by Lydia Kang
“I’ll take care of that.” A barrel-shaped guy with a Mohawk and one-inch ear studs leans over, putting a silver coin on the bar. I spin around.
“No, really, thanks, but—”
“Come with me, and I’ll forgive the debt,” he says, pulling me by the waist onto the dance floor. He’s so huge that I’m airborne for a second before I can push him away.
“I . . . I have to drink this first.”
“Okay, but I’m coming for you later.” It sounds like a threat, though the guy smiles at me, showing dyed black teeth. Monstrous, but very underground-vogue. All my life, I haven’t garnered attention from guys, and now I’m attracting ogres. Awesome.
The bartender gives me a suspicious look for nursing my cocktail, so I hastily take a gulp. It tastes like hairspray mixed with green apple. I’m sure it’s killing the lining of my stomach on contact. Before the bartender walks away again, I wave at her. This time she lands her elbows on the bar.
“So, you know anyone here named Q?” I have to yell my question three times before she hears me over the din of the music.
“Anybody who goes by alphabet letters is either a rock star or incarcerated. But you could get lucky. Try the Alucinari Rooms,” she yells back, pointing to a door at the far end of the room.
“Thanks!” I leave my drink on the bar. Already my face is flushed from the alcohol. I dislike the feeling—anything that makes me, well, not like me. I never understood the neurodrug groupies at school, or the secret ether-injection parties I’m happily excluded from. You always have to face reality again. I don’t need another reality, because the only other one I want—with Dyl back in my life—can’t be supplied with drugs.
I check the black box pendant in my skirt pocket. If this drink is stronger than I expect, I’ll have to put it on soon. Out of the parting crowd, the black-toothed guy zeroes in on me and heads over. Cripes. I duck into a throng of dancers and run through the door.
It empties into a spiral staircase. All the way down, alcoves in the walls contain plaster-like busts of figures. They’re unisex and featureless, except for an open mouth offering a bright-colored pill on an extended tongue. A guy in front of me pauses at a bust and gives it a lascivious kiss, then tosses his head back to swallow the pill.
The plaster bust coos at him. “You’re welcome.” It smiles, then opens its mouth to reveal a new orange pill for the taking.
A girl with a shaved head grabs the guy’s hand and laughs. “You slut! That’s your third, you’re asking for it!” They both gallop downward, ahead of me. It’s hard to avoid being bumped and pushed as I squeeze past people in the narrow stairwell. They cover the steps and walls, talking, drinking, or making out, writhing to the music.
At the bottom of the stairs, a smoky hallway with several doors stretches into darkness. I trip over something. The guy who popped the three pills is lying on the floor with the girl sprawled atop him. She’s yanking his shirt down, biting his neck. The guy doesn’t seem to care one way or another. He claws at the air around her head.
“Oohhhaaaahhh. Look . . .” He’s totally out of it and she’s just having her way with him, right there in the hallway. I wouldn’t be surprised if they’re naked in a few minutes.
The only sober-looking girl I can find leans against the wall between two doors. She smokes a tiny pipe, watching the dazed people pass by. I beeline toward her.
“Hey, do you know where the Alucinari Rooms are?”
She removes her pipe, the fuchsia smoke curling out of her nostrils. “Right here, sweets. Pick your poison.”
“Thanks.” I walk down the hallway, perusing the choices. Random body parts float outside each room. A pink-irised eye. An ear. There’s a quivering jellyfish that’s probably a brain. A hand with fingers, stretching and curling into a fist. Down the corridor, more doors and their holograms are hidden by clouds of fumes.
As I pass underneath the disembodied hand, it undulates toward me. A whisper of softness touches my cheek. It’s a hologram, how could it actually touch me? I shake my head. No time to think about that now. If Q is here, I need to find him. If not . . .
Well. I can’t think about that. I take a brave breath and push the door open. A pink pulsating cloud obscures the ceiling and twists frothy tendrils downward every few feet. It’s impossible to avoid the ropes of blushing mist. As I walk in, they softly fall over my shoulders, slinking down my back and arms.
A guy lies near my feet with his hands splayed out, as if beseeching the air. His eyes are shut, and he hums deep in his throat, a human purr. Another couple on the floor pets each other’s ankles over and over again, lost to the repetitive movement. The girl clenches her teeth so hard, her jaw muscles ripple.
