A to Z 2026 Grand Finale - Z - Contessina’s Collection of Human Treasures

Michelangelo spoke.

Shelby turned her head, astonished. “You…said something?”

“Yes,” he said. “I said she found me in a zoo. In Tampa, Florida.”

“I don’t understand,” she said.

“There is much to explain,” he said.

“You’re talking,” she said.

“She didn’t expect this, of course,” he said. “Among her people mine are known as westons. In their culture it’s not even a specific term. It means common. It means we’re easy to take for granted. An irony.

“There aren’t really so many of us. But we have often been found in zoos, across the galaxy, very much because of our scarcity. It was the Bith’Mari who began this practice, during the age of the Campaigns. The Puck found us in one of their zoos, and fell in love. It was the beginning of a healing process for them. Again, an irony.

“There is so much you need to know.

“In another lifetime her name was Llura. Llura had a child, a son. In her life of exile she had previously believed she had found a home on Stringfellow, where many dreams flourish, where only dreams exist. For a time they were happy there. If they hadn’t stayed so long things would be very different. But as with many, on Stringfellow the dream turned into something else.

“Llura’s young son made friends, and those friends suggested to him that they should explore the Prod Oasis, the wastelands of Stringfellow. In the middle of the night they stole away. In the morning Llura woke to a quiet apartment. She was used to her son’s scampering feet coming to greet her. 

“She rubbed her sleepy eyes, and then heard a knock at the door. The Stringfellow authorities had arrived. Her son had been lost in the wastelands. No one survives them. 

“She departed that world. Not so long after, the Danab invaded Earth, and that was when she decided to make her way here. She was among the very first. She worked as a nurse during the Pacific League’s counteroffensive. She buried her grief in another world’s pain.

“She wandered. Eventually the war ended, and in a zoo on Earth she saw a weston, and she was astonished. That was the first time she truly fell in love with humanity. But it also roused her. She wants these people to be better. She petitioned for the weston’s release. She sat in a courtroom for days, and in a little while was granted custody. These humans were full of wonders.

“She took the weston home. She took me home.

“So, these many years later, you know something of the truth,” he said.

“Why did you wait so long?” she said.

“Because you are ready, and she was not,” he said. “There’s more.

“There is something no Puck knows. Westons have an origin, too. We do not come from Earth. We are not cats. Even humans knew that. I’m sure you had never seen our kind, before.”

“Danab don’t have zoos,” she said. “Our creatures roam freely, even in our cities.”

“Something the Puck don’t know is that under very extreme conditions, what is commonly known as near-death experiences, a biological process occurs. As far as I can tell, this happens only to Puck, and they are not aware of it. Their body becomes a husk. But it is more like a cocoon. It’s a transformation. They become westons. 

“For many years we ourselves didn’t know. When we discovered the truth it seemed to be a cruelty, to reveal it to them. Every birth of a weston is a tragedy. The Puck had only ever known tragedy. They deserved something good.”

“They deserve a lie?” she said. “Your own mother?”

“In Earth culture I believe they would consider us guardian angels,” he said. “It becomes a very complicated matter. It becomes a matter of faith. The Puck had been persecuted for theirs long enough. It changed their relationship to it. You don’t alter such matters lightly. Their relationship with us had already begun a healing process. It was decided that it would needlessly complicate things, should we tell them.”

“You don’t have the right to decide,” she said.

“Perhaps,” he said. “I think the truth of her life was already reward.”

The third person, or fourth, if you included the body they watched over, stirred.

“Sometimes it is necessary to accept difficult things,” Lord Phan said.

“Tell me how the Tikanni ruled,” she said.

“Over her? There was no meddling,” Lord Phan said.

“Not her,” she said.

“In your case,” Lord Phan said, “You have suffered enough. That is your atonement. You have become someone else. A better person.”

“That was how she led her life,” Michelangelo said.

“She was an innocent,” Shelby said.