by Loki Renard
“That will kill you.”
“I’ll eject first. There’s a suit in here. I’ll be fine. And if I’m not fine, at least I’ll have done the right thing.”
Tarkan
I pull away from the intercom and look over at Reaper. “She’s crazy.”
“Not crazy,” Reaper growls. “Just completely out of control. I told you. Human females only obey the males they know are capable of enforcing order. She needs to be disciplined. Hard.”
I’d argue with him, but 42 is spinning her shuttle around our ship again, and I’m almost certain that’s her slim middle finger held up in rebellion.
“42!” I snap her name again, feeling useless. I don't know what I can do to stop her. There’s no way we can attack the shuttle, and there’s no way to stop it. This ship we are flying isn’t intended for hunting down prey. If we had the ship we traded for this one, we could lock a tractor beam on her and yank her in. But this ship only has a cargo beam and it’s located directly underneath the loading bay. To grab anything, you have to be positioned directly above it, and 42 has just hit the afterburners back toward the colony, zipping away from us in a flash of light.
I turn to Reaper. “You and One take the ship. I’ll take the last shuttle. You head back to the trader. See if we can get our first ship back.”
“With what money?”
“It doesn’t matter. Just head out in that direction and I will meet you when I’ve got 42 back. I’m going to go get this girl alone. I don’t want One in danger. She needs you with her to protect her.”
Reaper hesitates, but he knows as well as I do that every second we argue is another second 42 has to get closer to disaster, and it’s another second I’m going to be trailing her.
“Good luck,” he says.
“You too.”
This moment is more significant than either one of us wants to admit. From the moment we hatched, the two of us have faced every foe together. We have at the very least been within range if one of us needed help. But I’m sending him in the other direction, light years away. If this goes wrong, or rather, when this goes wrong, he won’t be able to help.
Reaper cracked his shell moments before I broke through mine. That made him leader of our clutch. I have followed him every day of our lives. Now we have come to a parting of the ways and we both know that if fate decides it, we might never reunite. But there is no time to say that, or even to acknowledge it with more than a gripping of one another’s arms before I am gone into the shuttle and speeding after trouble incarnate, the woman who suits me most.
42
WELCOME!
The message which greeted us on our first amnesiac journey here greets me again. The first time I heard it, I felt a sense of wonder. Now I feel nothing but anger as I turn my shuttle toward the simulation. Even the word they use for it is a lie. It’s not a simulation. It’s a real life penal colony.
I can feel Tarkan breathing down my neck. He’s nothing more than a speck on the rear radar, but if he catches me before I get down there, then this is going to have been for nothing at all. I know he’s going to drag me back, probably punish me. I’ll take it. It will be worth it to know that my life isn’t entirely worthless.
My plan is to hit the simulation, buzz my shuttle over the city, then land it and tell the gathered crowds the truth. Galactor will have no choice but to come in by force and the illusion of the human world will be shattered. I don’t need to do this right. There’s no real tactics to employ here. I just need to make a mess. And that’s kind of my jam.
VESSEL! YOU ARE APPROACHING IN AN UNAUTHORIZED MANNER! CEASE YOUR DESCENT AND MAKE FOR THE NEAREST DOCKING BAY!
I am tired of being ordered around by voices and men and men with voices. I am tired of being told I can’t change anything. I refuse to be helpless. I refuse to do nothing and be nothing.
I accelerate toward the simulation, knowing full well that this is dangerous and that I may not make it. There’s a bubble over it. I don’t know how thick it is, if it is permeable at all. It’s very possible that the moment I make contact with it, everything will be over.
It occurs to me in the seconds before I make impact, that this is the stupidest thing I’ve ever done. If this doesn’t work, I’ve thrown away everything. I’m never going to touch Tarkan again. He’s never going to know how much I love him…
FLOOP!
I slide through the space membrane smooth as silk and immediately forget all the self-recrimination. Fuck yeah. I’m amazing. I’m an amazing super hero. I’m going to save humanity.
