by May Sage
He knew what had driven him now – he wasn’t the first man to succumb to it, and he doubted he’d be the last. But intense lust and possessiveness had never worked out for anyone who refused to think before they spoke.
“You seem pretty organized,” he observed, evading her question.
He didn't have an answer, not really. What she was doing was none of his business; all he'd bought was a right to her womb, nothing more.
“We’ve done this for a while,” she replied, shrugging. “Now if you’ll excuse me, I need to get back to work.”
He should have taken the brush off for what it was, and gone on his way; instead, he find himself calling her as she walked away.
“Hey, Ruby?”
“It’s Ruth!”
That made him smile; he knew she preferred Ruth; she’d said it often enough. He even thought of her as Ruth – but it got a rise out of her, and he just couldn’t help it.
“Not according to your birth certificate. Anyway, I was wondering if you could use another pair of hands?”
She turned – which was a shame, because the view he’d had from the back had been quite pleasing. The woman could rock a pair of cargo pants.
“You want to help?”
He nodded, confirming that yes, he’d completely lost his mind.
“Why?”
He could have – probably should have – answered that sincerely, but he had a feeling it might have freaked her out.
“I have a few hours. Put me to work.”
Truth
“He's here again,” Rachel pointed out, her singsong voice alluding to some sort of amusement.
Ruth was not amused. Confused, annoyed, secretly pleased and openly angry was a constant state of being these days.
Yes, he’d come to Lowtown. Again.
The first day, Alexander had helped carry their heavier boxes of food, and made himself useful under Abigail’s command – the woman was in charge when her parents weren’t there. The second day, he'd come with tools, and fortified that tent, making it into a stronger structure that the wind wouldn’t easily take away.
Today, he wasn’t alone. Another man, visibly an Elite, wearing a uniform similar to his, had arrived with him in his car, and they'd been carrying boxes.
Alexander rarely even acknowledged her; today he walked directly to Abigail, announcing, “We've brought some medicine you might find use of. Where do you want it?”
That made everyone within earshot gasp; medicine wasn’t cheap and in this part of town, it often meant the difference between life and death.
Damn him. She knew it was just another political stunt, something that would end up in the papers sooner or later, but that didn’t stop her from swooning a little.
“And look at that mancandy,” Rachel said, whistling in appreciation, openly gawking at Alexander’s companion.
“You’re married, missy – remember?”
Her friend shrugged, like so many people did.
Marriage was just a way to avoid the Drafts, for most. If she hadn’t seen her parents’, Ruth might have felt exactly the same way.
“Maybe. But that certainly doesn’t mean I can’t look.”
Ruth sighed, although she couldn’t blame her friend. Alexander’s companion was beautiful, with the dark hair he wore in a loose bun at the top of his head, just like Alexander. He also wore a communicator and an energy sword, distinguishing him as a higher up in the food chain, even amongst the Elite.
Ruth knew Alexander was also a man of high rank, or there wouldn’t be as much attention on him, but now she thought of it, she knew very little about him. The clothes he wore looked like a uniform, but the colors were all wrong, different from anything she’d seen before; no one else wore beige and gold. The material also seemed more precious, luxurious.
She knew he had money; his bid, the car with a driver, said as much – but what did he do?
He turned and caught her gawking at him like an idiot. Perfect. Ruth looked away and started to move as quickly as she could, pretending to be busy, to no avail: she heard footsteps approaching and within a few seconds, her breathing hitched, her muscles tensed.
He was standing next to her.
“Good afternoon, Ruth.”
She wished his voice didn’t sound so enticing.
“Hey,” she replied without turning his way, preparing a few portions of pasta to keep her hands occupied.
“You spend a lot of time here. How do you manage that?”
That made her glare at him. “I wake up at dawn, work from seven till two every day. You’ll find that I clock in over six hours a day, five days a week.”
That was the minimum requested to receive benefits such as health care, and well, a salary. Those who did less had to be medically exempt, and they received so little money, it would have been laughable if it hadn’t been so sad. Artists like her parents were allowed to bypass the community work, but only because they paid higher taxes, buying their rights to free time, so to speak.
Their system was rotten, meant to only befit the fittest.
“And you still work at night.”
This wasn’t a question, and there was an edge to his voice.
“From five to eleven or twelve, yes.”
Her schedule left very little time to frivolous things, such as sleeping, but it also paid to feed at least a thousand people a day, so she bore it.
“What do you do?”
“I sing at the opera. What do you do?” she retorted, seeing the opportunity to satisfy her curiosity.
He stopped for a beat, weighing his words before replying, “I’m a military scientist specializing in biophysics, by trade. These days, I just seem to play around in my lab. There isn’t much for me to do anymore.”
As she barely understood the profession he’d given her, she pushed, asking, “what does that mean, what do you normally research?”
“Initially, ways to improve human performance. Make us stronger, fitter. Eventually, I also perfected a way to regenerate cells rather than allowing them to evolve.”
