Up and Coming: Stories by the 2016 Campbell-Eligible Authors

by Anthology

  Instead of heading back to the star lilies, Nilafay swam closer to the coast and waded out of the water right onto the shore. She’d never been there before, never dared come to land, but today she would be married and sequestered for gods knew how long. She wanted one secret thing that would belong only to her, something for her alone to hold on to.

  She lay in the sand, feeling each grain as it pressed against the thin material of her bodysuit. The clouds moved above, swaying in lazy patterns that sparked her imagination. Before long, she fell asleep, the warmth of the sand mirroring the sun’s, pulling her into a safe embrace.

  When she woke, someone was sitting next to her. She didn’t open her eyes but rather felt the presence, the small movements of another body shifting the sand. The smell clearly signaled this was not a Sualwet. Rank and foul, it reeked of compost and dirt.

  Fear surged through her body, sending her heart into a panic.

  “I can tell you have awoken,” the person beside her spoke in guttural, disjointed Sualwet. “I am not here to hurt you. Please, sit with me.”

  He did not move while she weighed what to do next. To acknowledge this person would be to interact with what had to be an Erdlander man, a proscribed act which could easily land her in jail. But refusing to acknowledge him struck her as a foolish way to deal with the situation.

  She opened her eyes and turned to face the stranger. His head and chin were coated with hair, as she’d read of his people. It had been trimmed short. He was older and his body bent forward over his knees. She felt no threat. In fact, he appeared almost comical with his loose-fitting clothing and furry appearance.

  She sat up.

  “My name is Rhine,” he said. “Dr. Rhine.”

  She nodded and narrowed his eyes at him.

  “I will not hurt you, if that’s what you worry about. You are not the first Sualwet I’ve met. I’ve had many Sualwet friends.”

  Her breath escaped her. She’d never heard of a Sualwet meeting with an Erdlander for any reason other than war.

  “You don’t believe me.” He smiled and his teeth glimmered. Despite the fur, his manner reminded her of her father for a brief moment. The way he once used to be, when he called her Nila and held her on his lap, talking or reading to her for hours.

  “I’ve simply never heard of such a thing,” she said.

  He tilted his head at her. “I’m sorry. What did you say?”

  “I’ve never heard of Sualwets and Erdlanders being friends.”

  “Ah, well, it has happened. I’ve been lucky to meet many kind Sualwets.”

  “Is that how you learned to speak?”

  “Yes, and I studied very hard.”

  “Your accent is strange and off-putting.”

  He laughed a loud, offensive sound that set her teeth on edge. “Well, it’s not my first language. I was raised speaking Erdlander.”

  The way he pronounced his race sounded like he had shells grinding and smashing together in his mouth as he spoke.

  “Would you like to see beyond the beach? I’d be happy to show you the wonders of my country.”

  His offer tempted her. She often swam far past the boundary of her father’s permission. Even lying atop the star lilies would be a scandal below. But to walk on land, under the heat of the sun? It was unheard of, and consorting with an Erdlander was completely against the laws of her people. “Yes, I’d quite enjoy that.”

  Dr. Rhine’s smile lit his eyes like the twinkling esca lure of a deep-sea anglerfish.

  They stood, Nilafay unfolding easily, while the Erdlander grunted and leaned on his thigh to straighten.

  “Will it be safe?” she asked.“ Erdlanders do not much like Sualwets.”

  “We’ll keep away from the city. But I’d love to show you the forest, and perhaps my home. You might like to see the gardens.”

  “You have gardens?”

  “Yes, dear girl.” He walked toward the line of trees separating the beach from the dark forest beyond. “But instead of seaweed or the stalky vegetation you grow, we have flowers of every color and vegetables that grow as tall as me.”

  Nilafay felt the ground change beneath her webbed feet. The silken sand grew hard and rough, its grains growing into painful pebbles. The sparse trees thickened, becoming larger, closer together, and more menacing. “Perhaps I should return.”

  Dr. Rhine frowned. “No, dear girl. You should not.”

