Beamer The Shape

It was a long week after the mother kissed her cheek and ran off. How that old running step, one with allot of hard pep brushed against the wind. And changed her daughter's life forever. It was many a year, and she had gotten used to living without her mother. It was a quiet house, quiet as a mouse. Dad also helped with home work, yet this was allot of work. It was allot of math, allot of science, allot of everything. No passion, nothing to enjoy. Everything felt quiet the same. No desire's flame. In her mind's eye of blue, while dangling her shoes, she tended to let her mind wander. She wandered, wandered, and wandered against the wind. "Benina, pay attention." She finished her homework, and then went to bed.

It was a long week, a long year. A loud year, hurting her ears. She never understood why her father never wanted her to wear her bunny ears. Benina always loved to wear her bunny ears. Hop, hop, hop she would go. "You'll jar the whole house down" her father would say with a frown. Her has always frowned sense mother left. Though at school nobody liked her much, she had her own friends to play with: there was Beamer the shape, who was quite a large shape. His big eyes reflecting like glass. Together they would hob nob. They explored the woods, the Savannah, the green meadows. Yet now they have turned to Grey. When awake her father never understood why she wandered off in her head.

Tonight he offered her a book to read. To him this was a noble deed. Yet somehow this always quietly back fired on him. As Benina the hop, would hop, hop, and hop along inside her head in new worlds to explore that she was introduced to in various books. Of course when come test time, this always gave whatever book a bad taste in her mouth. Every book she read, she always pictured it one way, while the test interpreted it as another. Comics she fell in love with, as you can't "misinterpret" a graphic novel. Here new world she found she enjoyed, hopping, hopping, and hopping along dirt trails, rivers, swimming in lakes, and gliding in thick atmospheres above the white clouds of distant moons. One moon was how she met Beamer the shape. who would fly high in the sky, and would wear a large red cape. They would fly together on whales of the sky, with the large yellow gas giants in the horizon.

Her life was like a distant tune of a cello, a faint hint of mellow while always tired like a mind jello. Hello to the mind jello. For anything would be a good bed, this idea she got in her head. Though she always preferred to sleep in her old bed instead. "You should try to sleep, your tiredness makes me weep." said Beamer the shape. Even as days go by she always hogged her time with Beamer the shape, yet even he had a home far away. Though it wasn't like this home, as Beamer lived on a floating island along the sea. Floating, floating, along the sea.

"Can you stay behind to read a story?" asked Benina.

"I suppose one more story to read." said Beamer. and it was a very long story. A story that felt like forever. "Somehow, I will show you a real story. When I become older. Become a prince." The idea of Beamer being a prince made her laugh.

"Some other day." asked Benina.

"Some other day." said Beamer, floating away. He left, with her waving with a tear dropping against the sea. Against the sea, yet in her mind—there will always be his planet, above the sea.

It was within the next few months that Beamer came back.

Beamer arrived at Benina's bedside, and then they were off. On this trip, they arrived in a world much like our own, but in a different dimension. It was a long a forest trail where Benina was sitting up top of a mushroom, and Beamer sat right beside her. Down, down, down they fall down from the giant fungus, until they softly landed. They walked to the trail, and then arrived upon a sign. One direction led to the circus. But it was not like any circus either have ever been to before. There were very few cars in the driveway, and most of the people in the carnival were some type of clown. They were are frowning clowns.

Benina walked in line at the Clown's shout, and she purchased her tickets with the money that Beamer gave her. Then they were in. Here in the circus of frowning clowns, she came upon one clown that runs the animal race. 'Why is everyone frowning?' asked Benina. The clown looked at Benina crossly, and was freightened by the alien Beamer.

'Young miss, that is what we do. It our job to make people unhappy. We whip lions, process horse meat for the corn dogs. Yes did you know? Those are not really make out of pork meat, but horse.' At first Benina that it was an odd type of joke, a different kind of shitck. But then she found he was being serious, and thus she felt like shit. 'Do you find processing horse meat funny miss? We had lost our prized horse racer. Though his time was about become up anyway.'

Benina and Beamer assumed this clown was just having a bad day, and they walked onto to do other things. Most of the clowns were just as cross. But eventually they found an tourist submarine. They purchased tickets, and got to travel through hydrochloric acid filled with decaying fishbones. The clowns shouted out through a megaphone, 'Watch out for the walls, they are hot from the acid.'

Then they got some cotton candy, but this was no cotton candy they have ever tried before, for this was a savory cotton candy. It had curry powder and chili powder seasoning on it's fluff. Benina, despite being weirded out, liked it fairly well.

Then they boarded their ship, and left this planet.

