably better.”

The bell rang.

“Okay,” said Terry. “Tomorrow is Friday. Let’s tell our parents and caretakers that we’re going to make a bonfire at my place on Saturday evening. That way, we can all meet later.”

“That sounds fun!” said Marin. “I’ll bring graham crackers and marshmallows and chocolate, we can have s’mores!”

“Hmm,” said Terry. “We should be serious about this.”

“But we shouldn’t be depressed,” said Marin. “Look. Look!” The other three turned to her. “Look, this is… good. It’s good. This thing, these things that are happening to us. They’re not some big, serious mission. It’s not like some dumb job. It’s… happy.” Marin grinned hugely at them. “I feel so satisfied and so happy since what I was able to do. Since I realized my connection to Water. It’s not some terrible thing, or serious thing. It’s happy. This is a good thing for us, not a bad thing.”

“We should still treat it seriously,” said Terry.

“Well, yeah, because it is serious,” said Marin, arching a blue eyebrow. “But it’s a good serious, not a bad serious. A happy serious, not a sad serious.”

“Types of seriousness,” said Saera, speaking softly, under her breath. “Species of seriousness.”

Terry narrowed his copper brown eyes. “If you say so.”

“So we’re agreed to meet in the evening on Saturday?” said Ardo.

“Yeah, I should definitely be able to pull that off,” said Terry. “It’s not like my dad is going to care one way or the other.”

“So,” said Marin, “let’s do it. Let’s go, and let’s build a fire, to help Ardo out.”

Ardo sat in his room late at night, clad in nothing but his boxers. The heater in the house was on, but the air was still a bit cold, leaving goosebumps on his brown skin.

He thought.

Thoughts drifted, a bit black, a bit oily, through his mind. His fingers began to drift, gently, softly, down his torso. Thinking. Thinking. Thinking about the girl with long blonde hair in his Art class. The brown-skinned girl with the green eyes. That girl with the black hair and the dark eyes. Marin—

“Ugh!” he snarled, the flash of Marin across his mind shocking and unpleasant. “Ugh, not fatass.” He was revolted. His temporary heat dissipated as he remembered, all over again, how much Marin got on his nerves. He could not, could not,

Could not understand how she had got into his thoughts,

That girl, that bitch, that fatass! What was she doing there?

He got up, and walked up to his easel, where its page

Was blank, waiting for him, and he felt his body grow

Hot, all over hot, as he was nervous and afraid,

So he blazed and snapped his fingers, and on both his hands

Came the fire, so easily summoned this past week.

Ardo expertly crafted his flames into a line

Of gentle clean flames, that he touched to the paper sheet,

Burning, delicately burning on the white clean space,

Burning, touching, carving burnt brown lines into the sheet,

Tracing lines, such gentle lines, in loops and spirals there.

Ardo drew in nervousness, unsettled by his thoughts.

He was settling his mind by making artist’s lines,

For he was an artist—and his red/black eyebrows rose,

Rose, then, as that thought went bathing over him like heat,

Like the summer sun’s bright warmth, it washed over his skin,

Bathing, and it penetrated deep into his chest,

Banishing the dirty thoughts that had filled up his head,

Banishing them, as he realized: he came to see

What it was. “I AM an artist,” Ardo said out loud,

“Just like I am… I AM…” and he smiled, and he laughed,

And he breathed out smoke, and fire licked out from his lips.

The next day, the evening sun was setting as Martha and Maria pulled up to Terry’s house. The self-driving car swung into the area before Terry’s house’s walk, as the Winter sun was setting, bathing the sky in radiant, fiery orange, with hints of the deepest crimson red just beginning to filter into the depths of the Heavens. Light, high clouds could be seen, thin streamers that curved and bent.

“Pretty,” said Ardo, glancing out the window, up into the sky.

“Bernardo,” said Maria, “how late do you think you are going to stay out here?”

“It was a little unusual for your friends to want you to meet here so late,” said Martha.

“I’ll be fine, aunties,” said Ardo. “Everything’s gonna be okay. I’m feeling really good.”

And he smiled. And there was that glint, that faintest hint, of bright red neon, in the depths of his ruby eyes.

And both Martha and Maria noticed it, though each one thought it was a trick of the light. But they saw the happiness on his face. It was not a thing that was always there. They had learned to cherish it, when it came. And it had been there since Ardo had woken up, this fine cold February Saturday. And this was a happiness that they both felt they could trust.

“All right, then, principe,” said Martha. She tapped a button, and Ardo’s door slid open. “Let us know when you want us to come get you.”

“Try to be done before ten!” cried Maria.

“I will, aunties!” said Ardo, swinging his legs around and hopping from the car.

“Your friends are all here, it seems,” said Maria. Ardo swiveled. Sure enough, he could see three figures, standing in the gathering gloom.