Was it the pill buffet on the way down the stairs? Did everyone take something except me? Just then, I step under one of the rivulets of pink smoke, and the coolness dances down my face. I inhale a tiny bit, in surprise. The scent of wine and sugary syrup blossoms inside me. The sweetness hits my throat and my lungs, and, oh god, I feel like I’m sucking in the best-tasting ice cream and chocolate and everything delicious and forbidden straight into my bloodstream.
The pink fog continues to swirl coolly down my face and neck, but it’s not just there. It’s in me, in my fingertips and caressing the backs of my knees from the inside. A warm hand touches my shoulder and I grab it, hungry for the sensation. I want to dig that hand into my body, let it pierce me because the pain would be lovely. Pure and awful and beautiful.
The hand turns me around. Through the brain-fog, I see him. The Mohawk guy who bought me the drink. His eyes travel over my body, fix on my mouth while a broad hand slips from my shoulder to the nape of my neck. Part of me is terrified, but that part is docile and numb, pushed aside by the strawberry clouds mingling in my blood. His teeth glint black like polished coal and part to reveal a thrice-forked tongue.
As he comes closer, his face divides a column of pink smoke. A wisp of it disappears into his nostrils, then more. He inhales deeply, his eyes shutting tight from the rush.
Another hand encircles my left arm. And another. I feel four hands on my body, which computes as impossible in my hazy brain. Are they real? Is it Hex? But all four hands suddenly release me. I watch, fascinated, as the black-toothed guy is pried from my body and pushed to the floor, where he groans in pleasure from the impact.
Whoever pushed Mohawk Guy stands behind me. Hands move to encircle my waist, and I gasp, shutting my eyes when I feel lips meet the nape of my neck. The lips are strong, insistent, and follow the curve of my jaw to graze my cheek. I can’t stand it anymore. I spin around to grasp the face I still can’t see and I crush the stranger’s lips to mine, letting the relentless slow beat push our bodies together.
I am four arms and four legs, and two mouths and two tongues, out of control. The pink smoke rains down on our bodies, but somewhere inside, a tiny remnant of good sense is screaming. What is it saying? I don’t care. Shut up, shut up, I’m busy. My nerves are all on fire and it’s torture and it’s heaven and I’m busy.
Reason shrieks again, so insistent amidst the sick sweetness of candy and wine.
Breathe, Zelia, the voice screams. Breathe!
The zillions of nerves firing pleasure all at once suddenly stop firing. Everything turns off so fast that I can’t catch myself as I fall. Two strong arms slow my descent; they drag me out to the hallway, away from the serpentine hand above the door begging for my return. People step over me, uncaring, as cool air touches my face.
Breathe.
I don’t know if the command is from me or someone else, but I obey, gasping the unadulterated air and arching my back to inhale deeply. My senses slowly become mine again. There is someone by my side, his voice emerging clearer and clearer by the second.
“Breathe! Keep going, breathe now.” I know that voice. I know the hands too. They’re warm. I remember their imprint on my body from just seconds ago. The face comes into focus, and I’m relieved to see white teeth, not black.
Charcoal eyes flecked with green and gold watch me.
It’s Cy.
• • •
I’M MORTIFIED. DID I REALLY TONGUE-WRESTLE with Cy? Or did the pink mist uncover some unconscious daydream of mine I didn’t know was so . . . racy? I still feel terrible, so I just concentrate on sucking and expelling air while he cradles my head. Cy doesn’t say a word. His black tattooed mask is the tiniest bit blurred already, the ink now looking like he smudged soot all over his face.
“What . . . what just happened in there?” I ask.
“You stopped breathing, so I pulled you into the hallway.”
“But . . . what . . .”
“They lace all the rooms with drugs, it seems.”
“Were you drugged too?”
Cy doesn’t answer me; he’s checking my pulse. I wonder if he can measure my embarrassment under his fingertips. I’m still so fuzzy. Did I imagine everything? Or was Cy in complete control, when his hands were up the back of my shirt and on my thighs and oh my god. What really happened?
“Water.” My throat is so dry that the request is croaked, rather than spoken.