The city is laid out beneath me as I zoom over it, pushing the controls lower so I buzz the tops of the buildings. I want people to see this. I want this to be something nobody is ever able to forget, no matter how much these aliens fuck with their minds.
A big open square thronged with people makes the best place to land. I put the shuttle down in the middle, throw the cockpit open and just start screaming.
“THESE ARE YOUR CAPTORS! THIS IS NOT A CITY ON EARTH! IT’S AN ALIEN COLONY! YOUR LIVES ARE LIES! REBEL! FIGHT THE SYSTEM!”
There is a sea of upturned faces staring at me. I feel the swelling of pure triumph. This is working! I’ve gotten through to them! Finally, these humans will break free from their alien oppressors. I will lead them into a glorious future of freedom. In the ruins of captivity, we will build a new civilization, and I will have Tarkan by my side - once he gets here. He shouldn’t be far away…
BOOM!
The sound of his shuttle tearing through the barrier above the city sends a shock wave clear across the entire simulation.
“Look!” I call out, pointing to his shuttle. “MORE ALIENS!”
“INVASION!” People start screaming. “THERE’S AN INVASION!”
“THE INVASION HAPPENED A LONG TIME AGO. BEFORE YOU WERE BORN,” I shout back. “GO! BE FREE! FIGHT THE POWER! STOP WORKING! THERE’S NO POINT! MONEY ISN’T REAL AND THE ALIENS ARE GOING TO HOUSE YOU ANYWAY! ALSO, THE 80’S WERE THOUSANDS OF YEARS AGO!”
I could scream forever, but I’m interrupted by the arrival of Tarkan’s shuttle landing next to mine.
I smile broadly as he alights, but almost immediately his presence causes pure panic. I have gotten used to seeing a ten foot tall beast man made of shanks, shivs, and knives, a creature who evokes the primal fear of the ultimate predator. But the crowd hasn’t.
Some people flee. Some people faint. Some stare at him open mouthed and afraid. There’s a lot of screaming, quite a bit of flailing and nobody is listening to me anymore
I turn to Tarkan, who reaches for me. Oh he’s angry. Really angry.
“You’re an idiot!”
“Hey now.”
Tarkan shakes me. “You could have killed yourself! You could have killed everyone here! Are you so desperate to disobey me you’re prepared to die?”
“I’m saving them!”
“HOW!?” He thunders the word at me, his fangs extended, dorsal ridge proud. I know he’s not going to hurt me. He would never hurt me, but he is angry, and he is ready for a fight. Not with me, but with the approaching army zooming over the city. Galactor isn’t playing now, and they’re obviously content to let the illusion of the simulation go to hell.
“Uh oh,” I murmur as the ships open fire.
I didn't think about what would happen after I told the people the truth. Riots maybe. Upheaval. Revolution. Rocks through windows. Stolen sneakers. But I guess I should have anticipated several thousand rounds of projectiles ripping into my general vicinity too.
Tarkan throws himself in front of me, stopping electric energy bolts from searing into my skin, and hard lead pellets from bursting through my body. He wraps himself around me and he holds me tight and I feel them hitting him even through his protective embrace.
Regret always comes too late.
Chapter Twelve - War
42
“I let you go once,” the judiciar says. “I will not be so lenient a second time.”
; What happened to us after the Galactor forces opened fire was a blur. I felt Tarkan’s grip on me loosen. I felt them pull me away from him. I think he might be dead. I think I might have gotten him killed. I think I might literally be the most stupid human in the entire universe.
I would say I don't know how I emerged from a hail of gunfire unharmed, but it was because Tarkan wrapped himself around me and used himself as a shield. And it worked. There's not even a scratch on me as I stand before the judiciar.
“Where’s Tarkan?”
“Don’t worry about him. Worry about yourself.”
“I’ve never worried about myself, and I’m not going to start now.”