She’d stopped fiddling with that damn salad, and turned to him, by then, because she’d heard those words before. She’d heard the rumours…
“Stopping cells from evolving… that’s how the Elites stay young, right? That’s how you guys are immortal.”
He chuckled low.
“We’re hardly immortal. Cut off my head and I’ll be gone for good.”
“But otherwise – if no one hurts you – you can’t die. Or age. Right?”
It shocked her when he nodded, because while that was a fact that the Regulars had witnessed when they saw the Elites look exactly the same after decades, they’d never confirmed it. They stayed extremely tight lipped about what they actually were.
“So, you research ways to keep the Elite healthy.”
That made her feel like throwing up; that he could hide in his lab, working on helping a couple of thousand people when there were millions across the country who suffered. The Dissenters outside of the cities, the lowtowners. They were those a biophysicist should seek to help.
“Actually, the last few hundred years, I’ve worked on the vaccines that immunize you and the rest of the Regulars against radioactivity. We’ve recently made it vaporous, to ensure everyone was included in the process.”
His tone was a little defensive, but she didn’t care if she’d offended him, and her stiff upper lip clearly said so.
“But for the record, yes. Yes, during the Last War, after forty percent of the population of Earth had been killed, when it was evident no one would win, I did come up with a solution. I created me. The government gave me leave to use my process on a few volunteers, and we ended the war. We also killed every president, every king, every military officer who encouraged that world, and we started ruling you. It has been three hundred and four years, sweetheart. And there has been no war, since.”
They stared at each other, glaring, their jaws set, daring each other to sa
y another word for an entire minute, before he turned and walked away.
It was only then, when he left her to think back to whatever-the-hell had just happened, that Ruth realized she was probably the one regular human being alive who’d ever heard those words.
Hospital
“Xander,” his friend called; even before he turned to look at Rupert, he’d heard the edge to his voice.
Rupert left it at that, not adding anything, which made Xander think that their campaign probably had a hiccup; he had bad news.
“What's the matter, now?” he sighed.
In all honesty, he’d taken a step back from the New Reign; Lucian had started to act irrationally, feeling threatened perhaps. Xander – or more accurately, Xander’s relationship with a certain prickly woman – was the reason why they were ahead, and the head of the party knew it. While Lucian would more than likely be elected as their Ruler, he hadn’t won the public, and the young fool was childish enough to resent Xander instead of counting his blessings.
Rupert warned him somberly, “You’re not gonna like this.” Then, he told him.
Thirty seconds later, bursting through his elegant home, jumping behind the wheels of his fastest car, Xander wondered if Rupert had somehow found some weed to smoke; not gonna like this? That didn’t even begin to cover it. Xander was furious. Angry at everything, he sped through the streets, barely missing those who crossed his path.
He couldn’t remember ever feeling quite as angry, or worried for that matter. Xander barely remembered his way in, but finally, he was standing at the entrance of a sparse hospital room, and glaring at the slight figure wearing a beige gown in the bed.
“What’s the damage?”
He’d turned towards the nurse who stood at the end of a bed, fussing with a chart.
The woman looked confused and startled, glancing from Ruth to him, and back again. He had to give her some credit for not spilling her guts the second an angry Alpha was demanding answers; it wasn’t until Ruth nodded her assent that the staff members told him.
“Ruby will be just fine in a few days. She has some bruises – those on her ribs are going to hurt some – but nothing too alarming. She wouldn’t even be here if her head hadn’t hit the pavement. But as there’s no sign of concussion, she’ll be ready to go as soon as the doctor signs her off.”
Some of his worry subsided, which only served to make him angrier.
The nurse wisely chose this moment to run away, and Xander walked in the room, his fists curled up. He wanted to hit something but as the vermin who’d done that to her wasn’t in the vicinity, he didn’t have a target. His punching bag would get a hell of a workout, later.
“You’re not going back to Lowtown.”
He said it like an order because that was exactly what it was, but she laughed. Outright laughed at him.
“You really think a lowtowner would do this to me?”
As per usual, her anger matched his own, never faltering. But Xander was tired of their game, tired of always exploding like a child when they were both grown ass adults; particularly him. So instead of starting another argument, he bit out, “Explain.”
She was visibly surprised, and given what she knew of him, he couldn’t really blame her.
“There’s a journalist I talk to, from time to time. She’s nice. A friend. I was meeting her after my show, but she’d been cornered by some guy. He was…” she left the word hanging, but her meaning couldn’t have been clearer. “Anyway I jumped in; and yes, he did get a few good kicks in – to both of us, but we got away.”
She glared defiantly, daring him to tell her she’d done anything wrong. But of course she hadn’t. What was wrong was the world they lived in. Women got assaulted everywhere; particularly those who were unattached, or worse, barren. That was what the Drafts had cultivated; the notion that women with a functioning uterus were made for procreating, and the others, worthless.
