DCU / Real Life
Things Wikipedia Didn't Tell Me About Canada
It all started with a trip to Canada.
“I still think this scene doesn’t work.” The voice comes down from about a foot above my head. Random — it’s been two weeks and I still can’t think of him by any other name — is lying on his bed, deeply buried in the latest edit of Chainbreaker. Nearly three years, it’s been, and fuck me but I am going to have this thing published before I die. He continues, “Miriah still comes across as too callous.”
On the floor, I flick through to the chapter he’s talking about. “You’re probably right,” I say after a while. “But can you see any other way to get them down into the subway? I mean, I’d say we can ditch the whole thing except it comes up later on…”
But this story isn’t about two kids editing their Great Intercontinental Novel. It’s about what happens right…
“I think maybe if we put some kind of—”
… about…
“What’s that li—”
… now.
The room goes blue and starts to throb — a deep, sub-audial vibration that goes straight to the heart — and I duck instinctively as something large and fast moving whirls past and lands against the opposite wall in a crash of broken Ikea and an avalanche of little plastic men. The throbbing dies down — though doesn’t fade completely, nor does the blue light — and it occurs to me that Random’s head has appeared next to my own, distorted with an identical expression of terrified shock.
“What the hell was—?”
There’s just enough time to register an ill-sounding moan and a flash of red and blue before I’m suddenly no longer leaning against anything. The floor and the back of my head become well acquainted but I barely register the pain when it occurs to me I’m staring up at the underside of what is definitely a bed, being held somewhere up in the vicinity of the ceiling, by something that if this was anything other than a completely sane, mundane, normal world would definitely be a giant tentacle. It’s green and glowing, and something about it doesn’t look quite real in a way that really should—
“Holy motherfucking shit!”
“Random!”
A heavy weight lands inelegantly next to me and a half-second later I’m scrambling back against the wall as the bed overbalances and lands across from us with a crash. The giant green tentacle doesn’t notice; instead is worming its way towards the broken collection of action figures. It seems to start at the wall behind where — not so long ago — the bed was. It’s surrounded at the edges by a burning blue light—
“There’s a tentacle in my bedroom!”
—that I’d swear blind was a portal. I mean, not that I’ve ever seen a Really For Real portal (on account of them not existing and all that), but if I had to describe one, it would look like this.
There’s a foot sticking out of the broken shelf. It’s wearing a red boot, and I’m hit with the sudden urge to say, “Kill it! Kill it killitkillitkillit!”
The tentacle wraps itself lazily around the foot and pulls. A shower of little red and blue Supermen action figures clatter to the floor, and before I can really think about it, I’m beating the oddly intangible green tentacle with all 300 pages of the Chainbreaker draft.
Behind me, Random has also pulled himself to his feet, and has gone completely still, staring at the broken shelf. I feel momentarily bad for the loss — busting into a man’s house is one thing, destroying his lovingly Allen key assembled action figure display shelf is quite another — but I know that’s not what he’s looking at. Not really.
“Tentacle! Dude! Tentacle!”
The book isn’t working — er, as a weapon, that is — and I curse the universe we live in for not providing the sort of environment where young twenty-somethings are likely to have weapons in their bedrooms. Bloody Canadians.
Random shakes himself suddenly, leaping across the tentacle towards the desk where he starts rummaging in drawers and upending containers. I’m about to ask him what the hell he’s doing when he turns sharply, clutching something in his hand I can’t quite make out, and with something that sounds a hell of a lot like, That was my shelf!, brings the object down hard into the tentacle. It can’t have been much bigger than a human hand, but the tentacle reacts as if burned — dropping the red-booted foot and rearing back.
“Don’t like that, do you! Out! Out!” He’s still holding the weapon; out in front of himself now like a priest banishing demons. It seems to be working; a moment of hesitation and the tentacle retreats, slithering back through the portal, which closes behind it with a shuddering finality. After the throbbing hum and the hallucinogenic light, the normality is deafening.
“What did you—?”
He turns to me, opens his hand; against his palm sits a cheap yellow pencil, the point mashed from where he’d driven it into the thrashing, green shape. The one that looked oddly… intangible. I swallow hard; things would be making sense right about now. Anywhere but here.
This is the Really Real World, Dee, remember?
No, actually, I don’t. Instead, I open my mouth — very carefully — and say, “I thought they retconned that?”
Random just shrugs. We turn; silently staring at the unconscious figure covered in little plastic doppelgängers for a while. We’re both thinking the same thing; both thinking there’s absolutely no sane way to say what invariably is going to come next.
“That’s Superman.”
“Seems to be,” I agree, because there’s really no other option. Well, there is, but ‘that’s a guy dressed as Superman’ seems a bit ridiculously stubborn after the Epic Battle of the Yellow Pencil.
“Superman is unconscious in my bedroom. Superman!”
“Yup.”