“I don’t want to leave you,” he says, and I return his concern with a coughing fit so violent that tears pour down my cheeks.
“I’ll get you something. Wait here.” He gently scoots me over and props me against the wall. I watch him step over the other people in the hallway, cat-like, making his way upstairs to the bar.
I just concentrate on my breathing and try not to hack up a lung again. This time, I’m taking no chances. There are too many weird vapors oozing out of the rooms here. I put on my necklace, making sure the clasp is secure.
My body responds to the tidal rhythm of the pendant. I relax a little, watching the other people walking by. The door to the room I’ve just left opens again, and a hand claws at the doorjamb. The guy with the black teeth drags himself out of the room, and as his head emerges, he sucks in the normal air, eyes squeezed shut.
I stand up, wobbling to the side. I’m not going to get pawed by this guy again. He opens his eyes and sees me.
“You!” he slurs, dribbling saliva down his chin.
“I’m not on the menu, sorry.” I trot a crooked path down the hallway. My legs feel weak, but I’ve a head start in sobriety. I can hide out somewhere else until Cy returns. As I push my way through a tangle of people by the brain room, I hear a laugh.
I know that laugh.
It’s a girl’s, one that rings like bells, high above the noise of the crowd. I twist around, searching anxiously for the source. I push people out of the way, trying to filter out the noise, wanting to scream at everyone to be silent. And then I see her, supported by two boys who smile smugly at her drug-induced mirth.
Dirty blond hair in ragged curls falls over her thin shoulders. A low-cut green dress is plastered to her frame, and eyes rimmed thickly in smudged blue eyeliner look straight at me, but don’t see me.
I scream.
CHAPTER 13
“DYLIA!” I SHRIEK, RUNNING TO HER. Everything about her is wrong, so wrong. Her bloom of health is withered beneath a pasty complexion. The slinky clothes and smeared makeup remind me of a dress-up game gone totally wrong, as if a little girl decided to play neurodrug addict instead of tea party.
I’m seeing Dyl’s innocence, the last bit of real goodness in the world, being flayed. And I know, as sure as I need another gasp of air, that it’s all against her will.
“Dyl! Dyl!” I push my way through the crowd, the vision of her half-dead eyes in my head. A large girl shoves me to the wall, irritated that my hands are so desperate to wipe her out of my way. I lose sight of Dyl. The crowd surrounding her slithers farther away, drawn into the room with the pulsating brain. I catch a glimpse of her ratty hair as the door closes.
“Dyl!” I scream again. I throw the door open and frantically scan the room. This one has glowing blue orbs of smoke that float around. An orange-haired girl wearing a chain-mail mini-dress saunters up to the orb bobbing closest to me. She purses her lips, as if kissing the sphere, and it shrinks in size as she inhales it.
“So . . . sweet . . .” she murmurs as she backs away from me, eyes glazing over with contentment.
I push her out of the way, and she laughs hollowly. The room is crowded, and I can’t get past the people right before me. I weave in and out of the blue orbs, refusing to get any of the inhalant in my face. The back of the room is partitioned off by a black wall with an entrance on each side. I start to make my way to the left opening, when a leathery hand pushes my chest.
“This is a private room.” The boy who’s holding me back is tall, wearing an unbuttoned, expensive-looking white shirt. His neck, chest—all of him, really—are covered in a hard, bumpy brown material, only slightly less repellant than a giant scab. His face is covered in a shiny white mask that reveals only his unsmiling lips.
“I need to get back there,” I beg, clutching his hard, scaly hand. It doesn’t budge. He pushes me hard, and I fall onto the ground painfully, skidding against the wall. There’ll be a fresh bruise adorning my hip where I’ve fallen, I’m sure. He laughs, as do the people around me. No sympathy for underdogs here.
“Fine,” I say. I stand up, pretending to walk away, then dash to the other open side of the wall. I get one foot into the room before I crash into a steel-hard pole. No, it’s not a pole, or even a piece of furniture. It’s a squat, muscular boy just under my height. I shelter my ribs where the pain begins to spread and notice that he too is wearing a glossy white mask.
He takes one hand and grabs my neck, not squeezing, just holding me in place. It’s like a metal vise. I scrape and claw the hand, screaming, but he won’t let go.