A planet of Hell.

It had been a year since Benina the girl with bunny ears had first met Beamer. Now on her fourteenth year, her mother has had a new baby--Benina's own baby sister. Oh dear! Benina had gotten her homework early that night, after a much shorter fight with her dad tonight. She was sent to be early despite it's brief extent, and to her lament was always the one to take care of the baby--who slept in the same room as she, as she rocked in her little baby crib. Though luckily for her, her baby sister was always quiet. Benina was not sure how long this would last. Then as she had her nightie put on, she met her old friend again. Beamer eased in through the light in the window pane, and told him of new life stories quite profane. Until finally he settled down and set with her on her brand new bed.

'So how have you been, you haven't aged a bit.' said Benina to Beamer.

'It was good, and my years in my home world are different from humans. While you guys live as few as 0ne hundred years if that in most cases, we tie the 1,000 year in a knot with universal boot laces.' said Beamer to Benina.

'Where are you going to take me tonight.'

'First your baby sister needs to be asleep, and once this is done she will not remember my visit.'

'How do you know it's my baby sister?'

'We've been watching you whole life, you're are as family to us as we are to you.'

Then up, up, and up they went into the light. And then Benina waved goodbye to her sister and said goodnight. Finally she arrived in a strange vessle she had not once seen before. Only once had she seen it in the land of Lore. Though the susperstition she has read, never ever quit matched the images in her head. 'I got a new ship this time, you did not get to see it much last time. After all we made sure you did not remember the ship from last time. Though to be fair I wouldn't have wanted to remember that ship either, though my messy tendencies are much better now. Just ask my pet cow.'

Beamer pointed to his pet cow, who was harvested in an animal multilation experiment, that was something Benina would surely lament. 'Don't worry, it's just a set piece. I dislike animal mutilation as much as you, in fact I'm a bit of an odd one out for my space culture.' And then they zipped, zipped, and zipped through the galaxy until they made their stop at a planet that at first seemed almost covered in water. Then pretty glowing ice crystals covered the ocean surface, and glittered the night sky like stars painting the void of the galaxies darkness. 'What do you think? I only been here a wink before.'

'It's beautiful.'

'Nice isn't it. Now down, down, and down we go.' And they hovered their vessle over the surface, and touched down on the slippery glass like ice. There was a small town of carved ice igloos, inhabited by sentient penguins. The penguins wore a scaly coat made from the fish of the sea. 'I've never seen a scaly coat before.'

'Now but you have movie costumes, close enough.' said Beamer the Shape. Her pictured said movies in his mind, being recorded on tape--though by now said film was possibly recorded on a frame set. He would almost bet.

'This place reminds me of something.' said Benina.

'What would that me, the North Pole?'

'Nope, a carbonated beverage.'

'The ice would not fit into a glass.'

'Unless it was as big as a the planet.' The planet was roughly one point five times the size of Earth. They were greeted by two penguin kids, who wore two scaly mittens.

'I've never seen a person like you before.' said the girl penguin.

'Nor have I, everyone else is a bore.' said the boy penguin. It was his sing song voice that reminded her of wind chimes.

'Don't mind him, he always speaks in rhymes. Are you hungry, we have some freshly caught fish.' said the girl penguin.

Benina and Beamer ate on a large plate of fish, because that was their evening's wish. Then off, off, off they went back to their home world, and through the air at the rhythm of swish swish. Until gently he said she could sleep in the spaceship's bed. Then he placed her on her bed in the house. Benina woke up, and her baby sister was still sleeping soundly in the early morning hours.

Beamer waved goodnight, and zipped off.

Goodbye Beamer, Benina waved.

It has been a month sense Benina had seen Beamer. Her sister was being tended to by her mother, while she was busy catching up with homework from her school, for she had always been a slightly late student. Her teacher had always lectured her about not turning in assignments on time. But to Benina this was OK. She had always had a tendency to let her mind wander in class more than other students. As her guidance counselors would say, she would go many places in her head and not focus on the now, the present, the real world. The world where school was still in session, now daydreamer of being a young girl during the age of US succession. This had always made her something of a pest in the teacher's minds. But she was creative. She would always paint various paintings, that while never very good, were indicative of an imagination that--if it would die--would not die until at some point later in her life.

Her parents wondered why she always take about a strange shape at night. At first they thought it was merely that of a child's imagination ran rampant, however over time she began to develop scratches and bite marks. Benina remembered when she last got her bite marks. Her and Beamer The Shape were running through the forest of one of the worlds they visited that had four moons. They zipped, zipped, and zipped through the green trees. Until eventually they ran into a fairly large pack of wolves. Each wolf had large red eyes, and were growling at the two viciously. Though they eventually managed to be able to leave the planet in one piece, both her and Beamer had to tend some scratches. It was only thanks to their technology she was able to heal as quickly as she did. But her mother would always poke the mark, 'Where did you get that scratch Benina?'

