The happy-ever-after kind.
Chapter Six
Hours later, Steffi hovered at the entrance to the turquoise tunnel, pacing this way, then stopping to nurse her sore back, then pacing that way, again and again. How long had it been now? Too bloody long. She galloped her fingertips on the same spot on the hard, luminous rim of the archway. The rhythm made no sound at all. She went to chew her lower lip for the umpteenth time but it was still bruised and bloody.
Flyte’s eager voice crackled to life over the comm link. She whistled and waved to Arne, who was recovering on the banks of the lagoon. He sat up right away.
“We’ve retaken the Albatross, Cap.” Flyte’s prolonged breath of relief sounded like a gale force wind buffeting the flames of a bonfire. “Just like you said. Rex and I did a Star Wars in our Royal spacesuits. You know, escorting Chewbacca—sorry, McKendrick—at gunpoint to the Royals’ ship. It was a capital idea. And they fell for it!” He paused, probably to gather his breath. “We overpowered the pilots and crippled the engine. Then we used exactly the same ruse aboard the Albatross. Chance and Alex were tied up in B corridor, watched by two guards. When Rex saw the big bruise on Alex’s neck, he didn’t say anything. He disarmed both Royals like that”—Flyte clicked his fingers—“dragged them into the airlock and hurled the bastards out into space.”
Steffi held a fist, then thumped it in triumph on the rock-hard rim. “Great show, you guys. Seriously, you did good.” She raised both arms aloft, sharing the celebration with Arne.
“Thanks, Cap. You should have been here—we got rid of every one of those sons of bitches.”
“Get your ass over here right away,” she replied. “I want to hear it in person.”
“Roger that…with bells on.”
Ten minutes later, he lumbered in through the tunnel in full suit sans helmet, his eyes immediately drawn toward a particular pear tree near the lagoon. A petite young redhead with light freckles stirred when she glimpsed him. Flyte blushed in reply.
“So it’s all ours, Cap,” he said, stealing another glance at the fragile-looking girl.
“Very nice work. A friend of yours?” Steffi teased. She loved winding Flyte up in that big sisterly sort of way.
“Yes. We, um, rather got to know each other while you were away. It’s their custom here. Where we shake hands and buy drinks, they lay you down and…pretty much have sex with you on the nearest comfortable spot. All very proactive.”
Steffi raised an eyebrow, pretending surprise. “So…who disobeyed me first today? I gave explicit orders for you not to come in here without me.”
“Um, yeah, you can probably guess. Rex and I were on our way back when we realised McKendrick had disappeared and…well, you know what she’s like.”
“I’ll deal with her later.”
Flyte rubbed his gloved forefinger back and forth over the stubble on his chin, a nervous tic that had often betrayed him during games of baccarat and poker. “Yeah, we told her it was dumb, but she went anyway. We reckoned it would be better to keep an eye on her, to make sure things stayed as cordial as possible. And they did.” He cleared his throat. “To say the least.”
Arne’s hand caressed, tickled her bare stomach. It reminded her of his eagerness to get her in the sack earlier. So he hadn’t lied. All the lagoon folk, it seemed, made love as a courtesy to attraction rather than leaving it as a promise waiting to be fulfilled. They acted on those sexual urges that most people suppressed in civilised society. And here, any question of unrequited attraction would be irrelevant; the lagoon folk were all knockout beauties.
“And McKendrick?” Steffi asked. “What did they make of her?”
Flyte sniggered in his snooty manner. “What do you think?”
“I figured. Don’t tell me…she’s had half the men already.”
“She’s given it a good try. I felt sorry for Rex, though. He was propositioned by at least five girls before they got the message. Apparently there’s no word for married here. He had to use the word mate, then they got the picture.”
Steffi turned to Arne. “So what are you, really?” She combed his long blond hair back behind his ears. “Nymphs and satyrs? You said the watchers created you as well. So there must be some mythological connection.” A gentle lump in her throat dropped an acorn of fear into the pit of her stomach. What the hell was he? Why was he reluctant to tell her? She didn’t know anything about him, despite them having slept in the same bed. She focused on his perfect features and the unblinking adoration in his blue eyes.