  Terror seized her stomach. She looked around her and realized she had followed him far enough into the thicket that she could no longer tell which way the sea lay. “Where are we?”

  “Where we have always been. We are at war!”

  Her panic soared.

  Large, hairy bipeds in dark clothing stepped out from behind trees and rushed toward her.

  Nilafay ran.

  She ran through the densely packed trees, grinding her sensitive feet against the ground. Tears built behind the membrane covering her eyes and distorted her vision. The sun hid above the canopy of leaves to darken the terrain. She stumbled and fell, slicing her hand on a sharp rock. The yelp of pain slipped past her lips before she could bite it back. The next thing she knew, rough, dry hands grabbed her arms, and a loud shout assaulted her ears.

  A painful whack struck the back of her head, and she tumbled into darkness.

  ***

  Darkness slipped into pain with ease. For Nilafay, it felt like the two belonged together. The dark was so complete she could have been at the bottom of the Drop, only her and the prehistoric monsters that dwelled in those primordial depths.

  The pressure against her body was wrong though: her lungs inflated with oxygen instead of absorbing it through her flesh. Dry air breezed across her skin leaving her parched.

  Her eyes flitted open—only a spark at first, the light a fresh new attack on her senses. It flashed to her brain, reigniting the painful throb she had thought couldn’t get any worse.

  “Where am I?” she squeaked out over a thick, dry tongue. Her words sounded scratchy.

  “Ah, you’re awake.”

  A large, warm hand touched her head. The intimacy of the contact repulsed her. She tried to shift away from it but couldn’t move.

  “Shhh, don’t pull now. You’ve been strapped down to keep you from hurting yourself when you wake up. Give yourself a minute to adjust. You’re fine.”

  “Where am I?”

  “At my home, just as we discussed.”

  Nilafay forced her eyes open, squinting until her vision adjusted to the glaring light. Dr. Rhine stood next to her, his large hand still atop her head, his other resting next to her on the strange bed she’d been strapped to. Her legs and arms were immobilized, her head held down with a strap across her forehead. The restraints were tight and bit into her flesh.

  “What happened?”

  “I’m afraid you stumbled into something you had no idea about. I don’t think you ever intended to be a traitor, but that is what you now are. You are here to aid the efforts of the Erdlander people. Dear girl, we owe you a debt of gratitude.”

  “No.” She pulled against the straps, desperate to wiggle loose from her confinement. “I’m not helping you. I need to get home.”

  “That’s not possible. You came to us, remember? You came on our land and entered our forest.”

  “I thought you were a friend.”

  “I am! I’ll keep you safe from the death we’ll be delivering to your people, and I’ll help you fulfill your destiny. You see, we’ve had a series of disappointments with our other test subjects.”

  He gestured across the room, and Nilafay turned to look. Along the wall were a row of cages. In each one, a Sualwet man sat chained. One met her eyes, pain and fury in his gaze. Another appeared to be sleeping—or dead, she feared.

  “Our females simply could not conceive after your male’s genetics were introduced,” Dr. Rhine continued. “Even the eggs we extracted and attempted to inseminate directly were dead ends. Those that became fertilized grew, but no
ne survived long enough to take a breath. You see, dear Nilafay, what we required, was a Sualwet woman and access to her eggs.”

  “You want Sualwet children?”

  “Oh no, we want Erdlander children who possess some of your better Sualwet characteristics.” He stood up and walked to her feet, forcing her to look down her body to see him. She had been stripped of her bodysuit, but a thin sheet covered her. “Our aim is to create a stronger, hardier race of Erdlanders who can succeed us when we’re gone. A race who will finally obliterate the Sualwet from the sea.”

  Nilafay’s mind spun. He wanted Sualwet children who would kill Sualwets? Did he expect her to mate with one of the men in the cage? His words, spoken in his harsh accent, didn’t make sense.

  “When can I go home?”

  Her question was answered with laughter. “Oh, certainly not anytime soon. We’ll need to wait for your body to give us enough eggs to fertilize and incubate.”

