by Deanna Chase
For, regardless of the Council, of Vash...even of Allie herself...Revik intends to handle this new development in the manner best suited to his particular form of training.
He is going to kill that son of a bitch.
He is going to rip his heart out and make him eat it.
No, brother, the voice intervenes. You are not.
Revik doesn’t answer. The words don’t create a pause in his intentions.
He will do what he needs to do here, no matter what Vash says.
No, brother. You will not.
Watch me, Revik murmurs back, not taking his light or his attention off the scene unfolding in the bar. Just watch me, father Vash...
They can fire him.
He’ll take the karmic hit for it. He’ll do the fucking time.
Penance be gods-damned.
He’s sure as fuck not going to be an accomplice in this.
But in the end, it is Vash who is right.
The change happens so fast, Revik doesn’t even feel it approach.
He is still staring down at Allie’s prone form, trying to decide the when and the how, now that he is shit-sure of the what he plans to do…
When he is yanked entirely out of that part of the Barrier.
What in the dugra a’ kitre gaos do you mean? Revik snarls.
He cuts off the one wearing the white robe, glaring around at the rest of the aged seers that surround him in a half-ring. They have collected him, pulled his light and broken it off from the Barrier proper. They collared him, essentially, and Revik is blind to everything but them...deaf to all but their thoughts, to the blank spaces they want him to see.
It scares him beyond where he can think.
He must think, though. He must convince them to release him. He must convince them to let him go so he can find her...so he can do his fucking job.
They watch him, emotionless, collected in the nondescript gray of a purely functional Barrier space. Revik fights to control his light, to reason with them.
Even so, his words come out with a sharp dagger of anger that stands out like a red-gold flame in the dimmer gray of the space.
How the fuck does this fall under the doctrine of non-interference? he says, fighting to control himself yet again. Explain this to me. How the fuck––
Brother, calm yourself, Vash says gently.
You would let her die, for your principles? Revik returns without thought, giving the senior seer a harder look. Is it so very important to you, brother, to be in the right on this?
Yes, Vash says only, ignoring Revik’s sarcasm. And it is highly unlikely she will die today, brother Dehgoies...
Unlikely––
But they cut him off again.
It is only marginally more likely on this day than it is any other day, says another Council seer, a senior monk who Revik knows by the name of Oparen. The biggest risk already occurred, and that was with the drug itself. Jaden’s actions may lack ethical integrity, but he doesn’t intend to harm her permanently in any way...
Revik fights with his light, fights not to tell them all to go fuck themselves.
Hell, he wants to hurt them now.
I know, brother Dehgoies, Vash says gently. And we understand. We do. But you must remember your job in relation to our precious intermediary, the Bridge. You cannot shelter her from living among the humans. You cannot. She must learn. She must learn to protect herself, and without your direct intervention every time she makes a mistake in judgment with a particular being...or even with the species as a whole.
Vash pauses, then adds, more gently still.
…Moreover. She must suffer at their hands. Without closing to them. Without losing her compassion for them as a species...
Revik glares at all of them through the Barrier space, at Vash especially, not controlling his temper any more than he can control his fear. He is cut off from Allie, from the bar...from Jaden and that sick fuck Mickey and whatever either or both of them intend to do to her.
He cannot even feel her anymore, not now, not inside the restrictive shields of the Council, and a part of him is vibrating out of its skin, wanting to return to her so badly he can barely keep his thoughts civil, despite the row of faces staring at him through the dim space, waiting for him to capitulate.
You knew this, Vash reminds him, still acting as spokesperson for the collective. We have explained this, as a part of her life’s path...from the very beginning, brother. I warned you about the difficulties of attachment in regards to her. Of the need to allow her to develop her own free will and discernment in relation to the humans. His voice edges harder for the first time, becoming an overt warning. You cannot impede her in this. We will not permit it. She is housed among humans not only for her protection, brother. It is an exercise in learning, too, one in which her parents have instructed us very specifically...
Revik feels his heart beating harder in his chest.
He knows it is illusion, too. His body is far away.
Near, but far away.
He cannot feel it really.
He knows damned well that Vash is not talking about Alyson’s human, adoptive parents. They would as soon as allow this thing to happen to their daughter as they would cut off their own hands. So would Jon, for that matter.
And which is the superior race for that?
The thought enrages him, even as it grows.
Which race was the one to feed their own children to wolves, all for some higher cause, one that would mean nothing to their daughter, were she to know the true source of her pain? Which was the one to put abstract, mythological bullshit before the safety of their own blood?
Revik saw nothing but arrogance in any of it. Ego.
Symbolism that meant nothing down here. The product of a bunch of old fucks who’d lost touch with what real pain even felt like––
That may be, brother Dehgoies, Vash says, his thoughts soft. But it is not for you or I to decide that, my friend.
Bullshit, Revik sends, cutting into the other’s thoughts. Bullshit. You gave me that very job. I could stop this thing…hell, you could, without me. You pretend to be powerless, but you are not. Her parents are not here. You are. I am. Yet you are letting it happen, anyway...like puppets. Like mindless automatons, devoid of any true feeling…
We serve a higher purpose, as well, Vash says.
