Aldebaran Divided

by Philippe Mercurio

  “Why did the Xilfs attack you?”

  The alien repeated himself and this time accompanied his words with a gesture intended to close the door. Without thinking, Mallory blocked it with her foot, patting herself on the back for wearing her heavy pilot’s boots.

  The ambassador waved his arms violently and rushed toward her, catching her off guard: no Vohrn had never acted aggressively towards her. She felt Torg wrap his arm around her waist and pull her out of reach as he pivoted to get between them. As usual, the cybrid had reacted instantly.

  The alien froze abruptly on the threshold, which he apparently refused to cross.

  “I don’t know,” he said.

  Torg addressed Mallory. “That’s it, we’re going!”

  Given her bodyguard’s tone, she could tell the extraterrestrial was really pissing him off. Stubbornly, she detached herself from his grasp and spoke. “No! We are not leaving until His Excellency gives me what I need to defend myself.”

  She was determined to take advantage now that the Vohrn finally seemed to be behaving somewhat normally. Keeping her distance, she said, “I need a pistol with hypertrophic bullets. Customs barely let Torg through!”

  The Vohrn sent more instructions via his navcom and then dismissed them once more.

  After leaving the embassy, as they meandered through the city-planet’s endless corridors, the cybrid couldn’t stop himself from grumbling, “Are you for real? Why didn’t you ask Laorcq or Alrine for a weapon?”

  “Yeah? And how was I supposed to find out if he’s gone around the bend or not? I wasn’t going to determine that by saying hello and goodbye!”

  “You take too many risks. If I hadn’t been there, he could have killed you.”

  “And you worry too much. If you hadn’t been there, I wouldn’t have done what I did,” she replied, with the vague impression that she was lying.

  A vibration on her wrist gave her the opportunity to cut the conversation short. Before her eyes, her navcom displayed the caller’s name: Laorcq Adrinov.

  He had just received her message and suggested they meet up. They agreed on a bar a few blocks away.

  On the way there, she began to hope he would come alone…

  III

  GASTRONOMY

  Cole Vassili entered his apartment and threw his coat onto a chair, groaning with irritation. The tattooed brunette and her giant cybrid had shown up in the nick of time, but he was still annoyed about it: he hated being indebted to anyone. These days, almost anything could plunge him into a foul mood.

  Without really remembering how it had happened, he had developed a palpable disgust for his fellow man. He felt nothing but contempt for the weak and jealousy of the strong. He could be very seductive but found sex repugnant. Teetering on the edge of true insanity, he vacillated between depression and rage.

  His only source of comfort was an object of unknown origin that had come into his possession while he was in the Altair system: a ktol.

  At the time, he was a young employee for a firm specializing in composite armor. He worked as an assistant, traveling from station to station and handling administrative tasks while his boss negotiated juicy contracts with Altair’s merchants.

  An alien with a porcine face had accosted him in an isolated corridor and given him a spherical object covered with spikes as thin as needles. Uninterested in what seemed to be a worthless bauble, he had tried to refuse the extraterrestrial’s gift. The alien had simply pressed the ktol into his hand, piercing his palm in several places.

  Cole drowned in an ocean of exquisite sensations. When he came to, the alien had vanished, leaving the object behind. Since then, he had used it every day, never questioning why it had been given to him. The ktol dominated his life with a grip stronger than any drug.

  During brief moments of lucidity, a disturbing coincidence sometimes surprised him: his malaise and misanthropy seemed to have taken root around this time. He rarely dwelt on the idea at length. After all, it was a small price to pay in exchange for bliss on demand.

  Over time, Cole had refined his use of the ktol, discovering that its location on his body influenced the quality of its effects and, surprisingly, that it would not function in the presence of others.

  He removed the rest of his clothes, revealing a body that would make a professional weightlifter pale with envy, approached a dresser, and opened one of its drawers. He pulled out an object that looked like a sea urchin the color of bone: the ktol. With the artifact lightly cupped in his hand, he lay down on the bed. He waited for a few moments, then transferred the ktol to his pectoral muscles. The prickly orb suddenly moved on its own, and its’ tips bit into his flesh. A thin rivulet of blood ran down along his ribs. Behind his closed eyelids, his eyes moved.