A pause, and then he says, “No-one on the internet is ever going to believe this.”
I don’t really have a reply to that, instead just watch as he bends down beside, uh, the prone figure? I just can’t say it; even to myself. It’s all just too… well, terrible.
“Zov nahnodh ghao udolzh,” I say, slightly hysterically; the words alien and unpronounceable on my tongue.
And then, a weak voice says, “Ta? Na-nahnodh... ta udolzh?” And for the first time, the words sounds real; like a Really Real language rather than just someone’s attempt at alien sounds.
“Ai, Rao…” I say, because it seems appropriate.
And then the person I absolutely refuse to call by such a ridiculous name as ‘Superman’ stands up, a little shaky, and another string of sibilant, alien words fill the room with the sound of starlight.
“What’d he say?” asks Random.
I blink. “How the bloody hell should I know?”
“You’re the one who speaks Kryptonian!”
“I do not!” That’s hysteria; but the clinical observation seems to come from a long, long way away, and it does nothing to stop my mouth. “I know how to tell people how many cakes Lex Luthor stole! There’s a big difference!”
“Luthao…?” That’s not good; that can’t be good. The voice is dark — if still a little woozy — and… and Kal (nice, safe, fandom name; use that one) has a strange, distant expression on his face.
“No!” I say, hurriedly, then, “Uh, zha. Zha Luthao. Uh, ah crap I’ve got no idea how to say ‘internet meme’ in Kryptonian!”
“Khahp zvot… Torontao?” It occurs to me the far-away expression might very well be x-ray vision in action. I have a sudden urge to purchase a lead apron.
“Zhi, Torontoao,” I agree. The words are easier now that I’ve heard them spoken out loud. I’m sure my accent is still incomprehensible. Hell, in this country my English accent is incomprehensible.
And then Random points out the 210 pound superhero in the room. “Why isn’t he speaking English?” Then, not addressed to me, “Uh… Mister, uh, Mr. El? Can you understand me?”
I refrain from the most obvious of jokes,
(So an Australian, a Canadian and an alien from Kansas walk into a bar, right…?)
and Kal streams words again. He still looks sort of off-colour; I swear I read somewhere on Wikipedia that Green Lanterns are supposed to be able to replicate Green K with their rings. Why would Green Lanterns be attacking Superman? There are… bad Lanterns, right?
(There are bad Supermen…)
Random looks at me, and I just shrug. We turn back to Kal. “Iao, nvoi? I’m really not very good at this.”
He sighs. “Mghudol,” he tries again. It sounds a little like the word for ‘terrible’, but the next one gives me context. “Myksiehzpytlyk.”
“Did he just say ‘Mxyzptlk’?” Random’s pronunciation sounds annoyingly believable. Sometimes I hate the written word.
“An unpronounceable name said in an incomprehensible accent.”
“Tatahn nahnodh khahp?”
“Uh…” I don’t know how to explain this. I try anyway. “It’s like… like Earth-Prime— uh, Uhrth-Zhachahv”— I’ve got no idea what the word for ‘prime’ is; zero will have to do, I guess —”Zao… more like Uhrth-Zachahv-Zachahv?”
“Nahvruht khahp.” He studies the action figures sprawled out all over the floor; not a small amount of them his own likeness. I study him in return; he’s big. I’ve had enough big friends in my day but only ever in one direction. Kal’s got both; it’s easy on paper. In real life it’s… terrifying. I’m standing not four feet away from something that can kill me with a glance. The thought is not at all comforting. I mean, it’s Superman and all that, but…
“Here!” Random pops up from where he’d been rummaging through the trashed remains of his desk. He’s holding up some kind of DC encyclopaedia, open to a page showing a row of different Supermen. “Ask him which one he is.”
“I don’t think I want to know the answer!” I hiss in a stage-whisper; not that it really matters. I’m still not entirely clear on whether English has been cursed off the listening menu as well as the speaking menu, and Kal’s scowl could really go either way. He’s still watching us, but he’s also scanning the room — well, quite possibly outside the room, too. It occurs to me that no-one’s yet asked the Big Question.
Random just rolls his eyes, and shows the page to Kal, whose eyebrows go up. More words; they sound… amused, maybe? Though it’s hard to tell.
“Ta nahnodh dhao?” he asks.
I don’t know how to explain it, so instead I point to the pictures. “Superboy Prime, Uhrth-Zhachahv. Kal-El, Uhrth-Chahv. Kal-L, Uhrth-Tav. Ultraman, Uhrth-Non…”
He nods, understanding, then points to the image of Earth-1 Superman. “Da nahnodh khahp.”
“Well, that’s a relief…”
“Yeah, sure, unless it’s Mind Control Thursday,” I counter. Random just rolls his eyes.