The judiciar cracks a hint of a smile, but it is not the kind of smile that gives me any kind of relief. It is the smile of a predator.
“You were shown mercy, but I knew you would return. Humans do not want mercy. They want pain. They revel in it. If they are not given enough pain by the world they inhabit, they create more for themselves. Today you have created much pain, human. And the others will suffer under it for a very long time. Those who heard you will be punished.”
“Let them go!”
“Yes, I might do that to some of them,” he muses. “The pain of separation from everything they’ve known would be torturous. Perhaps I’ll put some of them on one rocky moon and some of them on another, and give them a telescope but no other means of communication…”
“You’re evil!”
“I’m not evil,” he says calmly. “I am justice.”
“There’s nothing just in locking people up and using them to make money.”
“Humans like to be locked up and used to make money. They did it to one another all the time when they were wild. We’ve just made the natural process profitable for Galactor - and why not. Why should humans survive when other species perish? They need to be useful to someone other than themselves.”
“You’re a bastard!”
“Do you know what else humans can’t resist?” He seems to ignore my comment.
“What?”
“A tragic hero.” He makes a gesture and a window opens. I can see through to the outside world barren and gray. There are hordes of soldiers out there, surrounding a very wounded Tarkan.
He’s alive! My joy at that revelation is quickly tempered by the fact that he is alive in body, but not in spirit. If he were truly still himself, not a single one of the soldiers around him would be alive. But he’s not hurting them. He’s not doing anything. I watch as one of them walks up with a knife and stabs Tarkan.
Oh now he’s going to die. Now I’m going to see what his intestines look like decorating the main highway of the city. I wait, my breath bated with anticipation.
But nothing happens. Another steps forward and does the same thing. Tarkan grunts and folds in the direction of the knives, but doesn’t lift a finger to defend himself.
My heart sinks and I feel the sudden urge to throw up, but I don’t. I stand and I stare, frozen.
“What is happening? He could kill every single one of them twice over. He’s going to ruin them. And then he’s going to ruin you.”
“Yes,” the judiciar agrees. “Ordinarily, if he weren’t full of rounds, he could. He might even be able to in his current wounded state. But he has been told you will be executed if he does not surrender, so I don’t think they're in any danger.”
“No!”
I watch in horror as Tarkan allows himself to be overcome by lesser peons. They approach him with guns and knives and they begin doing the most awful animal things to him, attacking all the parts of him that are the most dangerous. They break the spikes from his arms, they take pliers and try to rip the fangs from his face. They cut the dorsal fin from his back and he roars in pain, but he allows it to happen. For me.
I am the cause of this pain. This is my doing. Every nasty piece of cruelty inflicted on him is happening because I exist.
"Are you satisfied now?” The judiciar purrs. “Does this fill your dark little human heart with all the pain it craves?”
“TARKAN!” I scream his name.
He can’t hear me. And even if he could, it wouldn’t make a difference. A thick dark goo is oozing from his wounds, covering his bright flesh in what I guess must be some kind of natural defense. But it's not enough. They just keep carving into him, taking him apart one piece at a time.
“Scythkin take a very long time to die,” the judiciar muses. “I might call for dinner while we wait.”
“Please don’t kill him. Please.” My eyes are full of tears, my throat rasping with desperation as fall to my knees and begin to beg for my lover’s life.
“Why not? I told you what would happen if you returned. I told you that I would subject you both to the worst of my justice. You are here because you wanted pain. You craved it. And your scythkin is here to suffer the same.”
“PLEASE!” I scream the word, tears running down my face. I cannot expect the judiciar to have mercy. Mercy is not his business. He is a cold creature of logic and cruelty and he does not care about my suffering.
He looks at me with a faintly bored expression. “Have you learned your lesson, human?”
“YES! I’ll do as you say. Whatever you say.”
“You’ll go back into the simulation and you will tell your fellow humans that what you said to them was a lie. You will tell them that you are part of a plot to destroy their civilization. And then you will be executed.”
