Excerpt: Faceless

“There isn’t anything to explain!” Dannon struggled to keep his tone low and respectful to some degree. “He knows nothing of history or how to handle artifacts of what that could even be possible or capable of doing if it is anything like what he is trying to convince that poor boy!”

“Possible or capable?” Adrian repeated. “I’m not sure I follow you at all.”

“What do you want me to say?” Dannon snapped, he was quite near the verge of explosion.

Craven stifled a laugh. “My dear fellow and our esteemed High Master, rest assured, Floyd knows what he is doing, he is merely having a bit of fun at our expense for not following what I’m sure he believes is his brilliant train of thought and Benjamin has provided quite an interesting angle to this mystery statue.”

“What angle?”

“He can sense the statue.” Craven said, simply. “How, I wouldn’t know as I couldn’t possibly explain his gift, but he knows something or the other and now Floyd is convinced beyond a doubt that the statue is alive.”

“That’s because I am alive, you blockhead!” The new voice was annoyed and laced with a tinge of contempt, apart from being decidedly feminine. “Would you all just shut up and be quiet? You’re giving me a horrid headache and I’m sick of them! I have had plenty of headaches and chattering and noise and everything, if you all don’t shut up this very minute-”

“You’re alive!” Floyd stared at her, the color slowly draining from his face. There was no emotion registered on it, except for one. Shock.

The girl statue fixed her white marble eyes on him with what could have been a glare. “Yes, Mr. Obvious, I am alive. Can we please move past that?” With movements too fluid and seamless for a creature of her kind, the girl statue swung down and off the trailer. She landed unsteadily and her attention immediately shifted to her feet. “Oh my-” She stopped in mid sentence. “Stars and sterlings.” Her fingers traced a shape on her shoulder as if apologies for the confusing exclamation.

She stared at her feet for a good long moment and then turned, craning her neck to see over her shoulder. “I don’t believe this!” Her voice rose to a high pitch. “Which one of you idiots tried to put me back together?” Her head gave a sudden shake. “no, don’t answer that, I don’t want to know that, at least not right now. But I am curious, exactly how many of you are blind?”

There was a moment of silence.

Her mouth dropped open. “Bieria, help me.” She muttered. “Don’t tell me, you’re all blind, mute and deaf.” Her head snapped to the side. “Except for you.” She nodded towards Floyd. “I know you can speak, tell me, are you the one I have to thank for this?”

“To thank for what?” Floyd found his voice quite easily, curiosity now getting the better of him. “What’s wrong?”

“Wrong?” The girl fairly shrieked. “I’ll give you a clue! These aren’t my legs!” Skinny arms waved wildly, in spite of their rocky nature. “And this isn’t my butt! My butt is not this big!” The arms continued to wave wildly. “My outfit’s all mixed up because you couldn’t put the bottom half of me together? I was wearing a uniform, for crying out loud!” Her hands clenched into fists. “And don’t get me started on my elbow! My left elbow! It sticks out, it always has and you give me two of them that match? What is wrong with you people? And this face…I’m sure you ruined my face…”

“How can you tell your face is wrong?” Floyd interrupted. “You haven’t even seen it yet.”

“It feels wrong.” The girl said, scathingly. “And I don’t care! It couldn’t possibly be right, because if you’ve got all of this wrong, then my face is definitely not my face!” She gave a slight twirl. “Ugh! My balance is awful and…ohhh…” Another moan. “Now I have to limp! My steps are gonna be so off and you’re just…what is the matter with you people?”

“Are you through yet?” Floyd asked, politely.

“No! I’m not!” She ran her fingers over her face and paused at her ears. “Neck’s right. Head’s right. So’s my ears. You can get that right and mix up everything else.”

“Actually.” Floyd bit back a smile. “I’m just impressed that you haven’t realized that you’re missing something.”

“Missing what?” Her head snapped up to look at him, worry immediately etching into her stone features. “What’s missing? How do you know something’s missing?”

“Well…the great big hole in your-” Floyd looked away as he lightly drew a mark on his chest.

Her head dropped down and scream left her lips. “Oh. My. Heart!” The screech was enough to cause a wince to all within a hearing radius. “My heart’s missing! How could someone take my heart! What did you do with it? Did you take it?” She lunged for him, missing as he dodged to the side.

“I didn’t take it!” Floyd ducked as she swung at his head. “and I don’t know who took it.” His arms came up to grab her wrist and they tussled for a few moments, before she jerked back, causing him to stumble forward after her. She was much stronger than she looked.

“Young lady.” Adrian’s cool voice cut through them. “Would you mind telling me your name and what you think you are doing?”

She whirled around with a punch that caught him in the right side of his jaw, flooring him. The white marble eyes opened wide. “Oh my goodness! I didn’t mean to hit you…well, maybe I did, but not quite on purpose.” She stared at him, now sprawled on the ground. “Are you all right?”

“I feel as if I have been hit by a-” Adrian bit back the word, being careful to move slowly. “I don’t believe we’ve been properly introduced, but-”

“Here, lemme help you up.” She reached down, caught hold of his collar and jerked him upwards to his feet. Her nose wrinkled. “You’re weird.” She turned on her heel, attention already refocusing on Floyd. “What’s your name?”

“Floyd.”

“Floyd? What kind of a name is Floyd?”

