Headlights(117)

The scream so bright, it calls to the creature. It reminds the creature of what want is. Of need. The light calls it. It needs to go to the light. It wants— It shakes itself awake.

It follows. Hunts. Searches.

It chases the sound, the bright searing light, across planes, dimensions. Worlds. Universes. Consciousness. It takes a moment, it takes a century.

The scream keeps calling, pulling at the creature.

Want. Need. Light.

And …

There.

Somewhere in the great expanse. In a universe in a galaxy on a planet. A pinpoint, nearly invisible to it at first.

SCREAM.

That light shining so bright.

The source of the light is small.

So small. This tiny, terrified thing. Its pain so bright and loud, That it ripped a hole between dimensions.

A little being in a dwelling of many doors. Orange, yellow, white. Color, and light.

The little boy shine, shines, SHINING his pain.

A scream that crossed existence.

The creature wants. Needs.

The creature pulls itself to the planet, to its plane. Steps through the hole between dimensions, makes itself very small to watch.

Boy. Little boy. That is what they call it in this world. The little one who screamed. Boy. The creature knows this, it remembers or learns.

The boy is gone from the orange glowing dwelling with many rooms and many inhabitants, but his scent is still there. The light from the scream is there. The hole he ripped is there. The blood of the boy’s mother is there.

And the creature understands.

Want. Need. Pain.

It takes what it can of the boy, learns what it might. The boy’s genetic material on an item it one day learns is called a brush. The boy’s shed on the brush called hair. The creature shrinks back through the hole, into the great infinite night. But it watches. Learns. Always notes where the shining boy is, where the light moves.

It watches as the boy goes to a new family. New dwelling, a thin place, a place the creature can watch him through. Not quite the hole the boy ripped in the orange-yellow motel—it learns it is called that—but … the creature can watch him there. Feel him. Whileago Manor, they call it.

The creature watches the boy grow. It is very fast, this growing. A blink of an eye. The creature doesn’t understand this earth and these beings, but it wants to learn. It wants and needs. Intense want, staggering. It thinks that maybe it has been to this planet and dimension before, long ago. But it was so different. Open land, space. Now it is crowded, too full.

It watches the boy. Doesn’t want to leave him. He shines, shines, shines in his pain. The creature can smell it, taste it, feel it in every atom.

The boy grows, leaves. The creature can’t find him. It can’t move easily in this physical plane. Not with the concrete and buildings and roads and sidewalks. Can’t move far beyond the hole. It doesn’t understand this, but it tries. It can’t find another way in from the other side, there is only the one hole the boy ripped. And it can only move so far.

It waits for the boy to return, and it learns about humans, about all species of this world. It learns it can enter their minds and bodies and experience life, can walk through them. But still, not far from the hole. Not past too much concrete and road and building. It walks as prairie dog and mountain lion and field mouse and dragonfly. It experiences life. As every kind of creature. It watches and walks this earth, steps into it, and it feels …

Such want. Staggering, overwhelming need.

This is home now. This is the boy’s home, and the creature is tied to him. The light so bright. The need in the creature.

The boy might one day return. Must one day return. The creature searching, always waiting for that shine. Craving it, tasting the air and scenting for it.

And the humans pour more concrete. Dig deeper trenches. Build more dwellings. The animals are restless. The earth is restless. The creature decides.

It calls this place home now and will protect its home however it can.

VOOM.

The boy returns. He is a man now. Grown human. The creature sees in his mind, understands. Violence. War. Blood and Pain and Fear. But the boy has love too now, a mate. He has a new dwelling, with his mate. Near enough to the others that the creature expands its territory, stretches to monitor all their places.

But it feels …

The territory is not well.

Crowding. So much crowding, building, pushing in, threatening their range.

Animals, dying. Earth out of balance.

The creature tries to talk to the humans through words, stepping into other humans, trying to speak to them, but their language doesn’t make sense to it. It tries to speak with them through feelings, through sleeping thoughts. It tries to walk through other animals and communicate.

The boy is the only one who shines so bright, who might understand the creature. But the boy cannot hear. Does not want to hear. All he sees and hears and feels is pain, violence, fear. He doesn’t want to hear anything else, wants only to look at his pain. Again, and again.

So, the creature thinks, the creature wants and needs, and maybe …

Pain. Violence. Fear.

Maybe that is how the humans communicate. Maybe that is why they keep pouring concrete and digging out the earth, killing, causing pain violence fear to the other animals here.

The boy thinks only of his pain. Maybe it is what will make them understand.

The creature hatches a plan.