I swallow. And then I nod.
“Really,” the judiciar smirks. “You’d agree to be executed.”
“If it meant saving Tarkan.”
“I never said I’d save Tarkan. I asked you if you had learned your lesson.” His smirk grows wider, and I realize that this beast who is supposed to be the lord of all justice and reason and mercy and everything else is nothing more than a lord of lies.
“Do what you want,” I say, abandoning hope. “Tarkan and I will find each other in death, just as we did in life.”
“Well that’s a romantic notion, isn’t it. I think I should keep one of you alive, prevent that from happening. Maybe I’ll have your mind wiped again, sell you to another trader. Maybe…”
I stop listening. I shut down. I feel the world go cold and dark, just like it was when I was covered in those chains and waiting my end. This time, it is different. This time, I know that death will be followed by release into love.
Tarkan will wait for me on the other side, I am sure of it. There is no death that can separate us, not truly. We are of one soul. One mind. I will spend every lifetime from now until eternity repaying this debt.
BOOM!
An explosion shakes the building. It is followed by several more explosions, each of them louder and more damaging than the first. I look up, not in fear, because fear has gone away from me, but in vague interest and hope that this will be what ends it all.
A murketeer comes screaming into the room, arms flailing, teeth shining brightly. “JUDICIAR, WE MUST EVACUATE. WE ARE UNDER ATTACK.”
“From what?”
“SCYTHKIN BATTLE FLEETS.”
I see the judiciar’s face go sheet white.
“This isn’t their territory.”
“THEY BEG TO DIFFER!”
BOOM!
Another charge lands very close by, making the wall collapse and sending shards of steel and concrete shrapnel flying. I make no attempt to evade it, and much of it hits me, pain flashing through my body. But it is not enough. Not compared to what Tarkan has already endured.
I am blanking in and out of awareness, shutting down and then becoming briefly aware as the trauma of my previous ordeals at the hands of these monsters comes rushing back over me in waves, dragging me down to a place I thought I had escaped - but now I know I’ll never escape it. It will always be inside me. The horror lives in the pit of my core, the place where I am all hollowed out, where no act of heroism will be enough to save me.
Big arms wrap around me. I don’t know if
they are friend or foe. I just know that I am afloat in a world that is beyond my control, and that everything I ever have done, or ever will do, is pointless. Who was I to think that I could change things? I am nothing. I am a speck of nothing dancing on a pin of nothing, and when I am gone, the universe will not notice one bit.
Tarkan
They’ve been cutting me. Bleeding me. Killing me. Every slice has only served to remind me how much I love my human. I would be taken to pieces a thousand times over for her. These Galactor peons are weak, but their knives are sharp and the natural defenses of my body are being carved away one piece at a time. The agony is severe - but I was made to endure pain. I am scythkin.
I allow this, because it preserves 42 for a few hours longer, but…
BOOM!
War breaks over our heads. The sounds of battle burst into life, the rushing of ships, the firing of guns, and when the energy bombs begin to fall, my tormentors flee and I am left broken on the ground, an easy target for any ship.
I know the sounds of war. I thrill to them. They make what is left of my blood pump harder inside my veins. Galactor have made me weak, but they have not destroyed me. I am not so easy to kill, and I would have taken a thousand times the pain to save her.
A ship comes skimming overhead and unloads into the wall in front of me. It collapses to reveal a chamber, and inside the chamber is the woman I love more than life. She was so close all this time. They must have made her watch.
I draw a breath full of blood. The pain wracking my body is nothing to me, because I will have what I came for: her.
I rise from the ground, my butchered body doing the bidding of my will and I go to her one painful step at a time until I can wrap my arms around her tormented form, the darkness of my interior coating her skin as I pull her up and cry to the stars above.
She is mine. No matter what.
Mine, not until death us do part, for I would undo death and make it bow to me if it dared attempt to take her.