  With delight, he entered the warm, soft universe created by the ktol. He bathed in liquid colors while being caressed by subtle sounds. As he floated in this captivating environment, his human existence became a distant memory, and time ceased to exist.

  Just as his consciousness was about to dissolve into an oblivion of pleasure, something unexpected happened: the mantle of artificial joy that enveloped him tore abruptly, leaving him stunned.

  He found himself lying naked on a rocky strip on the edge of a rust-colored sea. Cold wind whipped his face, and the waves breaking against the shore lashed him with a fine, freezing mist. In the distance, he saw the ruins of a city filled with stone buildings. A dozen high towers rose above the rest of the ravaged town. One of them had snapped in half, and its peak had crushed an entire neighborhood under its weight. Even without any landmarks, Vassili was sure he’d never seen these colossal structures before.

  Turning his head, he saw that he wasn’t alone. An alien stood nearby. The creature’s size was proportionate to the city of stone. The being was immense, more than thirteen feet tall. Its light brown skin was covered by a thick tangle of muscles, and its arms looked like gnarled tree trunks. It wore a tunic cut from iridescent cloth and covered with complex geometric designs.

  Vassili was gripped by fear as violently powerful as a phobia. Paralyzed, he didn’t move an inch as the monster leaned over him. A disproportionately large face sporting six pairs of eyes of different sizes examined the terrified human. Beneath these ocular globes, a lipless mouth formed a long slash across its face, like a badly healed wound. Although it remained closed, words reverberated in the man’s skull with a painful echo.

  We are the Primordials.

  It didn’t take Mallory and Torg long to get to the bar Laorcq had selected. The only entrance was located at the end of a corridor harshly lit with UV lamps. Under this artificial light, Torg’s fur appeared even darker than usual, and his stripes blazed fire-red. At the end of the hallway, Mallory found a section of wall that looked like marble with a glowing circle in the center. As soon as she touched it, the stone panel disappeared, revealing a wide, cubic space.

  Followed by her bodyguard, the pilot entered and wondered immediately how she was going to find Laorcq.

  The place was filled with giant, floating glass bubbles big enough for two or even four chairs and a low table. Several hundred of these spherical salons hung in the air.

  A small silvery robot flying three feet above the floor came to her rescue. It correctly identified Mallory’s home world and spoke to her in her native tongue: “Welcome to Cerdvar. Do you have a reservation?”

  She replied that they were meeting Laorcq. Instead of a verbal response, a hatch opened abruptly on the machine’s limb. Taking Mallory and Torg by surprise, a translucid film flowed out, enveloping them and transforming into one of the many balls that filled the club.

  The robot launched itself toward the center of the large building, dragging the sphere and its two occupants behind. The flying salons circulated according to an expertly orchestrated choreography. Some of the occupied balls were opaque, but others were transparent, providing a view of the guests inside. Mallory saw a sort of giant starfish covered with long, white fur i
n one of them. The creature alternated between complete stillness and sudden bursts of movement to grab pieces of meat floating around it in zero gravity. Mallory wasn’t sure if it was a captive or if it belonged to a species from an unknown world.

  She forgot about the strange extraterrestrial when she saw Laorcq in the bubble toward which the robot was dragging them. The two spheres touched and fused, and Mallory and Torg suddenly found themselves face to face with Laorcq. Seated in a comfortable-looking chair, he welcomed them, saying, “Only just arrived on the planet and you’ve already been involved in a gun battle. I’m impressed!”

  Somewhat annoyed by his lighthearted tone, she fired back. “And yet that wouldn’t stop me from answering if my colleagues were having an emergency.”

  Laorcq shrugged. “We all need peace and quiet from time to time.”

  Mallory sighed inwardly. She could easily imagine what “peace and quiet” meant.

  Nevertheless, as she and Torg sat, she couldn’t stop herself from saying, “By the way… You and Alrine?”

