That’s all the convincing Mika needs. It’s not like that wasn’t where her mind was going, anyway. “Follow me. I know the way.”
That earns a smile. “I knew you would.”
“This way.” Mika takes the lead, buoyed by Syl’s confidence in her. Why does the alien’s praise mean so much?
Because she’s the kind of woman Mika always dreamed of being, sitting at home alone, playing video games. Strong. Capable. Commanding. Unapologetically sexual. To have someone like that acknowledge that in her? Trust her?
It feels kind of amazing.
They move off. After a few blocks and no activity of any kind, Syl moves closer, side by side with Mika. “Interesting.”
“What?”
Syl smirks. “The witches. I have seen their type before, in our elders. They act like they are all knowing. They are arrogant.”
Mika frowns, thinks of her parents. “Yeah. I know the type.”
“But they do not know that we’ve deviated. That we are not playing their game.”
“You’re right.” Mika glances at her display. 00:34:43 “Why aren’t we being attacked? Funneled again, like before?”
“Because those… Bitches… Do not know where are!”
Syl says the word like it’s a foreign language. Mika laughs, really laughs, for the first time since coming to this trial. Since she realized where they were. What game this was modeled after.
No. Not going to think about that. Not going to let it bring her down. So she laughs and lets herself experience that little pocket of joy. Even if it’s short lived.
Syl’s eyebrow is cocked. “Was my attempt at humor that… Humorous?”
“No, no. Well, yes.” Mika wipes away tears, takes Syl in a one-armed hug. “Just the way you said it. Your English is incredible, but the way you say some words…” Mika stops at the confusion on Syl’s face. “What?”
“English? I am not speaking English.”
“Of course you are. I can see your lips moving, can understand you.”
Syl looks stricken. “I am as stupid as a farloth.”
Mika finally stops, worry draining the last of her mirth and any desire to ask what a farloth is. “Syl, what the hell are you talking about?”
The alien paces to a nearby building, then returns, chewing her lip. “Mika, when I speak, you hear… English?”
“Yes.”
“And my lips, they form these English words?”
“Yes! Trust me, I would have told you if you looked like a villain from a Kung Fu movie a long time ago.”
Syl’s brow furrows. “Kung… Fu? No, it is not important.” She stands fully in front of Mika, speaks slowly. “When you speak to me, it is in Threvian. Your lips, tongue, they form the Threvian words.”
Mika blinks. “What?”
“In retrospect, I should have realized the oddness. Your tongue is not built for our language, as short and stunted as it is.” She glances up. “No offense meant.”
“None taken,” Mika whispers. “But, what does this mean?”
“That you are speaking your language, and I am speaking mine. But we can understand each other. Our mouths form the proper shapes, to the other.”
“Which means…” Mika puts her hand to her mouth. “This place is screwing with our brain function. Our perception of reality.”
“Yes.”
“Oh, shit.” A thousand thoughts flush through her mind. If the Citadel can make her see whatever it wants… “How can we trust anything we see?”
Syl motions to her wrist pad, and they move off again. “On one claw, I would say we cannot. But on the other?” She motions to the broken buildings that surround them. “It makes some kind of sense. How would we be seeing this if our minds were not altered somehow?”
“I don’t know.” Mika’s mind races. “I had originally thought holodeck, but if this is all taking place in our minds? That makes a certain kind of sense. More technologically attainable, too.”
“Holodeck?”
“Never mind. Just… Something for us to remember. For now, I don’t think this changes anything.”
“Agreed, we must find Sam. Save him if he has not already come to the same conclusion we have.”
“Yes,” Mika says fervently. “We’re close.”
Syl glances to her, eyes intent on Mika’s face. “You care for him.”
Mika looks down. “Yes. Very much.”
An odd look crosses Syl’s face at her response before she looks away. “I understand.” She’s quiet for a full block. When she speaks, she’s hesitant in a way Mika’s never heard. “I have come to… Care for him. As well.”