  Dr. Rhine turned to a man sitting at a table near her. She hadn’t noticed him before, but his features were strong and handsome. No facial fur distorted his appearance.

  Rhine spoke in his abrasive foreign tongue quickly and loudly. She couldn’t tell if he was scolding the man, but his companion did not appear submissive. Instead, this man nodded and replied, his own words sounding more like the scraping of a rickshaw under the weight of an indulgent Sualwet.

  The assistant handed Rhine a syringe.

  “This should stimulate your body to produce more eggs than usual,” Rhine told her.“ Our scientists have been studying Erdlander female cycles and believe the same medication will work on you.”

  Nilafay struggled as he plunged the syringe into her arm muscle, the contents burning as he emptied it into her veins. The straps holding her in place tightened against her as she tried to pull away.

  “In a few days,” Rhine said, “we’ll be able to extract them and begin our work. Until then, we’ll make sure to keep you comfortable.”

  He handed the syringe back to the man at the table, and after a few more moments of their awful talk, Dr. Rhine returned his focus to her. “Nilafay, this is my assistant, Dr. Vaughn. He’s going to unstrap you and settle you in to your new”—he paused and gave a wicked smile—“accommodations.” He gestured to the cages and placed his hand on her bare foot.

  She tried to pull back, but the strap holding her leg in place forced her to suffer the touch.

  “You behave.” He squeezed her foot, and she bit back a growl.

  When Dr. Rhine left, the other man approached her. The first thing he did was undo the strap holding her head in place. As soon as it was removed, she attempted to sit up, only to find another strap around her ribs.

  “Please, let me go. I have to get home.”

  Dr. Vaughn’s heavy brows lifted, scrunching the skin between his eyes and hairline. He looked so strange with all that head fur, like he was weighted down so he didn’t bounce to the surface.

  He pointed to himself. “Vaughn.”

  A tear broke through the gap between the membrane over her eyes and the world.

  He pointed to her. “Nee-la.”

  She shook her head, more tears falling. Hearing her private name fall mutilated from his lips was almost more than she could bear. She wanted Adaltan. Her Adal. He was the only one who should ever speak that name.

  “Steell now,” he said before unstrapping the restraint over her chest. “Steell, pleese.”

  She nodded and held still, her body rigid, desperate to flee while she forced it to stay in place and wait. Once he undid all her restraints, she could use everything she had to break away from this horrible place. The bright lights still burned her eyesight, and tortured Sualwet eyes gazed at her from behind cage doors.

  She would run, find her way to the ocean, and get home. She would tell her father of this horrid place, and he would rise from the sea and avenge all those who had been wronged here. She would marry Adal and have the life she’d always dreamed of, one free from her father’s control. She would forge her own life but heed her father’s warnings more closely now. She’d obey his rules about Erdlanders from now on, even if it meant not returning to the star lilies.

  Those beautiful moments of peace beneath the sun and the more rare, sacred nights under the ruby moon—they all seemed so far away.

  When Vaughn undid the final strap, she launched off the table and ran toward the door. Her legs were weak, the gravity strong. It felt like the earth was trying to swallow her whole. Since she lived in the Domed City, her muscles were more used to walking than swimming, but the weight of her body never crushed her down like this.

  She stumbled and reached out for something to hold onto. The door looked so close, but as she made a final lurch forward, she fell to the ground.

  “Don’t,” Vaughn said from behind her. He approached the cage nearest to where she lay, and opened the door. “Een.”

  His Sualwet hardly resembled the actual language. He distorted the words with his oversized tongue so much that she barely understood. But when he nodded to the door he held, waiting for her to enter the prison he clearly intended to be her new home, she had no difficulty following his meaning.

  “No.” She shook her head and lowered herself to the floor. “Gods, no. Please, let me go!”

  He approached, a soft light in his eyes illuminating what she desperately hoped was kindness.

  “Een.” He grabbed her ankle and dragged her across the smooth floor until she lay at the entrance.

