Issue #33

Ezinma is a slip. She hates the word — it makes her think of a slimy worm slithering into wet soil — but it’s the least degrading name she knows for people like her with the power to possess the bodies of anyone they touch.

She leans against the bar of the Slipcraft nightclub, flanked by a quarrel of other slips, all competing for a body to borrow among the swaying crowd of vessels — another word Ezinma hates, though it feels better than calling the non-slips of humankind “normal.”

Ezinma is two shots of tequila in. Her pulse is made of a surging bassline and strobing lights. She keeps the unspoken rules of this place in her mind as she scans the crowd — never slip anyone who looks like a cop, never slip someone who looks even a little drunk.

Her eyes rest on a woman with a platinum buzzcut and winding hips who looks a touch freer than the rest. The woman’s eyes are closed, and she undulates like she’s swimming in the music. Ezinma knows from experience that people who move through the air like they’re gliding through water are a dream to drive.

Ezinma smooths manicured hands over her cascade of microbraids and approaches. The woman opens her eyes and gives her a dimpled smile, still dancing. Ezinma returns the smile, opens her mouth to flash the split tongue that distinguishes slips from vessels.

“For you are all children of darkness, 

children of the night. 

We are not of the day or of the light.”

—The Dusk Song

The summer Pa died, I discovered there was a boy living in our woods. I was ten when he found me and the world felt like it teetered on the brink. Right on the cusp of change. Like I’d been born holding my breath and could only exhale once he breathed life back into me.

Leaves crisped brown on the edges, and the wind howled with a chilling bite. Over the rise, Crosby Manor with its white flagstones and filigreed eaves stood as a frozen monument against the black tide of midnight.

Skin numb to the cold, I rocked in the wooden swing Pa had made for me among the trees. My fists wrapped tight around the ropes, skirts swishing in the cool breeze.

“Why don’t people last?” I asked the night, eyes burning as I battled back tears.

An airy voice skulked from darkness. The hairs on my arms stood on end. “Because people have other things to be. A body is just a house. Open the doors and the spirit gone run out.”

Taona did not shed a single tear when his baba died. Not when he heard the news. Not when he greeted his father’s wife and she wailed at the sight of his face. Not even when they lowered his father’s shiny black casket into the grave and his sea of half-sisters wept.

Those who watched him at the funeral would say that Taona stood like a man. But he really stood as an only son whose father had never recognised him because his mother refused to be a mistress. She was holding out to be a second wife. A lot of good that had done her. She lived in poverty while her competition enjoyed the benefits of being the girlfriends of one of the richest men in Harare. So, no, Taona had not cried.

But now, standing outside Baba’s lawyers’ offices, a solitary tear formed in Taona’s right eye, and gently rolled down his cheek, a perfect drop burgeoning with feelings of absolute joy. For he was now holding the keys to a second-hand Honda Fit. It wasn’t new, but it was his. His inheritance. The bespectacled old man standing next to him told Taona the message his baba had left for him.

“Your father said this car will make a man of you,” the lawyer said. “It’s the kind of gift that forces you to decide who you want to be. Choose wisely.”

I was strapped down in the transference pod, inside of Vessel #0122-20: female; twenty-one at time of death; hair cropped short and tight exposing the nape of her neck where the barcode and transference port were located. She was on the shorter side; skin a deep brown like mahogany; a smile wide and gorgeous, with dimples that were canyon deep. She was perfect in every way, and now, I was her.

The station’s tech stood in front me and held a mirror so I could inspect myself … I mean, my Vessel. I was speechless. Partly because of shock, mostly because I’d never had vocal cords before. After disconnecting from the pod, I was handed some basic clothing, blue jeans and white v-neck, and put through a series of physical tests: speech exercises to make sure the Vessel’s voice box was nice and loose; some stretches to make sure my fine motor skills were up to task for my time in the physical world. My Vessel was, in comparison to other Vessels, recently deceased. She died decades ago, but her youthful look was preserved in time by an amniotic sack-like containment unit.

While going through some paperwork, the station’s coordinator reminded me that my time in the physical world was subject to change due to negotiations over Accord Number blah-blah-blah. She also emphasized to me, making sure I was paying attention, that any attempt to hide that I was a Sentient would be treated with “harsh penalties.” Afterwards, I ran outside of the building, where a car waited, and looked to the sun, the real, physical world’s sun, and smiled.