Sam’s face, winking, as he teases her. His command, courage, as he pulled her through the first few trials when she felt like a total wreck and failed to hide it. The feel of his cock in her hand and his lips hard against hers, taking her to places she’d only dreamed of for years. These memories are so fresh, so vibrant. Damn, she misses him so much. “I don’t blame you.”
Syl takes a long breath. “Among my people, monogamy is unknown. We mate for convenience, to breed. One female may birth children from many males over her life. It is… Necessary.” She says the word with bitter distaste. “It was not always such.”
Mika files that for later, stays silent. Syl’s leading toward something.
“I know it is not so for humans. In most Earth cultures my people have studied, even among those where unions are frequently sundered, humans take only one mate.”
“That’s true,” Mika says.
“So.” Syl coughs, a little hissing exhalation. “If my interest in Sam… and you… is misplaced… I am content to…”
She’s so adorably awkward, so nervous, that Mika has to stop her. She grabs Syl’s arm, turns her. “Syl.” She motions around her, nods to her staff, blazing with amber flame. “I have no fucking idea where we are. Why we’re here. I didn’t know that aliens really existed two days ago.” She laughs. “Fuck monogamy. Fuck tradition. I think it's safe to say we care for you, too.”
Syl looks up, guarded. “You are sure?”
Mika examines herself, really considers, for the first time. Would she have said so, before she’d died? Probably not. Sam is her first… everything. She probably would have been jealous as fuck. But now? After all they’ve been through, the insanity of this place? Of dying? “Yeah, I’m sure.”
Syl flushes, her scales lightening. “Well. Then.” She leans forward, kisses Mika’s cheek. A light brush, a trailing of her tongue. Mika shudders. “Later, then. When we have time, this should be explored.”
“What if Sam protests?”
“I do not think he will. I have seen the way he looks at us. But if he does, I believe you and I can convince him.”
Mika shivers at the emphasis she puts on the word. “We should hurry. If this is a trap…”
“I do not believe it is.”
Mika gives her a skeptical glance. “Oh?”
“No. As of now, we are playing the witches’ game. Or so they think. Else, would they allow us to rush to Sam’s rescue?”
“That’s true.”
“Whatever he faces at his destination, whatever trap they have designed, I do not believe he is in mortal danger. Why attempt to suborn us back at their dwelling? Why the seduction when they could have easily killed us?”
Syl made a lot of sense. “Okay. I still think we should get moving, though.”
“Agreed. How close?”
Mika squints. “Four blocks, then a turn, five blocks in the direction of the cathedral.”
“Excellent.” Syl flexes her claws.
They move quickly, side by side, lost in their own thoughts for a minute. They move quickly, not fast enough to raise a racket and possibly bring the townspeople down on them but still at a good pace. Mika damps Inferno’s flame to almost nothing, and they stay near one set of buildings in shadows, only darting across intersections when they have to.
All the while, Mika chews on something,
almost chickens out before blurting: “Syl, please tell me more about your people.”
Syl starts, frowns. “For what purpose?”
Mika laughs quietly at the alien’s confusion. It really hadn’t occurred to her to share?
Then again, maybe not. The last few days have been… it’s been hard to care about the real world in here. To wonder. Maybe that’s why she hadn’t thought to ask before. “Well, you know a lot about humans. In fact, why is that? Have you contacted us?”
Syl’s look is guarded. “Yes,” she says simply.
“Hah! I fuckin’ knew it. The conspiracy theorists were right the whole time.”
“Perhaps.”
Mika quirks her lip. Syl is reticent, suddenly. The question is why? “Syl, what’s the matter?”
“Nothing, Mika.”
Mika doesn’t want to press, push her somewhere she doesn’t want to go. Syl’s sudden shift is confusing, but she doesn’t know anything of Threvian culture, their history. If this is a sore spot…
Maybe a different tack. “You told us you’d never seen your home world. Why is that?”