  The tears demanded release. She looked up at him, lifted the membrane covering her eyes, and let the sorrow fall. Tears fell as her dreams of the ruby moon shattered into nothing.

  Vaughn crouched and reached for her face. When his hand cupped her cheek, she allowed the contact, hoping to reach any part of him that might choose kindness over imprisonment.

  “Please…,” she whispered.

  He leaned forward and placed dry, cracked lips against hers. Before she could react, he shoved her into the prison and locked the door.

  ***

  Nights passed, one after the next. She judged it to be night when Rhine and his minions departed, leaving her and the three other captives to wallow in their grief and filth. At first, she tried to talk to her companions, but they never responded. Either they were too afraid or too broken to bother.

  The eldest had dark spots on his head and deep, sallow rings under his eyes. His lips had dried and cracked, and his skin appeared so delicate and thin. Nilafay worried it might crack and all of his insides would gush out.

  Her fellow captives said nothing to comfort her whenever she cried. They watched passively whenever Rhine injected her with unknown chemicals or extracted eggs from her body and placed them in Petri dishes or test tubes.

  On the sixth night of her imprisonment, the old Sualwet died. His breath no longer joined the rhythmic pulse of their small group, and his heart no longer added to the unified beat.

  “Jisquekai,” said the prisoner in the cage next to her, and he began humming a funeral dirge. His voice filled the horrible room, bouncing off the exam table and shelves of torture tools. The specimen jars full of half-formed offspring from the Erdlanders’ experiments rattled, and the singer’s voice rose to a tortured wail.

  Nilafay and the other remaining prisoner joined in the song, adding harmonies and discords as they sang. No one slept that night. Instead she and her two living companions mourned the passing of a man who had never deigned to speak to her, even as she sobbed and pleaded for someone to tell her where they were and what the Erdlanders wanted.

  As she eventually cried herself to sleep, she held her arms around her middle and wished it was Adal.

  The other Sualwets had never spoken to her, and as grief for this unknown prisoner washed over her, she understood why. The depth of her pain at losing him was so immense, so overpowering, it threatened to rip her soul in two. She hadn’t known his name until the other spoke it. She had never even heard his voice except for the
times Rhine or Vaughn demanded his response, usually following screams. How much more devastating would her loss have been had he shown her kindness, had they forged a bond between them?

  She rocked back and forth in her cell, singing while tears slid down her cheeks. Eventually the prisoner in the adjacent cage came close to the bars separating them and reached his hand through the opening. Together, they sang, holding hands.

  In the morning, they continued their song even when Vaughn arrived. He ignored them while setting up the morning’s tortures. When he noticed the body of Jisquekai, he shrugged, opened the cage, and dragged it out. Arms and legs askew, the corpse lay on the floor while Vaughn went to the door and said something to a guard.

  The two Erdlanders lifted the body and placed it on the exam table.

  When Vaughn stripped the body and picked up a scalpel, the prisoner beside me dropped my hand with a screech and slammed himself against the bars at the front of his cage. He screamed and cursed the Erdlander, but Vaughn ignored him. No doubt he didn’t care. He certainly didn’t understand.

  Nilafay watched Vaughn slice open the body which had once contained Jisquekai. She couldn’t look away. There was a tragic lack of bleeding. His heart no longer beat, so his blood lay stagnant in his veins.

  Vaughn dissected the man piece by piece, then weighed the organs and jotted notes on a pad. By the time he had finished, Nilafay felt as hollowed out as the dead man.

  “Swim strong, Jisque,” she whispered.

  Vaughn faced her and smiled, his hands covered in blood, his teeth bared. He made a for gruesome sight.

  She backed away, huddling at the back of her cage on the small, worn mattress on the floor.

  That night, the prisoner in the cage next to hers sat against the bars, their fingers intertwined as they fell asleep in silence.

  ***

  Telling time became impossible. The progression of one day into the next never stopped. Rhine and Vaughn never missed a day; they never took a break. The constant march forward toward their goal wore Nilafay down, and she began to wish they would either kill her or succeed in their gruesome task.