'I just had a bad dream last night.' Benina said.

Her parents had toyed with the thought of taking her to a psychologist, but they were poor and also assumed that she would mostly keep silent. This they would lament. But dear Benina would act as if nothing was wrong. And hope in the flowers of daisies all day long. Then she would sing a song from the radio, and would probably sing until her father called for dinner time if she did not personally have to make up her homework. Benina wondered if she would see Beamer The Shape again, and was also curious if he still had some of the marks he had gotten from those aline wolf like dogs. Her mother said it was time to eat, and she for a brief moment halted her make up work.

It was the following night, that she had other dreams, though far less exciting than when she had her 'real life' adventures with Beamer The Shape. In these, she would travel to various countries, pretend to connect with real world friends that could not possibly really be talking to her. And go on adventures across time and space. Her dream at present was lucid, and she felt as if she would really walk through the neighborhood she had never been to before. However the neighborhood was covered a thick fog. And the exit out of this neighborhood was covered in a thick fog. She wondered what existed within the fog. And it was then that she noticed that nobody was outside to play. Benina was all alone, and she had never been alone before. Though she had certainly wishes for this, though nothing like this. This was more than alone, this was like being dead. But she was not dead at all, but merely asleep. Every now and then she would had dreams like these, that were neither nightmares of good dreams. She would always her the crying voice an old woman whose face she never got to see. But she knew she was there.

She would also occasionally meet a crazy old cat lady, that some of her own friends from school would recount would occasionally see in their dreams. She would walk around in a circle ritualistically, as if she were walking around some imaginary pentagram on the road. As if she were to summon something to due her bidding. But there was no demon would that come. For a moment she wanted to travel further into the fog, but heard screeches and growls. Those meows in the distance were not of lonely cats, but something far more sinister that she did not see. Something that was lost in the fog.

'Time for school today, want pancakes early?' mom said.

'Getting up, what's that smell?' Benina said.

'Pancakes are ready.'

Ah the warmth of pancakes.

It was the next following evening when Benina was able to see Beamer the shape again. She had come to miss the draw of going to lands upon the blue moon, and other worlds with many a moon. The chilly night chilled her through the blankets on her bed. Briefly she tended her little sister who slept with her in the same room. Though still quite, her baby sister now was lightly crying. Benina picked her up, and then gently rocked her as she sat on her bed side. Then when her little sister finally got to sleep, she gently placed her back in her crib. Benina was at least glad that she never had to clean her sister's diapers. But this she could tolerate to an extent. Then once she was able to go into a deep sleep, once again she was greeted by the window light. A familiar face greeted her in the window, it was Beamer The Shape. And he had two other friends that also greeted her. She was hovered into the spaceship. She wondered whether the tall blue man and the tall blue slender blue woman were his parents. 'I see that you have met Beamer. He's a good kid, and I've heard many great things about you.' said who she took to be his father.

'Beamer has never had a playmate, but now we have you to be by his side.' The mother gave her a kind of odd feeling, much like someone who wished to have kids, but in reality was unable to conceive. It was with this she noticed that Beamer looked more human than them. That in fact Beamer was in an odd between state between praying mantis and human, but his parents were entirely praying mantises. 'Now then, would you like to have some grains of wheat. We ourselves love to eat upon grains of wheat?'

After dinner, Beamer and Benina dropped the parents off back at their home world, and they traveled to a new kind of planet: a gas giant. As it turns out, while it was indeed a giant ball of liquid whatever that Benina had alway been taught in science class, Jupiter has giant floating islands that are in perpetual motion. 'These are the continents of my friends.' said Beamer. What Benina did not know, was that these were not actually islands but rather ancient spaceships from eons ago that were designed simulate the appearance of landscapes. Beamer friends are in fact the ancient ones, who had originally lost their mother planet, and settled in this ancient planet Jupiter. A shield covers their island to protect from the poisonous gas. The knowledge of ancient ways to leave the planet were considered to them much like to us the 12,000 year old ruins are. Beamer himself knew of their old culture, but thought it be to much to explain Benina at the moment.

They landed in a forest simulation--a large expanse that joined the millions of ships that were perpetually rotting over eons. There were many towns they could have visited, but instead they visited one with his friends. When they arrived everyone looked human. But unlike we, they have come to accept the wearing of wooden shoes. As they had no leather to make shoes, and they were not about to skin their pets. Sometimes they were use the points of their clogs to poke holes in trees, and this tree sap they were use to make honey infused chewing gum. Benina got to try some of these with having conversations with his friends, until eventually they had to leave because Beamer himself had school lessons. Benina was dropped off in bed.