Did it really matter that he was something unnatural? What did natural mean anyway? Human? If the despicable Royals were any measure of that label, maybe it was better that Arne didn’t qualify. Unnatural, up to a point, might well be just what she needed.
Maybe.
“You are right about that,” he admitted. “We are creatures of myth. The watchers created us to bring joy to Earth. But I would prefer to show you what we are rather than tell you.”
“Well? Here we are.” She swallowed again. His cryptic remarks didn’t bode well. What if he transformed into some startling aberration? Something that gave her the creeps? Would he ever seem as sweet again if the change was too drastic?
“When the time is right, I will show you.” His bloodied lips curled into a sore smile. He flinched when she touched the bruise on his chin.
Steffi drew her hand away and, blaming herself for everything that had happened, curled her fingers into a gentle, apologetic ball. “This was all my fault, Arne.” Her monotone voice sounded far too cold and remorseless for what she wanted to say, but it was her captain’s voice—conditioned, pragmatic, a shield over emotion—and would not give in. “Those bastards followed me for a week through deep space. I had no right staying here so long and subjecting you to that. I…I brought them here…to all of you.” The shield wavered and she felt it slipping. The warm beginnings of tears trickled from the heavy sponge behind her eyes. “You can never forgive me, but—”
“If you were guilty of anything, I would have already forgiven you. But, Steffi, we know you never intended for this to happen, so there is nothing to forgive. I will never regret your arrival for a moment. On the contrary, I consider myself the luckiest man in the history of our kind, for while I was stuck in the past, in fantasies, I was visited by the only real woman I have ever met…a woman…both timely and timeless.”
Steffi started to sob but turned away instead. Those were the loveliest words she’d ever heard, and from a man whom she knew meant each and every one of them. How could she have been so lucky to find him? It was so much more than she deserved.
Surges of pride and shame lifted Steffi away from him, to her feet. She needed to change the subject, to distract her from the tears piling inside. “It’s okay, there’s no hurry…I guess,” she pressed without meaning to.
“No hurry?” Arne queried.
“For showing me…whatever it is you’re going to show me. Don’t worry, we have time.”
“Yes.”
The vapour cloud hung low over the lagoon, and even appeared to dip into the water a few hundred yards offshore. Fidgety whispers from the naked folk huddling in small groups in the undergrowth gnawed at her sense of escape. The Royals had been defeated, yes, but what now? Where could they go from here? This was still the middle of nowhere cubed—the doldrums of space.
Flyte took the lovely young redhead in his arms and kissed her with far more than the etiquette of attraction. He’d already had sex with this girl. She was more than willing. So he had nothing to gain by lavishing such passion on her if not for a deeper longing. He cupped her blushing cheeks in his hands and, red-faced himself, kissed her in front of everyone. A swooning, romantic kiss.
Steffi glowed at the sight of her adopted little brother so happy. Right then, the entire plan of what she must do played out in a glimmer from the rippling lagoon. Whatever else happened, she had to get this unprecedented ship safely to another world, one that had oxygen and wate
r and could support the life of myths. Past the great asteroid belt, countless promising planets awaited colonization. It was up to the Albatross to find one. It could tow this alien ship through space without trouble. Not much manoeuvrability, but that wouldn’t matter if they could bypass the deep space blockade.
The redhead took Flyte’s hand and led him back to her group under a pear tree. An older couple greeted him. They could not have been more than forty-five years of age, yet they were the oldest-looking people lakeside.
“You don’t live long, do you?” Steffi asked Arne, a twinge of loneliness keeping her from looking him in the eyes.
“Why do you say that?”
“Because there are no old people here.”
“Not exactly true. We age slowly, that is all. Our formative years pass by much like yours, but when we reach maturity, the ageing process all but grinds to a halt.”
“So how old are you? A hundred?” She laughed, more in anxiousness than levity.
Arne shook his head with a playful grin, then groaned as he rose to his knees. “No, I am sixty-three. Your friend Flyte has found one of our youngest girls. Gerty. She is only seventeen. I predict they will become life-mates. And there you can see her parents, Lorne and Michaela. They are both over one hundred and twenty. You can probably guess that we know each other rather well by now. Time passes so slowly here.”
