by Viola Grace
“How can you be so calm about this?”
“Look, Torun, I am on very little food and sleep. I have work and a client tomorrow. I need to rest, and tomorrow, I need to shop.”
“What aren’t you saying?”
She sighed into the com. “All of my memorabilia is gone, as is Susa’s. The bots packed everything after the search teams left. It was a preprogrammed response. All we lost was the shell.”
He was silent. “So, you have gained some precognition.”
“Logical extrapolation. Why did you strip my protections from me?”
“It was time. You are powerful enough now to keep yourself protected, and Mentor was not going to step out of the shadows until you looked frightening and exotic. He can still book you. Has he?”
She laughed. “The teams have fully booked the next two weeks. I would have to start booking two on the same day too, and I do have a job.”
He chuckled. “Which pays better?”
“That isn’t the point. Money is not the problem. The device design is so much more satisfying mentally, if not physically.”
His voice came through the hall as well as the com. “Are you sure it is more satisfying?” Torun walked into her office.
“You know, I am going to look into your security clearance being revoked.”
He grinned. “Good luck with that. You look tired.”
“What did I just tell you?” She huffed and disconnected the com. “I am tired.”
He walked to the couch, lifted her, and settled her against him. “Stop working and sleep.”
She snorted and leaned against his shoulder. “You are not the boss of me.”
He chuckled. “You are the scrappiest female I have run across with your soft side running wild when it has to.” He sighed. “I miss you.”
“You were the one who said that my ravenous activation could be fed this way. You were right, but it takes a toll.”
He grumbled. “On me as well. I want nothing more than to come home to you and you alone, but I understand. Do you think you will need to do it much longer?”
Zera chuckled softly. “Until I can get more escorts to fill the emotional needs of the teams. You guys are messed up.”
He pressed a kiss to her forehead. “We are. You are helping, as are your other escorts.”
“I know. I watch your stats. You are pretty tough for someone who has the colouration of a flower.”
“And you are pretty tough for a pain in my ass.” He murmured against her temple.
“Ah, you love it.”
“Yes, I do love you.” He sighed softly as he cuddled her. “Now, get some sleep.”
She tried to relax while her heart was thudding hard in her chest.
He lifted his head. “What is the problem?”
“You haven’t said that before.”
“But, you knew.”
“I suspected. I hoped. I didn’t know.” She looked up at him. “It is nice to know.”
He looked at her expectantly, his jaw flexing. “You feel the same, right?”
She chuckled and stroked his cheek dreamily. “Yes, purple pretty; I love you, too.”
He looked at her in surprise. “How old are you?”
She blinked at the question. “I am twenty-four. Why?”
“I once met a girl who called me that, but it was years ago, and I was just entering the program.”
She yawned and leaned against him. “What did she look like?”
“She was with a bunch of other kids, and her skin was translucent, her eyes wide and bright green. They were part of a find that the teams had discovered at a northern base.”
She mumbled. “A find? How did you meet the kids?”
She felt her body winding down to a resting state.
“We were taken to see them, and the little girl got out of the fencing that they had her in. She looked up at me and said, purple, pretty.”
She chuckled. “You were pretty then; you are pretty now. Don’t worry. The others of my clutch are dead. No one needs to worry.”
She fell asleep and could feel the riot of his emotions through the rushing of his heartbeat. Served him right. He had interrupted her own peace of mind countless times.
* * * *
Torun looked down at his love. Holy hells. If he was right, this was the same woman he had met when she was a child. He had been fourteen and only recently activated. His skin was as much of a sensitive point as his having moved away from his family and losing his last name. Fifteen percent of the population were activated, and his parents were not among them.
He had been hurting, feeling lost as they toured the detention facility where a batch of six creatures had been found at an abandoned northern research base. The strange, bald translucent girl had stared at him while the others she was in with fought using a variety of activations. Her green eyes had stared into his soul, and he had moved on when he was ushered along with the rest of the group. They were an unknown species, and there had been no one else alive at the base. How the children had survived was a mystery.
He had continued the tour, and when they were looking at the med centre, a tug at his tunic made him turn around. The little girl smiled. “Purple. Pretty.”
She reached out to take his hand, and a tremendous wave of power ran through him, but he kept control of it.
“Who are you, little girl? What are you called?”
She smiled happily. “Zero.”
Alarms went off, and she got an upset look in her eyes. He knelt, and she threw her arms around his neck, hiding against him.
A female researcher ran into the room and halted. “Sir, you need to let her go.”
“I know. Zero doesn’t like the alarms.”
The researcher blinked. “Zero? Right. Just a moment.” She talked into her com, and the alarms stopped.
The little girl nodded and leaned back to talk to Torun. “Thank you. I don’t like things that hurt my ears.”
The researcher gasped, and Torun stood with the child in his arms.
The group with Torun was very still. It was obvious that the little girl was considered dangerous.