Kal, meanwhile, has produced some kind of futuristicy sci-fi comic book gizmo from somewhere and has started to scan the room with it. The device goes peep! every now and again. I notice it does so with alarming regularity when it passes over us. I get the feeling that this is the bit that I’m not going to like and — just as I think it — there’s a hand on my shoulder. It’s big and hot and solid and suggests in no small way that whatever is coming next is not a suggestion. I share a Look with Random; equally frozen under that touch.
“Zhgamurr rraop vot w khahp.” Followed by a long stream of sentences too complex to catch; Kal sounds excited and… slightly pleading? Apologetic? Again, the language makes it hard to tell, and from here I can no longer see his expression.
“What’s going on?” Another stage-whisper.
I echo Random’s conspiratorial lean almost unconsciously. “I… I think he wants us to… come with him?”
Eyebrows vanish under shaggy hair. “You’re kidding?”
“I might be wrong,” I concede.
“To hell with that; let me just pack some stuff!” He moves away and Kal lets him go; the hand on my own shoulder follows soon after.
I throw what I really hope is a passable apologetic smile, and hurry over to where Random is throwing a bunch of, well, random stuff into a satchel. “Are you crazy! We can’t go… go flying off with Superman!”
He gives me a funny look. “Why not?” As if the possibility of some other option had never occurred to him.
“Because! My flight’s tomorrow night! I have to be back in Australia by Monday; with my husband and my job! I’m an adult now for fuck’s sake! I can’t just go… running off with strange men!”
“It’s not ‘strange men’; it’s Superman and— oh, hold on.” He fumbles about in his pocket for a moment, finally pulling out an invisible cell phone. “Hello? Yes? Yes she is. Hold one moment and I’ll put her on.” He holds the invisible phone towards me. “It’s The Call,” he says, portentously. “Will You Answer It?”
And there it is, really. Because I’m right; I’ve got a flight tomorrow and a husband waiting for me back home, never-mind the other stuff like the job and the mortgage and my parents. I’ve got Responsibilities in the Really Real World; people who rely on me, people I need to appear reliable to. And the real kicker is…
The real kicker is that he’s right, too. I know it as well as he does; twenty years of comic books and movies and video-games have all subconsciously conditioned us for this very moment. You can’t refuse the Call. For one thing, it knows where you live, and for another…
(“Kid, I tell you… once when I was your age I had the opportunity to save the world. Once…”)
I take the invisible phone. It might not be real — might only be a transference of one set of extended thumb-and-pinky to another — but it sure as hell feels real. It has weight and depth and breadth; maybe more so than anything else in my entire life thus far. I raise it to my ear and say, “Yes? That’s me. Yes. Yes, I know. Okay. Thank you.” I hang up, turn to Kal and say, “Nahv. Just, uh, let us get some stuff together first?”
He smiles at us. A proper Superman smile; all confidence and trust and pride and I turn around quickly and pretend to look busy in order to avoid it. It’s the sort of smile you can’t disappoint.
My suitcase is just down the hall; all near-packed and ready to go. I could fetch it, but… I realise I’m afraid to leave the room. Besides, where we’re going — and, let’s face it, I’ve got no clue about that, really — somehow… somehow I don’t think I’ll be needing it. Random doesn’t seem to be packing clothes; instead his bag is jammed with books and TPBs and — yes —- a whole handful of yellow pencils. I realise I’m staring off into space when I feel something warm and fluffy dropped around my shoulders, and realise that it’s a towel.
“I thought you were the frood?” I say dryly.
He just grins at me, “Well, you can be honorary frood for today. You ready?”
“Yeah, I—” Something purple catches my eye in the rubble. “No, wait.” I walk over and pick it up, hold it out. “Me am bad luck charm,” I say. “Me bring lots bad luck to Dee and Random!”
“Your Kryptonian is better than your Bizarro,” he replies, walking over to study the mess himself.
“I’ll be sure to brush up during the trip.”
After a moment, he bends down and rescues Red Son Superman from the rubble. “Mozzahlaand!” says the Red Son.
“Fazzahlaand!” agrees Bizarro, and little plastic fists give each other an awkward high five.
Kal watches us with an odd sort of expression; all at once amused and alien, and it suddenly occurs to me to wonder how anyone could possibly mistake this guy for human. The outline is right, I suppose, but there’s something about the details inside; not wrong exactly, just… too. Too real, too solid, too bright, too kind.
He’s standing in front of a portal; a vortex of blue light and throbbing bass, though there’s something about it that seems somehow less… manic this time. That’s good; I don’t think I could do this otherwise. My hand is warm and slightly damp where’s it’s clutching Random’s, and we stand together in front of the unknown, deafening Kal with the sound of our hearts. You can’t refuse the Call, it’s true, but knowing that doesn’t make any of the stuff that comes next any easier.
“Ready to fall?” he asks me.
“No,” I admit, and close my eyes. “On three?”
We count down.
Chahv… tav… non…
We fall.