Silence. Even the lakeside whisperings lowered beneath the drips of moisture running off tree leaves and plopping into the lagoon.
“Are we…?” Steffi couldn’t quite give shape to the words.
“Are we what?” he asked.
“Could we be…life-mates?” Now the idea was out, she wished it back in as though it was a spiteful genie wrecking her dreams. Dumb, dumb. She was a wanted fugitive, and after the day’s violent turn of events, she’d be hunted to the far side of the galaxy. But she wanted, needed to stay with Arne. In the short time she’d known him, the Steffi Savannah of Hellespont had grown, like an image in a darkroom, into more than an inkling, more than a whisper of vague and cloistered memories. He had begun to define her, or rather, in his sweet company, she had begun to redefine herself. Days ago, the galaxy had shrunk so completely she’d had nowhere left to hide. Now, despite having a ship full of myths to hide as well, Steffi no longer felt trapped. For she had a purpose. The cosmic winds would fill the Albatross’s wings and guide her to a new home.
At least, that was what her heart wanted.
Her insides knotted at Arne’s long hesitation.
He limped the few steps to her. Though barely able to steady himself, he draped his warm, sticky body and muscular arms around her, holding her tight. “Do I think we could be life-mates?” he said before kissing her cheek. “I think you know the answer to that.”
She suppressed the desire to scream with delight while she helped Arne hobble to the turquoise tunnel. Steffi didn’t care where they were going, only that they were going there together. Marvelling at the sheer scale of the main corridor once again—phosphorescent cathedral walls hundreds of feet high to a phantom cloud ceiling—she loved how centred and electrically charged Arne made her feel. Intimate in epic surroundings. Epic in intimate surroundings.
“We need somewhere a little more private.” He winked and held a comforting, innocent smile.
“But I have to tell my crew what my new plan is.”
“This will not take long. Think of it as a quick convalescence.”
“Where to?”
“To a North American forest.”
“Oh? Sounds big.”
He chuckled. “Big…yes.”
California Redwood trees dwarfed even her memory of the water tank holding the Loch Ness monster. They stood so straight and imperious that Steffi asked him if they’d been exaggerated.
“No. Scaled down, actually.”
“You’re shitting me.”
A massive transparent shield enclosing the forest resembled a cellophane dawn. Artificial light from high up in the mist reached the shield with a cool glare between the shadows of trees. A carpet of clumpy grass, pinecones and dry leaves covered the forest floor. No signs of animal life. Arne assured her there was no way through the shield unless he deactivated it, which he’d done on occasion.
“Oh yeah? What are we looking for this time?”
“The sasquatch.”
“That sounds gooey. What is it?”
“You will have heard of him by another name—Bigfoot.”
Her eyes beamed, full wattage, at the empty autumn scene. She whispered, “Bigfoot?”
Recalling what Arne had told her about the length of time the creatures had been on this ship, she reckoned there must be a few families’ worth of sasquatches by now. Same for the plesiosaurs, and any other species. Minutes passed without movement in the forest.
“This happens sometimes,” he said, disappointed. “They are not the most dependable of neighbours.”
She cast him a surprised glance. “So you know them personally?”
“Not very well, but we have communicated often. They usually seem to enjoy my visits.”
Impressed, she lifted an eyebrow and squeezed his arm. “You are a gregarious fellow, Arne. Whatever next?”
She caught the faintest twitch of a smirk on the bloodless side of his lips.
“Let me guess. You want me to follow you?” she joked.
“Or you can carry me if you like.”
She laughed and tried to lift him. Her lower back wrenched, defusing the high jinks. “Or I can follow you,” she groaned.
“Smart girl.”
The tubular white tunnel for this particular simulation was much smaller than the Scottish enclosure. Arne pressed a calligraphy function on the wall. In moments, the convex white morphed into sky-scraping redwood trunks and a ceiling of potted blue sky. The phosphorescent floor flickered into an uneven assault course of scattered fern needles, jutting roots and pinecones by the thousand.