Revik fights not to tell them what they can do with their higher purpose.
He knows already that it will do no good.
As much as he loves Vash, he knows that in this, he is as foreign to Revik’s own nature as the faceless seers who stand behind him in that dark.
And right then, he could hurt all of them.
He could make them feel what she felt.
Without so much as a second’s worth of remorse.
When he is allowed out again, they have blinded him.
Revik blinked up at the dimly-lit ceiling, confused briefly about where he was.
Then he remembered. The club. He was still in Torek’s club.
It must be close to dawn by now.
He turned his head, shaking off the last of the Barrier’s clinging strands, even as the sense of time reasserted itself, yanking him out of that timeless space and putting firm boundaries around him once more. Limits. Allie was on the other side of the world right then. It wasn’t four or five a.m. on a Sunday morning in California.
It was closer to eight or nine p.m. on Saturday.
Revik realized in the same set of seconds that his thought earlier hadn’t been random...or even based on some threat they’d left hanging in the space as he left.
They really had blinded him.
He fought to see, to reach her, but he couldn’t. They’d enclosed his light in some kind of dense, impenetrable shield, one that barely allowed him to feel his own light, much less anyone else’s. He wondered at first if he’d been taken off the job totally...
No, Vash murmured through his light. No, brother. The Council is sympathetic to
your position. We simply cannot allow you to act upon it.
Revik fought a fury so intense it grew nearly murderous.
Fearing they might really take him away from her if he didn’t control himself, he struggled to dim that rage from his light. He couldn’t stop himself from trying to worm his way through and around the blocks they’d erected in his aleimi, however. He spent minutes more just lying there, trying to find a way through, to reach her.
He couldn’t.
He couldn’t even get into the Barrier far enough to track her.
Letting out a groan of frustration, now mixed with equal parts fear and pain, he sat up. He realized only then he was nearly panting, sweating with the exertion of trying to get around the blocks they’d placed over his light. It took him a few minutes more to realize it was sheer panic he felt now. The blindness only worsened the panic, causing it to ricochet through his light, if only by reminding him of just how powerless he was.
He didn’t even feel the light of the other seer. He didn’t see him until he stood, regaining his feet with another low gasp.
Or perhaps Revik had simply been too wrapped up in his own shit to realize he wasn’t alone, that maybe he hadn’t been alone all that time.
He flinched openly when he saw the male seer sitting there in the dark, smoking a hiri stick from one corner of the room and watching him with those gold eyes. Revik’s more aggressive tendencies lashed out for real that time, shifting to a near violence before he could dial it back. He felt the electric charge that snapped through his light as his fists clenched in front of him.
“What the fuck are you doing here, Torek?” he snapped. “I told you to leave! I told you I needed fucking privacy…”
“Who is she?” Torek said. As before, he didn’t sound afraid, or even cautious. Instead, his voice held an open curiosity. “This female. The one you are fixated on. Who is she?”
Revik didn’t bother to answer him.
He aimed his feet for the door.
But Torek was up and across that space in a heartbeat. His palm pressed against the wood before Revik could open it, and he leaned his full weight when Revik tried to open it anyway.
Revik looked down at him, feeling that heat in his chest turn into the blast of a furnace. Even so, he didn’t move back, but let the height difference between them remain obvious.
“Get the fuck out of my way,” he said.
“You owe me,” Torek said.
“Get the fuck out of my way, or I’ll kill you,” Revik said.
Torek’s light flinched slightly that time, but he still didn’t move.
“You would leave me cold on a debt?” he said, his voice softer. “Do you wish to break Code? To have me as an enemy? The thought saddens me, brother Revik...it does, indeed. Moreover, it disappoints me…I had begun to trust you. To believe you to be a seer of your word, despite your reputation…”
Revik fought with the other’s words, with the images and emotions that shifted through his head. He couldn’t afford to make enemies of the seers here. It would be another thing to get him thrown off his detail with the Bridge. Hell, it could get him killed.
He couldn’t afford it, not when they already made him unwelcome in Asia.
He found himself remembering Torek’s connections to the Rynak, too.
That rational, tactical part of his mind asserted itself, dialing down the anger for real, forcing him to be strategic, to play the long game.
He was halfway across the world.
A few more minutes wouldn’t save her.
“Give me your headset,” Revik grunted.
Torek blinked at him in the darkened room. Then, with a barely perceptible shrug, he reached up, pulled the requested device off his ear and handing it wordlessly to Revik. Revik clicked on the guest mode with his mind once he had it looped around his own ear.
He split his consciousness a heartbeat later, and used that part of his mind to connect first with Eddard, then with a travel company he’d utilized in the past.
He found he could do it for this, which was a relief.
“Brother?” Torek said, his voice polite.
Revik held up one finger, asking the seer to wait. When he got the basic information he needed from the travel agent, he shifted the rest of his attention back to Torek.