Syl’s scales darken slightly. “Plague.”
“On your home world? Damn.” She’s silent a moment. “Must have been bad.”
“Yes.” Syl’s eyes hold so much sorrow, such loss, that Mika almost stops her. “Long ago, hundreds of years. Our planet was ravaged by a plague of such ferocity that those in orbit and all in space were warned not to come home.”
“Oh, damn.”
“Yes. Billions perished over the space of months.”
“But you survived. You know of Earth.”
“Yes. Though we had not yet mastered faster than light travel, we were on the cusp. Those in space congregated on an orbital station, learned to create the food and the resources we needed to survive. It was… It almost ended there. Warring factions, shortages…” She shudders. “It is a miracle our species survived.”
“What happened?”
“We needed a cause. All of our old religions were long dead, and so we had to find something else to rally behind.” Her words are quiet, reverent. “Bastion was that cause.”
“Bastion?”
Syl smiles. “I can tell by your facial features that the word does not translate.” She taps her head with a claw. “It is the version of the word this place is putting in your brain. It will suffice.”
“What was it?”
“A world ship. Capable of travelling to distant stars, vast enough to house what was left of my race. With resources to feed us and house us we left our ravaged planet behind.”
“Did any survive? Down there?”
She sighs. “Yes. At least, when we left. You saw one of their outposts, in the first trial we faced. There are not many, and their lives are…. Difficult.”
That’s putting it lightly, if what they saw was true. The hooting of the scaag echoes through Mika’s mind, and she shivers. “What then?”
“We travelled. Sent forth thousands of probes. Bastion required enormous resources, some of which we could not simulate in space, and so we made first contact with dozens of races. Most instances were peaceful.” She pauses, a hesitation so slight Mika almost misses it. “But not always.”
There’s that guardedness again. They’ve almost caught up with Sam. Mika doesn’t have long. “Syl, what… Is there something you need me to know?”
The Threvian turns, stares at Mika for a long moment. Her eyes are wide, pleading. “Mika, please. Our time runs short, and we have almost found Sam. There is so much to tell and so much to share, about your life and about mine. After this. If we survive. When we have time, I will share everything of myself. As will you. There is nothing more sacred to my people than trust.” She puts a finger to Mika’s lips, not to silence her. A promise. “Until then.”
There’s something Syl’s not telling her, something important. The same thing Sam almost pulled from her earlier. But does it matter right now?
Mika glances down the street. Not too distant is a house with a single glowing window, its light spilling into the street like a beacon.
Sam. They had to hurry.
She takes Syl’s hand, drags her along. “Until then. I trust you.”
Syl relaxes, tension draining visibly. She gives Mika the briefest of hugs, grabbing her from behind. “Thank you, viera.” Her words are a warm brush at Mika’s ear.
“Viera?”
Syl’s eyes widen. “That is our word. You heard it?”
Mika nods.
“It means many things. Clan. Friend. Love.” She shrugs. “Viera.”
Mika smiles. “I like that.” She quickens her pace, wonders why the Citadel didn’t translate that one. She’s glad it did. “Let’s get Sam.”
“Yes,” Syl says, baring needle-sharp teeth.
20
Chamber 5
Aspirant #2239
Room Timer: 00:41:18
The city is silent as death.
I can’t get over it. Ten minutes ago, millions of people thronged the streets, trampling each other in their eagerness to get at us and rip us to shreds, only held back by the Jötunn. Throngs of slavering faces and murder filled eyes backed by a flaming beast out of my nightmares.
Now, there’s nothing.
It’s fucking creepy. I’m not afraid to admit it. Where are they? There aren’t broken bodies on the ground, the trampled dead under the feet of the others. There’s no blood or teeth or discarded weapons.
Were they real to begin with?
Oh well, screw it. They looked real enough at the time and now they’re gone. Part and parcel as far as the Citadel is concerned. I’m sure the witches were full of shit, but at least they didn’t lie about that. My way is clear, an almost straight shot from the cottage to my destination.