“Yep!” said Ardo. “Don’t worry!” He swung his coat behind him, and he waved, and ran up the cold concrete of Terry’s walk.

“There you are,” said Terry, as Ardo approached.

“You’re late!” said Marin.

“Whatever,” said Ardo. “So, what’s the plan?”

“A fire, I think,” said Terry. He turned to Saera, standing tall and thin amid the shadows. “That’s right, right?”

“Yes,” said Saera. “That is my suspicion. My hint.”

“I keep a good stock of wood near the pond down in the woods,” said Terry. “I have my flint, too. We can build our fire there.” He began to walk.

Terry walked, and Ardo, Saera, Marin followed on,

Following behind him, close behind him in his wake.

As they walked the sky grew darker, as the night drew on,

And above, the first hints of the stars slowly appeared.

But the darkness came, and they began to cast in murk.

Terry knew the way; the other three were much less sure.

“Hey, fatass,” said Ardo, causing Marin then to snarl,

“Can you use those glowing eyes of yours to light our path?”

“They’re not light switches,” said Marin, glancing back at him.

Even as she said this, though, her eyes began to glint,

Shimmer that bright neon blue that shone amid the dark.

Only for a moment, though; the blue light then was gone.

“I can’t just turn them on and then KEEP them on,” she said.

Ardo growled beneath his breath. “Then I’ll do it,” he said.

And he slipped the glove off his right hand, and then he snapped,

Snapped the thumb and index finger of his bare right hand.

There was the great pulse of spark, and then the fire rose

Lighting up the space around them with its warm, hot glow.

Ardo raised his arm up, and his hand burned like a torch,

Flames billowing into the night air above his head.

“That’s handy,” said Saera, glancing upwards at the fire.

“Light amid the darkness, carried everywhere you go.”

“Huh, I guess you’re right,” said Ardo, thinking on it then,

Thinking on the images of bright light in the dark.

“Light amid the darkness,” he said, underneath his breath.

They walked on, as Terry led them down the muddy slope,

Down into the darkness of the trees, which still were bare.

Now the sky was very dark, deep purple and deep black,

As the sun had rapidly set, and its fading rays

Looked like the last embers of a fire at a camp,

Final embers, before the last bits of it went out.

All four of them now were very grateful for the flames

That burned from the torch of Ardo’s hand and fingertips.

“I don’t need that,” Terry muttered to them from the front.

“I could walk down here in the pitch blackness of midnight.”

“You know the way well, huh?” Marin said, beside him close.

“I come here a lot,” he said, “just to avoid my dad.”

A seeming-collective sigh went up from Ardo, Marin, and Saera at this, breaking the trooping silence.

“We’re here,” said Terry, as the still, black waters of the pond came into view. Marin easily recognized the space, from that strange, lovely dinner of fish, so long ago. But only a few months ago. It felt so long ago.

“So dark,” said Saera, gently, gazing up into the sky. It was, by now, pitch black, and the stars were coming out above in great report. Yet warm light, orange light, red light, played upon her back, and her hair, and her cheeks, and she turned, and smiled tenderly. “But you’re not dark, are you?”

Ardo smiled at her, happy to see her happy.

“Okay,” said Terry. He was dragging wood from the pile along the embankment of dirt where it was stored. In short order, Terry had hauled a very good-sized pile of logs into his fire pit. He arranged them, piling them up into a stack. Then he turned, and said, “Okay, Ardo, you can light them up. You’ve got the fire already.”

“What about your flint?” Ardo asked.

“I mean, I could use it,” Terry said. He smiled. “But why, when you’ve got the lighter ready now?”

Ardo hesitated, balancing on his back foot.

Something, just a tiny little thing, now held him back.

But it was not in his nature to give in to fear.

So he said, “Fuck yeah, sure thing,” and walked up to the pile,

Walked up to the fire pit, and knelt, and thrust his hand,

Into the bottom space open underneath the logs.

The flames on his fingers and his palm easily caught

Up the dry logs, and the fire blazed fast into life.

All the logs were caught up, and the fire hotly burst,

Raising up into a campfire, and even more.

Ardo pulled his hand back, yet he paused there, and he knelt,

One knee in the muddy dirt as he beheld the flames.

“Fire,” Ardo said, and watched the roaring bonfire burn,

Watched the flames go curling, billowing into the night,

Orange and red and white and yellow, blazing, crackling, bright.

Hypnotizing, beautiful, a lovely, perfect sight.

Better than a sculpture or a painting on the wall,

For the flames were stuck in place, and yet they were alive,

Moving and yet not moving, such beauty and such grace!

And as Ardo stared at them, he slowly fell in love.

Or, rather, he thought it felt that he had found a love

That had always been there, somewhere, deep inside his chest,

But that had not been alive, aware, until just now.

“Fire,” Ardo said, and poised, and slowly stretched his hand,

His burning right hand into the bonfire that burnt

Burnt, and Ardo reached into the center of the flames.