“Sir, can you bring her this way?”
Torun nodded. “Sure.”
The researcher murmured, “What is your designation, sir?”
“Cadet Torun.”
“Well, Cadet. We don’t know what... uh... Zero is. We don’t know what the others she is with are. But, the boys appear to be burning themselves out. They grow weaker every day. She is a little weaker, but she is stable.”
“Why are you telling me this?”
“Um, because she is mildly radioactive, and you are the first person she has sought contact with.”
He smiled. “I am radiation-resistant. It comes with the purple skin.”
The researcher relaxed. “Well, that’s good then. So, if you just put her down in her holding cell.”
“Why is she in here and not with the others?”
“What?”
“When we saw them earlier, she was with them.”
The researcher paused and was about to speak. Zero leaned over and patted the woman’s belly. “Hello, baby.”
The researcher jolted. “How did you know that?”
Zero smiled and showed serpentine fangs. “Best friends!” She shot her arms up in the air.
Torun laughed, and they set the little girl in front of a sealed door.
The researcher knelt. “Now, how did you open the door, Zero?”
The little girl giggled and ran toward the door at full tilt. She ran straight through it and then ran out again, her arms out like the wings on an aircraft.
She stood in front of Torun and looked up at him. “Will purple pretty play?”
The researcher shook her head. “He doesn’t live here like you do. He can’t come back and play.”
Zero’s eyes got watery, and tears ran down her cheeks. He crouched and said, “When you grow up, come and find me, and we will go out and get ice cream.”
“Frozen cream and sugar with an egg-based stabilizer in a variety of flavours.” The researcher filled it in.
She frowned and stuck out her hand. “Deal.”
He took her tiny pale fingers in his own. “Deal. Will you go back into your room now?”
She wrinkled her nose. “I don’t like people looking at me.”
He laughed. “You need to be seen, Zero, for people to know you are there.”
She sighed and walked over to the researcher, taking her hand. The woman looked surprised, but she smiled. “I will try and find you a new room, Zero. Or at least some curtains.”
The little girl beamed. “Can I have a tablet? I want to make things.”
“We will get you a locked tablet. You can show us what you want to make, and if it is safe, we will send it to the CAM.”
Zero chuckled and nodded. “I will go to my room now. Goodbye, purple pretty.”
Torun stared as the little girl walked through the wall and sat on her bunk with her feet swinging. She started singing and light took shape, filling the room with butterflies and birds that kept her company.
The researcher smiled slightly. “Cadet, walk with me, please.”
“I have already sealed the non-disclosure agreement for this facility.”
“Um, no. That isn’t what I am talking about. Did you feel anything when she touched you?”
They were walking toward the secure wing of the facility. “Um, yes. There was a jolt, and I felt... stronger? Enhanced senses are my activation, but this feels like extra.”
“Can we run some scans on you every six months or so? We want to keep an eye on your progress and watch out for any unusual activations.”
“I have mine. We only get one. Right?”
“The radiation she emits is similar to that of the activated. She might be triggering something else.”
“Do you think it was dangerous?”
The researcher put her hand over her abdomen. “I hope not.”
“Oh. Right. You are carrying?”
“Yeah. I guess that it is going to be a girl if they are going to be best friends.” The researcher chuckled.
“Do you know why she is thriving and the others are fading?”
“It’s classified, but she is soon going to be the only one of her kind, whatever she is.”
They walked into a med centre, and he was introduced to the curious medics. “He had direct contact with the little girl. She would like to be addressed as Zero.”
The room was still, and then, they exploded into action, goading Torun to the scanner and checking him up.
“Cadet Torun, you have had a five percent increase in muscle mass, your tendons have increased in tensile strength, and you are going to need mineral supplements because your bones are thickening.”
Torun flexed his hands. “That is what it feels like. Like I am about to have a growth spurt.”
He could feel the ache in his bones, and then, the injections started. After half an hour with the medics, he was released as long as he turned to the team trainers in his home city.
“You mean the program medics, right?”
The researcher shook her head. “No, the team trainers. If you can pass your exams, you are going to be fast-tracked into the teams. I hope you didn’t want to be an accountant or construction worker.”
Torun looked down at his hands. “No, I wanted to be in the teams. I just thought it would be eight years before I got there.”
“It will still be a few years. We don’t know if this is a boost, a long-acting effect, or something that will make you explode.”
Torun blinked. “What has Zero done to others?”
The researcher smiled. “Nothing. We didn’t even know she could speak until today. What was the first thing she said to you?”
He was embarrassed as everyone was staring. “Um, she liked my skin.”
“Exact words, please.”
“Purple. Pretty.” He would have blushed if he could. “Then, she took my hand, and I felt the rush.”
“Describe it.”
They recorded the details, and he was interviewed for all interactions with Zero.