Then she had a normal morning.

But Benina was tired in class.

Along the tide of the sea, there flew a giant space fortress that cut through the sky.

Through the clouds it went woosh, woosh, woosh. Until eventually a now older Beamer The Shape arrived at Benina's house. The house was what Benina's mother would refer to as a starter home, which is coupled with a large deck and an above ground swimming pool. Beamer hovered his space ship, that he was currently borrowing from his parents, over the deck. This was what he would always stand on when peeking through the window. He wondered if Benina would be awake, as she had gradually began to stay up later and later over the Summer month. When he had last saw Benina, her eye lids appear heavy and her skin was paler, almost like the color of fine China. 'It's time to go.' Beamer said when he picked up Benina.

Benina stayed mostly asleep throughout the trip, until they touch down on a new world--the planet of Cagaea, a binary planet that shared a collective atmosphere with it's twin. The two planets were roughly 1,500 year apart in culture. Though the one of earlier culture had once had technology, it is simply degraded and left mainly to the ruins that filled it's worl map. Yet when he had visited, the towns were ran by twisted town pastors. 'So where are we now, are we going to meet new people again?' Benina asked. Beamer noticed that she sounded more world weary than she had been in previous months. He had a hard time imagining that it was simply about how he would take her on adventures to distant planets.

'Now I thought you might like an extended vacation.'

'By extended how long do you mean? My grades are just now suddenly getting better.' said Benina.

'Is that why you're staying up later?'

'How would you know about that?'

'We have been watching you you whole life, I thought that she knew that by this point.'

Benina did not remember his parents mentioning this, although it only just now began to really sink in what exactly they meant. She had not seen his parents in the last few trips with him. She got to know the people better on the planet of the spaceship continents, and got to explore further within the ice caverns of the slush planet. Although she wanted to home for a moment, she said 'Sure, how long could it possibly last?'

Beamer and Benina spent the greater part of the five hours on this new planet. They would later meet the residence of the planet of Cagaea in other circumstances. But for now Avaste! They went zip, zip, zip through the stars faster than the speed of light. Benina felt a mixture of pain and loss of a friend when Beamer left to see his parents.

It was the next morning that her mother woke up, her mother took her various places to meet friends, and other things people her age would do. Before Summer vacation, she gradually began to have less and less make up work as she had began to turn work in on time. All as a result of her spending late nights studying when she did not feel like going to sleep. As while her travels with Beamer were excellent, her nightmare began to gradually take on a more realistic every day world tone. With the supernatural, she always felt a friend in Beamer. Someone she could always talk to tell her that said things were not real, someone that could help her keep her frame of good sense.

At first it mainly had to do with school relationships, but gradually began to take on aspects of many other things in her life. The psychiatric meds only did so good, and it never helped the experience in seeing Beamer. She had never told her psychiatric about Beamer, as there was still somewhat of a cultural stigma about aliens. And after all, the medicine really did help with her supernatural nightmare. The problem than was the distinction between the supernatural and the paranormal. And while it seeing Beamer did effect her sleep somewhat, it had no real baring on her life like those red eyed demons, that made her scream and wake up with claw marks on her arms. There were no such things having a magic charm to take away the demons of the night, those shapes that even Beamer himself did not know. Benina was mime, she was lost in her own silence.

'Beamer, I want to go away.' said Benina.

'But where would you go? And you mother would worry about, just as my own parents would.' said Beamer.

'Somewhere, out there. Not here. Anywhere, but here.'

Beamer did not know what to say, as for a long time him being with Benina was merely a task that his parents would have him do. But he himself never considered Benina an object of inspection. The idea of traditional aspects of alien abduction made him sick to his stomach. 'Trust me Benina, it's best that you be here with you family. I'm going to try to talk with my parents to see if they can have someone take over my job. Look, I have started to love you. That is not normal for my people.'

Her quickly boarded his ship with Benina trying to follow him through the long grass. But it was to late, for her one only friend was not there. She wasn't sure if she would ever meet another friend--she hoped this but could never be sure. Over the last few months she became quieter and more reclusive. Inside she cried unseen tears.

She sunk into her own personal misery and hell.

But soon there would be many other adventure that she would have with Beamer The Shape, though this time they were not merely adventure--they were a matter of utmost urgency. But for now I leave with this promise. She would see Beamer again. And she would hold hands with her boyfriend, as they walk through the light.