Chapter 12 - Speed

"Are you rich?"

It was one of the first things this girl Eileen asked me at college. When I couldn't provide a prompt and decisive answer, she hung around me less. She was interested in my roommate for a semester, whose brothers were part of a media empire. Sure, mom had an investment firm but I, nor anyone else, could tell you how much she was worth.

I didn't blame Eileen for practicing her gold-digging. She got to college on an academic scholarship from a family who had nothing. Many of our classmates were spoiled to the point they could throw a fit to mommy and daddy about the size of the dorm television and a 60-inch Smart Screen would be there the next day.

If I was a girl at that college, I'd probably be looking for a sugar daddy too.

Well, now I was a girl bug and all it mattered was I'd have to pick out a male in some number of days to put his stuff into my egg sack. Although, these bugs had stories, ideas, hopes, and fears. And still a few schemers.

Flax wore my gift like a fancy, mud-dazzled leg-warmer as she showed it off to the family and pronounced, "Look what our generous little sister donated to me!"

Real-mother loomed over Flax and scrutinized our mood. She asked first, "Is this true, Grete?"

Tula backed up Flax's confidence with folded legs and a leer. I could call them out on taking advantage of me but I made my choice. "Yeah. I appreciate it so much, but I want others to appreciate it too."

Father bent over to listen. Gleefully, Flax fawned and flaunted, "Oh, daddy! Doesn't it look so lovely? Adorable little Grete is just the best!"

Moving around as though Flax wasn't even there, father locked eyes with me.

"You want your sister to have it?"

His overwhelming, nutmeg presence made me swoon with nervousness but I set my feet in the mud and resolved, "Yes, father. I love your gift, but I want to share it. Plus, it's easier to run and dash without it. My generous, lovely sister can take care of it and I can be as quick and safe as possible."

For a second, Flax dipped her legs like she was thinking, like she realized I might be cleverer than she expected, but she soon returned to fanning and flaring the material for an awestruck Citrine. Sana wore some of her father's same skepticism but looked on me pleasantly.

After a long pause, father stroked my head and cradled my back as he proclaimed, "My precious little one, your generosity brings honor to the King. May He always bless you." Both real-mother and father doted on and groomed me till father declared, "It is also wise to learn the protection of speed and your fleet sisters would be better teachers than I. Anise! Lapis! A moment..."

Before he could finish, the blurs dug narrow lines of mud to his feet.

In sync, they responded, "Yes, dad!"

He beckoned them to me and urged, "Please teach your little sister all you know, so that she may be faster than a soaring shadow and safe from all danger."

"Got it!" Before I could even move to greet them, they each had hold of me. My limbs bolted and burned, like socks vigorously rubbing on carpet.

"Great greetings Grete Im Lapis loopy laughing launching lovely Lapis and there is no challenge I cant crunch rolling and flowing and moving and dashing and bashing and we're gonna have so much fun but my feet just can't keep still gotta run flashing fun dashing run all the delightful night you dig of course you don't we're not diggers we're runners and we need you fast and smashing dashing zoom whoom zoom right sis?"

Did Lapis just shoot up with sugar? By 'sis', she meant Anise, who mercifully had a less frantic pace to her words as she announced, "Right, sister. You gotta kick it. Roll and rush and dash. That means you give it all you got and then you find some more. Now, I understand you might be intimidated. No one else is as cool as a cloud like me but we're bound by blood. That means no matter how fast we go, we're always sticking to your side. Anise the so nice, Lapis the launcher, and Grete of fleet feet. We can outrace the burning lights so it doesn't even think of chasing us and it turns back to night!"

I was getting too much information too quickly to contemplate how the two of them smelled. Scorched rubber, cut grass, and dried mud were all I could cling to as they hauled me to the nearest wall.

"Awesome toss 'em. Running is all about pushing your legs and letting them go, you know? Don't fight but flow it. Egg sleep or no, every one of us can flow. Once you get a taste don't waste your energy just pushing, just feel the air and how the waves of it totally crash against you. Alright, you're ready."

Lapis hopped and spun around, flattening the mud in her path. "Totally ready and eager and rushing though meager size dont matter just move and flow and you know how to go we are all born moving just push everything you got as fast as you can you got this!"

This could only go well. Fortunately, they let me start. It had been ages since I ran anywhere in my human life. I would hustle sometimes but it was just a quick shot of adrenaline going all out before I needed to pant and burn and flail. Here, my start was staggering over my feet and tumbling right to the mud.

Over my shoulder, I heard a stifled snicker. But Anise and Lapis picked me up as Lapis urged, "If you fall with one step, you get up with the next. If you're down, you can only go up."

To their word, they stayed with me and even showed me the leg motions to support myself and push off slippery mud. It was exhausting and I briefly worried I'd cracked some part of my still-developing body but Lapis assured me it was "just stretching".

After a lot of falls and even more embarrassment, I managed to figure out a way to move and scurry and dart through the mud. It still felt like awkwardly clambering over uneven terrain, but I was at least moving. Racing was a long ways off, but Anise and Lapis stayed with me as we made doughnuts around the room. Riva even crept over to cheer me on.

The duo urged Riva to join in, but she nervously freaked out and tried, "T-that's fine. I can hide well enough. I j-just need to keep still."

Once I'd managed to stagger over the peaks and valleys in the mud, Anise and Lapis urged me on by bolting ahead then drawing back to my side. They made me watch their footwork. That was all nice, but I was still adapting from a lifetime of being bipedal. Avoiding a spill and a roll on my back was victory enough.

Still, I pumped those legs and tried to train new muscles to know what to do. This was how a Shashelm survived, move in shadows, dart as quickly as possible, be safe from the Vesperil and other dangers. The realities of this life all came down to being able to run. I should've known that innately in egg sleep, but I had to learn it one way or another.

That was easy to say and think but difficult to do. Run when you can barely cling to the side of a parent and climb up. Scurry over walls when the taste of real-mother milk is still fresh. Be fast enough to survive when your body still needs to instar several times over.

Those were all the excuses but I still pumped my legs and tumbled over rough spots with my sisters just a blast of warm air away. I didn't figure out how to run from that first lesson as Riva staggered over stacks of mud just to watch us, but I walked faster than ever before.

As we ventured further from that little cavern of all I had ever known, I caught a brighter glimmer in the distance, through a tunnel of Shashelm I didn't know. Maybe it was the call of day with the night slipping away. Perhaps it was just some luminescent moss. But it was a reminder of the challenge set before me by my bitch of a sister.

I was going outside.