The next flight wasn’t for two hours. He had time for this.
“I owe you a debt,” Revik acknowledged, bowing to him formally. “I will transfer the credits now, if that meets with your approval, brother. There will be no debt between us when I leave. Code will not be violated...not by agreement nor currency.”
But Torek was already shaking his head. He shifted his voice, however, mirroring the formal cadence of Revik’s as he entered negotiation stance as well.
“No,” he said. “I already told you this, brother. I will not accept currency in trade.”
Revik felt his shoulders stiffen. “Then what? Another show? Fine. Consider it done. But I am leaving town for awhile. We will schedule it before I go...is that agreeable to you?”
“No,” Torek said.
Revik felt the heat returning to his light.
“What would meet your approval, brother?” His voice dropped that time, falling out of the more polite cadence of formal Prexci. “Or are you just enjoying holding me up for no reason?”
“I don’t want a show,” Torek said, making a line in the air with his finger.
“That was the original agreement,” Revik said, not hiding his annoyance. “Are you toying with me, brother?”
“I am not,” Torek said, his voice flat. “I am asking you to allow me to alter our original agreement. We can do a show, too, if you like. In fact, I would be highly amenable to negotiating such a thing as a separate arrangement, brother Dehgoies. However, for this, I admit, I would like something else, and I feel I am in a position to ask for it now, since you have forced me into a difficult situation by leaving in the middle of our last arrangement. You have angered my clientele, brother. More seriously, you forced me to renege on my agreement with them, something I am loathe to do for anyone…even if the situation demands it.”
Revik waited, watching the gold-eyed seer in the dark.
His own eyes had adjusted to the dim lighting since he first came out of the Barrier jump, so he could see Torek’s face and expression clearly. Due to the other seer’s infiltrator training, however, he still could not read his expression...and thanks to the block from the Council, he couldn’t read much off his light, either.
When Revik didn’t break the silence that time, the other sighed, clicking softly.
Then he laid a hand deliberately on Revik’s crotch.
Revik tensed. He found himself pressed up against the door before he could take a breath, the other’s face only a few inches from his. Torek’s fingers wrapped around his cock...not in threat, exactly, but with a fair bit of aggression behind the move, anyway. Revik couldn’t help but interpret it as a threat anyway, and felt his light go entirely still.
Before he could speak, or decide whether he would have to fight to get out of here in one piece, Torek leaned closer to him, so that their faces nearly touched.
“I confess,” he said, his voice quieter that time. He coiled his light deeper into Revik’s. Pulling at him slowly, he began tugging on his light sensually, warming various points between their two bodies. “I have developed a hunger of my own tonight, brother. I wondered if you would consider a less public trade? One that involved more than simply me hitting you.”
Revik frowned. He looked between the other’s eyes, feeling his light react, in spite of himself, but mostly feeling confusion.
“A lay isn’t worth that much money,” he said, blunt.
“I am aware of that,” Torek returned smoothly.
He leaned back slightly, assessing Revik’s face.
“…But a week at my house is worth that, if you hand over agency to me. Within reason, of course. To be agreed upon, in as much detail as you require.
We could even do it in writing, if that is something you desire...or in light contract, whichever suits you.” Torek paused, as if letting him think. “...A week where you would belong to me, brother, once those rules were set. I would release you after. No expectations. No commitments or entanglements. Friendship only.” He paused again. “I have a relationship of my own, if it reassures you.”
Revik let out a low snort.
Even so, he shook his head, clicking softly.
“Don’t get me killed by another seer, brother,” he muttered, glancing at him.
It was a half-assed attempt at humor, but when Torek smiled back, the humor didn’t touch those gold eyes.
“You needn’t worry yourself on that account, brother,” he said, his voice still utterly calm. “We have discussed you already. She is amenable to this. More than amenable, I’d say.” He paused again. “...You can meet her first, if you like. In fact, I might insist you at least scan her light. She’ll want to fuck you, too...and I fully intend to let her.”
Revik felt his body tense more. He still didn’t push the other away, but his confusion hadn’t lifted. Moreover, he found himself growing more irritated than aroused.
“Why?” he said finally.
Torek chuckled. “You need me to answer that, brother?”
“You know who I am,” Revik said.
“I do,” Torek acknowledged.
“That doesn’t bother you?” Revik said, his voice still holding an edge. “Most of our kind would not touch me for any amount of money. Or is that the attraction?”
Torek smiled, leaning into him harder. The added pressure and light caused Revik to suck in a breath. Torek didn’t take his eyes off his face, but watched him react. Once he seemed satisfied with the reaction he got, the seer smiled.
When he next spoke, his British accent grew prominent again, even in Prexci.
“A fair few seers just paid a lot of money, brother, hoping to see you get off tonight,” Torek said, smiling at him that time. “They were pretty pissed off they missed the finish, if you want the truth. Some were right bloody pissed off, in fact. Do you really think I’m so different from any of them, whatever my proclivities?”