“Ardo, Ardo, please be careful,” Saera softly said.

“Don’t worry,” said Marin. “I think he knows what to do.”

“Pretty,” Ardo said, as his hand blazed amid the flames,

“Pretty, pretty, beautiful, I guess it’s always been.

I’ve always loved anything I thought was beautiful.

I like making it… I like it. I like making art.

I like making beautiful things. That is who I am.

That is what I am, it is a part of who I am.”

Now his eyes gleamed neon red, so bright amid the night.

“And the Fire is part of who I am just as much.

I am Fire, just like I an artist also am.

I AM it and it IS me, and we are all the same—”

And the blazing bonfire raced up his outstretched arm:

Fire raced and swallowed up his whole entire form!

All the fire from the campfire came off the logs,

Came off of the logs and bathed Ardo in blazing flames!

“ARDO!” Saera cried in terror, and she moved to help,

But a sallow hand latched on and sharply pulled her back.

“Let him do it!” Marin shouted, restraining her friend.

“He knows what he’s doing. Let him do what he came for!”

All the fire bent and warped and woofed around the boy,

Engulfing Ardo. And in the quiet, he stood up,

Stood, and now the fire swirled and hung about his limbs,

Hung and wrapped around him and he stood upright and spread

His arms wide—and fire burst in a huge flaming blast!

A great swell of fire that washed over all of them.

Marin, Terry, and Saera were knocked off of their feet,

As the heat bathed over them, and light blinded their eyes.

Saera’s eyelids opened first. She felt the heat, the glow.

When she opened up her eyes, she gasped in wonderment.

All the space around them in the woods about the pond

Had become a lovely realm of hanging, floating tongues

Of fire—of tongues of fire, hanging in the air,

Hovering about the air and branches of the trees

Making that small space seem an infinity of light,

Bright and loving floating candles there, amid the dark.

One tongue of the fire came to rest upon her head,

Settling upon her forehead, and as Saera looked

To the side she saw two other blazing tongues of flame

Come to rest on Terry’s forehead, and Marin’s as well.

And one final tongue of fire fell on slowly down,

Fell until it came to rest on, “Ardo!” she exclaimed.

“Yeah,” said Ardo, bathed in fire, as the tongue of flame

Sat upon his forehead as he burned and gleamed with light.

“Yeah, I knew that I could do it!” Ardo proudly said,

As he was engulfed in fire, burning head to toe,

Burning, burning all over, yet he was not consumed.

Wrapped in flames—bright neon flames! Bright flames of neon red,

That engulfed him and surrounded him with neon light.

Even his clothes were not burnt, though they were wrapped in flames.

Flames were blazing all around him, as he grinned at them,

And his hair had changed, totally changed—now fully red!

Every inch of his formerly black hair had become

Crimson red, dark, burnt, and rich, as it sat on his head,

And his eyebrows—even his eyelashes were transformed

Into crimson red, so striking against his brown skin.

And amid the darkness there were blazing neon eyes.

Ardo’s eyes shone neon, gleaming red, and what was more,

At their edges, at the corners of his eyes there burned

Neon red flames, blazing, burning up into the dark,

Up, flames of pure neon light, that shone and blasted hot,

Neon red flames from his eyes, and round his body, too.

Ardo smiled at them, and threw back his head, and laughed.

“I knew I could fucking do it!” he shouted aloud.

Then he turned, and flicked his wrist, and then the flames that burned

All around him funneled down his arm onto the wood

Of the fire pit, and once again they burned where they

Had before been, as though they had never left at all.

They lost their red neon glow and turned to normal flames,

Normal fire, hot and orange and red amid the dark.

But the neon red light and the bright neon red flames

Still burned in Ardo’s two eyes, and still Ardo was there

Smiling as his crimson red hair fell about his head.

Still, too, sat the tongue of fire, on his brown forehead.

“Is this what it felt like for you, fatass?” he asked then.

“I’ve gotta say, this is pretty COOL!” he shouted out.

“Like I’ve found something I never knew that I had lost,

But now that it’s back, I wonder how I went so long

Without having it. How did I even LIVE before?”

“Yeah,” said Marin, her own eyes now gleaming neon blue,

And the neon blue tears once again streamed down her cheeks.

“Yeah, THAT’S what it feels like,” she said, smiling, laughing now.

Saera, as she saw both of their gleaming sets of eyes,

Felt within her rise a feeling that was hot and cold,

Something that was also sharp, and also, too, was soft.

And she breathed, and as she did, upon the frigid air

Rose a wind, a howling, chilly wind that sharply blew.

Ardo turned to her, his eyes still blazing neon red,

Shining, with those neon red flames burning at eyes’ edge.

He saw Saera look at him, and then he grinned at her.

“Your turn, Saera,” Ardo said. “It’s you who should go next.”