Xander remembered the world he came from; it hadn’t been much different, in all honesty. Rape, now and then, had always been outwardly frowned upon, but the victims received no justice; rapists only got a slap on the wrist.
“I’ll run through the security videos and catch him,” he swore darkly, before forcing himself to reign in some of his anger.
“How did you hear about me being here?”
“It’s on social media.”
He never paid much attention to gossips; thankfully, Rupert did. “Where’s your family?”
It only hit him then, that he didn’t know much about her at all. Did she have some family around?
She blushed, replying, “My parents are at recital, so they couldn’t have found out yet.”
Of course; it wasn’t like Regulars – even wealthy regulars – had access to the kind of Communicator the Alpha used.
After the war, they’d spent a hundred years in bunkers, until the air had cleared enough for the Alphas to set up their cities in the least radioactive parts of the world. Since then, they’d limited the access to the technologies that ran on finite resources; Communicators were nothing special; basically a step up from the old smartphones Xander recalled from his youth – but they cost more than a year of rent, for most people. The essentials – a computer running on solar energy and a home phone – were given to any household.
The system worked, but it also meant that some people waited at the hospital without any family after being assaulted and beaten.
Something needed to change. And soon.
Surprise
“Break a leg,” Danielle murmured.
She meant it quite literally.
Danielle had applied for the role of Christine and everyone had fully expected her to get it. Unlike Ruth, who had other priorities – she only worked at the theatre for the money – Danielle lived and breathed opera. She had the talent, the beauty and the connections.
Yet it was Ruth who now stepped forward.
It was a Thursday and as per usual on such a day, they were less than three quarters booked, yet for some reason, she'd given her very best performance so far. Dad had mentioned that she seemed detached as she sang and taking this critic in stride, she'd opened up and even she would admit: she'd been good.
“What was that,” Marc, who played her Raoul, asked as they exited the stage.
“I don't know, I just felt...”
Lighter. She'd sang her feelings instead of repressing them and for the first time in months, she could breathe.
She'd once read something about a bird in a cage. How she'd pity him, the poor bird who saw his kin flying the sky through his bars. Never had it occurred to her to think of those who were unclaimed.
Alexander didn't get in touch; after the hospital, he stopped coming to Lowtown, too.
The twenty-second of January and February, she punctually received her installment of ten thousand marks.
These eleven weeks, she had lied a great many times. People around her continually asked what was the matter, to which she responded a curt: I'm fine. She was nothing close. Angry, edgy, confused, ashamed, yes, but fine? Nope. And how she hated him for getting under her skin that way…
“You'd better figure it out,” her partner replied with a wink. “You need to do that again.”
“Believe me, I will,” she replied, loving how bellowing those songs had served to let some feelings out of her chest, somehow.
She got changed and ran out of doors, eager to get home. Her parents made it to every show, unless Henri was working: they would have plenty to say after that one.
She was laughing, giddy with her own success, when a force suddenly pined her to the adjoining wall; her head rebounded, but a hand was behind her neck, stopping the impact seconds before she hit. She barely had an instant to recognize the dark green eyes when Alexander's frame pushed up against hers, caging her in.
“You are mine,” he growled, before taking her lips.
There was no other way to say it: he took. They were his by rights and her body knew it.
Her arms hooked around his neck as though they'd done exactly that since the beginning of time and when he pulled away, she pulled him right back where he'd been.
They. Were. Not. Done.
Her tongue darted out, tentatively tracing his bottom lip.
“Hell, woman,” he said, half laughing, half scowling. “Not the time, not the place.”
Only then did she notice a good half of her colleagues by the staff entrance. Oh.
“Not the place,” she agreed.
Definitely past the time.
Alexander saw right through her in the relative darkness and it was obvious he understood just what she meant.
“You're coming home with me tonight.”
It wasn't a question, but he still waited for an answer; she nodded and before she knew what was happening, she was in his arms – space blended in a blur and her stomach recoiled for an instant – then, they were standing two streets down, in front of a car.
It was an actual car, rather than the fancy affair that didn't even touch the ground and it occurred to her that this black, sleek vehicle was made to impress where it was seen, rather than to move its passengers from one place to the next.
“Ruby, meet Lucian. Lucian, Ruby.”
“It's Ruth, actually” she corrected, grinding her teeth.
The knowledge that although she’d told him, repetitively, the man didn't even know the name she used should have been a cold shower but she was well past finding reasons to dislike her owner. The truth was, little as she might like him, she wanted him and that was that.
“Ruth,” Alexander repeated, testing the word. “Nope. Ruby fits best. Get in. Lucian's dropping us off.”
His
They all wanted her.
They were actors, playing their roles with perfection but regardless, he had seen it, felt it, as she bellowed out love songs to other men. They'd all desired her. His woman. His.
The reaction had been visceral and he still suffered the after effects, the compelling need to touch, to take.