He was dressed in a chequered red and beige lumber jacket, dark corduroy trousers, hiking boots and a warm-looking Klondike hat. Her outfit consisted of tight jeans, a bulky blue ski jacket and a sweatband over her brow.
Before she could tell him what utter morons they looked, the foliage rustled behind them. A middle-aged man and a tallish boy, both dressed like hunters, both brandishing rifles, tore toward them. She stepped aside and yelled in the man’s ear, “You’re an idiot. Your boy looks about twelve. What the hell are you doing giving him a loaded gun?”
No response, just as she’d expected. Arne had explained that all simulated characters were non-interactive.
Arne doffed his hat to her. “After you, Captain Savannah. It is just over the next rise.”
“At ease,” she deadpanned, following the hunters’ trail. “And this’d better be worth it.”
On the other side of the verge, both man and boy crouched low behind a moss-covered stump. The man bid his son stay put. Something up ahead had piqued his concern. Was it the quarry they’d been pursuing? What was it? A deer? That must have been what they’d assumed.
Steffi held her lower back as she staggered down the crinkly slope to where the armed duo was hiding. She had to hear everything they said. These alien reconnoitres were nothing if not fascinating glimpses at Earth people. Her ancestors.
Twigs snapped up ahead. One at a time. Careful but heavy steps. The thing had to know it was being followed.
“Stay low and don’t make a sound, Kevin,” the man whispered over his shoulder.
“Don’t go, Dad. Just…don’t go. It’s too big.”
“Rubbish. I’ve waited for this since I was your age.”
“But, Dad—”
“Sshh.”
The broad-shouldered man crept as lightly as he could but the ground was littered with dry, dead flora. His every step bristled. The boy shook, patting the leaves at his knees with his rifle butt. He even gave the cold barrel a kiss and prayed that it keep his father alive. Halfway to the cluster of tree
s, the man veered right. He quickened his steps and bent low. What was his plan? To sneak up behind his quarry, making enough noise to wake the entire forest? Insanity. Fathers showing off to their sons were up there with the craziest hombres she’d ever seen, and this was no different. She shook her head, feeling bad for the boy. What sort of boneheaded example of manhood was this for him? A rite of passage? A rite of rampant testosterone, more like.
A godawful roar forced her to cover her ears. In a panic, the boy kicked out, gouging the mud with his boots. Apoplexy gripped the forest. The man ducked and, tautening his shoulders, raised his rifle at the tree. A bird caw echoed high up. Another twig snapped. Without warning, a tall hairy biped creature shot out and rushed straight at the man. Its effortless stride was gigantic. It looked about twice the man’s size, with simian features and arms at least as strong as a gorilla’s. Shaggy brown hair covered every inch of it except its face, palms and toes, which were black.
Crack!
The man shot in a hurry on the turn. The creature squealed, sped off to the right and shoulder-barged a branch barring its escape.
“Dad!”
“Gotcha, you son of a bitch!”
“Dad!”
The man cocked his rifle and ran after the sasquatch. Meanwhile, little Kevin knelt up to see what the heck was happening. When he saw his dad had vanished and then flinched at two distant shots, he leapt up and raced in the direction he’d heard them.
“Dad!”
“Get away, Kevin! Run!”
Unarmed, the man stumbled back into view at top speed under the broken branch. He dove to the ground in front of the trees to avoid smashing into them. Right behind him, the furious sasquatch showed no mercy. Blood seeped from a wound in its arm, blotting the mangy hair black. It stood on the man’s back with all its weight, then bent to pummel his head. Blow after crushing blow killed the man outright.
Steffi hid her face in her hands when Bigfoot turned to face the boy. But she couldn’t miss peering through tensed, clammy fingers. This was it—the crux of the vignette. The rite of passage.
Trembling, Kevin didn’t want any part of his rifle. The way he raised it looked as though he was lifting a rump roast to a T-Rex. The sasquatch loped with menacing focus toward him. Kevin peed himself. He cried, “Dad, Mum, I wanna go home.” He tried to raise the rifle again, but he was crying too hard. He dropped it. The sasquatch approached to within a few feet of the boy, still grimacing, the whites of its eyes as big as boiled eggs.
The Mythmakers: An Impulse Power Story Page 7