“Get OFF me!” I kick him hard, only to be rewarded with a throbbing pain in my foot. It feels like I just kicked a boulder. Geez, is this kid wearing steel plates under his clothes?
“Shhh.” A girl’s voice whispers in my ear from behind. “Time for you to check out, darling.” Thin feminine fingers cover my eyes for several seconds. I blink wildly as my world descends into black. My eyes feel like rubber globes, my lids fluttering strangely over them as they search for light, people, anything.
The vise-like grip around my neck is released, and I stagger away with my hands splayed out. The edge of the wall finds my fingertips, and I cling to it. I’ve no confidence that the floor is solid, or that there isn’t a gigantic hole I’m about to step into. Male and female voices murmur, giggle, chortle.
They are laughing at me.
They are laughing at me because I’m completely blind.
• • •
“DYL!” I SEARCH THE ECHOES OF LAUGHTER, trying to find the thread of her voice. But I can’t find it. She’s gone, and I am worse than helpless. The sick fear of losing her again overwhelms my body and I dry heave, my knees hitting the floor.
I wish Cy were here. I feel my way around the wall to a flat section, pressing my face up against the cold plane to avoid the blue puffballs. I swallow over and over, the saliva pooling in my mouth in reaction to all the retching. I touch my earlobe, hoping my holo is still on. “Someone, please help me. I’m in the Alucinari Room with the brain. I can’t see.” I choke on my words.
“You can’t see because you’ve met Caliga.” A guy’s voice sounds close to my ear, the tone warm and gentle.
“Who’s Caliga?” My words sound slightly garbled with my face pressed against the wall.
“Her talents are pretty wicked. She numbed your optic nerves, but it’ll pass shortly.” A warm hand covers my cold one where it’s splayed against the wall. A buzz of prickly heat emanates from his hand into mine.
“Who is this?” I ask. The hand gathers mine in his as another cradles my back tightly as if I’m in danger of sinking in a black, deep sea.
“You know who I am.”
“Q,” I whisper in the darkness. My statement is affirmed by a hand squeeze. The buzzing feeling intensifies and I yank my hand away. “You’re hurting me.”<
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“Sorry, I’ll tone that down.” His hand meets mine again, and this time it’s just warmth, no buzzing. What the hell was that? “Come on, let’s get you out of here—”
“No! My sister, I have to—I can’t go.” I push his hands away, trying to find the wall. Something catches my toe and I tumble, flying through nothingness until my palms and knees slam the floor. Before my head follows suit, Q’s arms encircle my waist to pull me off the ground.
“You’re in no state to go anywhere. And anyway, Dylia is gone.”
My heart sinks. “How do you know?”
“This is when they put her down for the night. They’ve been keeping her asleep most of the time.”
“No. No.” It’s all I can manage to say. This can’t be happening. They’re chemically tying her wrists. No wonder she looks so half human.
“Come on, let’s get you out of this room. The neurodrug clouds are everywhere, so forgive me for this.” One warm hand gently molds to the back of my neck, the other rides on my left hip as we walk into the void. He guides my head left, down, and right, so no doses of drugs hit me. Soon, the overwhelming stench of sweat disappears and the sensation of claustrophobia peels away.
“Here, sit down.” He guides me to a soft seat. “Did you come alone?”
“Yes,” I lie. I’m afraid he won’t tell me everything if he knows I’m with the others. I still can’t see much, but a faint patch of midnight blue enters the inky blackness. My deadened retinas are fighting to register every bit of light possible.
“How did you get here?” he asks, but I wave away his questions.
“It doesn’t matter. I came here to find you, and I found Dyl.” And then I lost her. I twist my fingers together, squeezing so hard it hurts. “How do you know so much about Dyl? Are you part of Aureus?”
“I’m just hired help there. But I want to help you, Zelia. Your dad saved my life a long time ago. I owe him.”
“You knew him too?” How come everyone got to spend time with him but Dyl and me? Jealousy swells up in me, quickly extinguished by regret and sadness. If only I could ask Dad now. My life is so replete with “if’s.” I mask a sniffle and blink rapidly, wondering if numbed eyes can cry.