He was brought back to his tour group with an explanation that the little girl belonged to one of the researchers and had gotten lost and refused to leave him.
The others in his group teased him about being attractive to all ladies, no matter how young.
He had left the facility, and the tiny girl in her tiny uniform had been standing on the roof and waving at him until the shuttle he was in was out of range.
He had no doubt that she was safe and warm inside the moment he was gone.
Three years later, there was a violent explosion at the research facility. Everyone found themselves outside the buildings, safe and sound. Torun had read the report. There had been no sign of Zero. He had just been put on his first team and had been on the scene.
The wreckage was absolute; there was not one computer or one wall standing. The destruction went all five levels down.
He had gone to find one of the first researchers he had met, and the man was blinking in shock. “Where is subject Zero?”
The man blinked. “Who?”
The lack of knowledge was worrying. He asked a few more of the researchers, and none of them knew what he was talking about had erased Zero.
Fifteen years later, he helped a young woman near a program education centre out of wreckage near the campus. The moment her hand slid into his, he felt the same surge of energy. The woman had smiled at him, but her eyes were a soft hazel.
Torun’s heart had thudded in his chest, but he had fallen back to etiquette training. “Would you like to join me for coffee?” He blinked. He was supposed to excuse himself and exit.
“I have just had coffee, plus this shop won’t be rebuilt for months, but there is an ice cream place across the street.” She smiled, and his heart pounded against his ribs.
He held her hand formally, and she moved through the rubble like a queen. His team was talking with others who saw the attack.
Over ice cream, he tried to do his job while watching the smooth column of her neck and the curls of her brown hair over her shoulder. “Did you see who did it?”
She snorted. “Yes.” She brought a name, address, and image of a rupture class activation. “This is him. He blew up, knocked the car loose, and it crashed into the storefront. He had been dating Selatha, and she broke up with him. Rejection is not something he can deal with.”
“Selatha is the counter person with the broken leg?”
“Yes. They had dated for a while before she broke it off. He didn’t take it well.” She smiled and finished her ice cream. “Well, you need to get back to work, and I have to get back to class.” She got to her feet.
The door flew open, and a young woman who looked like candy floss darted toward them. Torun was on guard, but the woman ran toward his companion and slammed into her. “Zera! Oh, gods. I was so worried! I heard you were in the blast; I came right away.”
Zera stood nearly a head taller than her friend. “Susara, manners. This is Torun. Torun, this is my best friend, Susara.”
He blinked as he recognized the bright blue eyes of the researcher in this woman. Of course, it wasn’t done to ask about family.
“Zera, was it?”
She nodded.
“May I get your number? I may have questions about the events that need answering.”
She grinned. “I have given you everything. I am sure you will be fine.”
Susara was between them, and she chirped out the digits. “She turns folks down constantly, but she does it so sweetly. Don’t worry about it. Unless you try and get violent, there is always a second chance.” Susara laughed. “And folks call me Suit Bait. I think Zera’s issue is just that she avoids the teams like the plague.”
Torun had looked at Zera and the woman he wanted cleared her throat. “I am certain you are
very busy, sir.”
The downward flick of her eyes, the honorific, they were all things he wanted from her, needed from her. He swallowed as he nodded, and they left him on his own. Outside of the shop, Susara held her hands up, and Zera slammed her hands to her friend’s above both their heads. The similarity in the name, the feel of her touch, seventeen years later, she was eighteen years old when she had been four, to begin with. He didn’t know what was going on here, but the researcher who had been pregnant might have the answers.
He looked down at the woman in his lap. The researcher—Susara’s mother—had died, and there were no answers on that front.
Zera rolled toward him and put her hand on his chest. “Don’t worry about it. I will explain it next week.”
“Why next week?”
She huffed. “Susara’s funeral. Next week Thursday.”
“How do you know?”
“I scheduled it.”
“She’s not even dead yet.”
She opened her eyes slowly, and they glittered. “She will be.”
Chapter Eight
She was tucked in on her couch and still wearing her wrap dress from the day before. She got up, stumbled down the hall to the bathroom before grabbing some scrubs and going to the showers.
Zera washed and put on some loose scrubs that she used when in training with some of her combat toys. It was always better to dress in something that didn’t provide resistance when using energy weapons if you wanted to know what they would do when they hit a body. She pulled on some ballet slippers that she kept in her desk and fired up her large computer, starting shopping.
She ordered the basics—dresses for work, underwear, shoes, toiletries, and haircare items. With her schedule, trousers were going to be out of the question. A few skirt suits and blouses were also on the list. She ordered her funeral clothing, and her stomach rumbled. She was going to have to go up and get a meal unless...
A knock at her door brought her head up with a grin. Alya held up the bag and coffee cup. “Here you go. Sorry about your home.”
“It continues an absolutely sucky week. Thank you. You are my hero.” She grinned and batted her lashes.