“My mother’s favorite.” Floyd shot back, a faint smile playing about the corners of his mouth.

“Oh. Well, nothing against your mother, then. I mean, I don’t know her, so I can’t really…I mean, Floyd?”

“Yes?”

Her head shook at once. “No, I meant, really, Floyd?”

“Yes?” He repeated.

“Shut up!” The annoyance was returning. She sighed. “I need to wear something… I feel really…” Her voice trailed off and she finished with another word. “Weird…do you have like, an extra shirt or something?”

“A shirt?”

“I don’t really care to wear like a mountain of clothes, or anything that weighs more than a half pound.”

“A half-pound?” Floyd repeated.

“I’m a statue, in case you haven’t noticed.” She shot back. “I don’t really have to worry about what I wear…just the fact that I have the right arms and legs. Where’d you find me anyway?”

“I’d be happy to tell you if I knew your name.”

“You don’t really want to know my name.” She tossed her head. “I won’t tell you my name, because I know that you don’t really want to know. But if ya gotta call me something, because you’re like, so incredibly polite, than can I please have a shirt? I cannot just waltz around the place with a giant hole in my chest!” She let out a frustrated breath. “And you can call me Phoria, that’s what my mom calls me.”

“Phoria…that’s pretty.” Floyd smiled. “I’m sure I could find you a shirt-”

“Floyd?” Adrian cleared his throat. “I don’t suppose either of you would care to include us in the conversation?”

“No, we don’t.” Phoria waved her hand. “Go away, please.”

“You’re alive.” Dannon finally spoke, the redness having faded from having witnessed the statue coming to life and then watching the interaction. “You did this, Floyd, didn’t you?”

“Who are you?” Phoria whirled about again, this time she fixed her stare on Dannon. “You are a strange and snively little man. I don’t like you.” She leaned to the side, now seeing Craven for the first time. “And who are you?”

“That would be Craven.” Floyd hid a smile. “And we, like him, so be nice.”

“We?” Phoria turned in a complete circle before realizing he’d walked past her. “I have to be nice?”

“You’re being nice now.”

“And I wasn’t before?” She exclaimed, outraged.

“I think you were being…yourself, before.” He amended.

“And being myself isn’t nice?”

“Now you’re being polite.” He chuckled. “Welcome to the Aurex, This is High Master Adrian, trying to find out what’s going on so he can assess the situation. We want to be nice to him too, because he’s my half-brother.”

“You have a half-brother?” Her head snapped back to him with amazing speed. The uneven eyebrows arched upwards. “Wow. I wouldn’t have pegged you for that.”

“Pegged me? Really? And why not?”

“You look more like the single child type, the one left to his own devices.” She yawned. “Can I please get that shirt?”

“Is that going to be a deciding factor in you telling your story?”

“Do I have to tell it right now?”

“Now is as good a time as any.” Floyd shrugged. “I’ve got all the time in the world.”

“No you don’t.” Phoria jerked a thumb over one shoulder. “Not if that Shaman cloud isn’t yours, ‘cause it’ll catch up with y’all pretty fast, like in a couple of hours and judging from like, all the noise can chattering I heard while I was stuck in that stupid trailer, then you guys need to be moving.” She bent over halfway, fingering a hairline crack along her thigh. “I also have to add that I have absolutely no cracks or chips or anything in me at all…how could you possibly put me together and think that tada, this is me with all these flaws!”

Floyd stared at her. “What did you just call that?”

“Huh?”

“The cloud, Phoria. You just called it-”

“Oh. That. Yeah, it’s a Shaman cloud, I didn’t think it was yours, I mean, your alls own, but since nobody here’s running for their lives, I guess I thought wrong. I’m a tad rusty on my predictions and judging people at first sight.” She morosely traced the crack all the way through her knee. “Owww…this is so gonna hurt. I hate cracks!”

“What’s a Shaman cloud?” The head snapped up again, the quickest he’d seen it yet.

“You don’t know what a Shaman cloud is?” Four heads shook in unison. “Whoa. I can honestly say I’ve never met someone who didn’t know what it was.” She shrugged. “Just wait for it, it’ll come.” Her mouth twitched. “And then you’ll never ask that question again.”

“It’s bad?”

Another shrug. “Depends on your definition of bad, sure doesn’t bother me.”

“Is that because nothing can bother you, or because you’re a statue?”

“Shirt, please?” Phoria wiggled her fingers. “And hurry it up, if you would. I really hate feeling like I’m standing here and talking to y’all and instead of us actually getting a decent conversation and without anything to wear-”

“Adrian!”

“We’re already moving.” Adrian said, tersely, the soft ripple of energy that emanated outward was a warning to all of the Aurex. They needed to move and they needed to move now. “Let’s go.”

“Just like that?” Dannon hurried after the High Master. “I didn’t know we were ready to move. I thought we were staying here another day!”

“Whatever gave you that idea?” Craven wanted to know. “You think we can stay here with that hanging over us and gaining every hour?” He nodded towards a rather ominous looking black cloud, with dark energy sparking outward and down to the ground. “I don’t even want to know what that thing really is.”

“But I can’t see anything!” Dannon puffed, trying to keep up as the rest of the men broke into a dead run. “And I can’t run that fast.”

“Hey! What about me?” Phoria yelled as the supply trailer she was leaning on, suddenly whirled to life and rushed after them.

(c) Sara Harricharan