Now that I’m away from the women, I have a bit to reflect. It’s kind of crazy that I haven’t questioned the Citadel in what feels like forever, that the desire to know why the hell we’re here has dampened as much as it has. I mean, I want to know, but before the need to figure this out and escape was all consuming. My only real motivation.
Now? That’s dulled.
When did this shit become my new normal?
I took a few night classes at the local community college a few years ago. Dimly lit rooms full of uninterested teachers and middle-aged burnouts. I quit after one semester when I got a long-haul trucking job, and don’t remember much. But a few things stuck with me.
One class was intro to psychology. I don’t remember much about it, but the phrase “cognitive dissonance” jumps out at me like a half-forgotten dream. Something about how, when faced with circumstances that the brain can’t change, it instead forces itself to be okay with them. Like buying something non-returnable and then regretting it, but a week later you’re cool because there’s no point in feeling shitty when you’re stuck with it.
Is that what this is? I can’t change my circumstances, so I’m just rolling with the punches?
Maybe. Or maybe it’s more. Maybe it’s that I’ve almost died a half dozen times and might die in the next hour. Maybe it’s that I’ve been through shit I never thought I could survive, and somehow… I’m fucking loving it.
Part of it is her . Them . Mika. Syl. I love Mika, like no woman I’ve ever known. And Syl? Do I love her? Does it make me some kind of asshole that I think I do? They’re not the same, and my feelings for them aren’t, either. But they’re both incredible. And, if I’m not crazy, both want me.
Goddamn. I don’t know how to sort this.
Part of me doesn’t care. I’m taking each moment for what it is. Surviving and trying to keep them alive, too. Whatever’s at the end of this, we’ll figure it out when we get there.
My worry for them is a knot at the back of my brain. I hate being separated, hate that I’m on my own. I’m more capable and dangerous than I’ve ever been or ever thought myself capable of being, but this place has shown me repeatedly that all that means dick. That a fi
fty-foot-tall monstrosity might jut from the ground at any moment to devour me alive.
But somehow, I doubt it. The witches may be lying through their teeth about many things, but I don’t think they want me dead. They could have killed me a dozen times already. If they really do command the millions in this city and the Jötunn, we’d never have made it to their cottage. And I don’t want to remember how powerless I was once we met the Sisters.
As for whatever’s guarding the piece of the door?
I pass a statue of a woman, head hacked off and arms raised upward. She’s surrounded by hundreds of burning candles, but something about them is… Off. They don’t lend nearly as much light as they should, and all of it is directed inward at the statues battered body, stone that looks like it’s been hacked with blades. There’s no molten wax under the candle flames, and somehow, I’m sure that these have been burning for a really long time.
What does it mean? Is it part of the video game Mika recognized when we got here? Some creepy effect the Citadel dreamed up just for us?
I keep moving, ticking off blocks somewhere in the back of my head. They’re so similar, so unchanging, that I’m kind of amazed I can keep track; I’ve never been great with directions or numbers. If not for GPS, I wouldn’t have kept my truck driving jobs long and a lot of loads would have ended up in really bizarre places.
It’s just another change in me, something the Citadel’s done. Another part of that new normal. Though, this one scares me a lot more than bigger biceps or faster reflexes. If this place can change the way my brain works, what’s stopping it from changing me? Altering my opinions and thoughts. Brainwashing me?
I chew my lip, squinting through a broken doorway into the shadowed building beyond. It’s a disturbing thought. One more thing to shelve for later, when I’m back with the girls.
I finally reach my turn, a corner that looks pretty much like the ones that have come before. But I know I’ve counted correctly, and so I stop, pressed up against the filthy stone of what looks like an old shop. I peer around the corner.
Light. Glowing from a single window five blocks down, spilling like amber liquid into the street. The only light on a street that stretches further than I can see.
Aspirant: A Sci-Fi Harem Adventure Page 26