  The half-formed question clearly made Laorcq uncomfortable. He launched into a fairly muddled explanation. In the end, Mallory understood that, despite their differences, he and Alrine complemented each other perfectly.

  Now that she knew where she stood, she reoriented the conversation toward the mission. “The Vohrn ambassador is a serious problem. It’s true that I haven’t known them for long, but his behavior was completely different from Hanosk and the others…”

  In a few sentences, she described the black magma she had seen on the ceiling during her conversation with the ambassador.

  She watched the scarred man’s forehead wrinkle with deep thought. “He’s not the only one who’s glitching. Alrine and I were sent here because highly-placed Gibrals are showing similar symptoms. All of the tests come back normal, but their behavior is completely incoherent.”

  “So, the Vohrn are counting on us to find the common denominator,” Mallory guessed.

  “We’ll see. I’ve spent six months with them, and their logic still surprises me. Maybe they’re using us to throw fuel on the fire to see what happens…”

  Laorcq leaned over the round table in front of them and brushed one of the symbols with his fingertips. A panel slid open, exposing a set of multicolored balls that floated up into the enclosed space. With a precise gesture, he caught one of them and brought it to his lips.

  Mallory imitated him. In her mouth, the bubble transformed into a shot of a refreshing, mildly alcoholic beverage. Torg simply left his giant mouth hanging wide open and gobbled up the balls of liquid by the dozens.

  Once his thirst was quenched, the scarred veteran continued. “I’m intrigued by the assassination attempt against the ambassador. I’ll go down to the lower levels and see what I can get out of the Xilfs.”

  “What good will that do?” Mallory retorted. “They’ll avoid you like the plague.”

  “You’ve forgotten what I said about throwing fuel on the fire to see what happens. I’d like to borrow Torg to go take a little stroll among them…”

  “You want to deprive me of Torg? What if I need him?”

  “It won’t be for long. Take the time to relax a little. Go on… Besides, he must have spent most of the trip here in stasis.”

  He spoke directly to the cybrid. “I’m sure you’d like to stretch your legs a bit.”

  “Definitely!” Torg agreed. “I can’t wait to see the Xilfs again.”

  Mallory agreed reluctantly and muttered, “Try not to get in a fight, okay? You’re unlikely to run into the guys from the embassy.”

  Gulping down a last colored ball, she savored the drink briefly and decided that relaxation could wait: she was going to find something useful to do.

  After saying goodbye to the pilot, Laorcq and the cybrid left the bar and headed toward the antigrav tubes. They arrived at the Xilf sector without incident. At this depth, the veteran expected to find dark and narrow concrete corridors but was surprised instead by wide spaces lit by a clever system that channeled the rays from Aldebaran through a multitude of light wells.

  Large arches made of yellow wood supported the ceiling. There were so many of them that they formed a gigantic spider’s web. He noticed that the walls and floor were covered with paneling cut from a dark blue variety of wood, some of which was shot through with red veins. Many types of aliens were strolling around at the foot of this strange structure, although most of them were Xilfs. The veteran estimated that they made up about three quarters of the neighborhood’s population.

  “What if we sampled the local cuisine before getting down to business?” said Torg, whose appetite had few limits.

  Laorcq shook with gentle laughter.

  “While you can ingest almost anything, I can’t. Oh well, you never know: let’s go – I’ll follow you!”

  Guided by the cybrid’s sense of smell, they pushed through the wooden pylons. As they advanced, they discovered a spot reserved for small shops at the base of each of the arches. Most of the stores belonged to Xilfs. Crammed tightly together, these tiny boutiques were decorated with lighted signs in loud colors flashing illegible characters. To Torg’s great joy, most of them served food: it was an authentic local market.

  “A people after my own heart,” he declared, licking his chops at what looked like a giant chrysalid.

  Laorcq inspected the large cocoon roasting over a brazier. Judging by the layers of charred fat covering it, the barbecue was at least a century old.

  The Xilf working at the stand in question turned its spherical eyes toward Torg.

  “Gatid norx do?”

  Startled, the human and the cybrid looked at each other. They both had translator functions on their navcoms…

  The alien tilted his second eye downward and repeated the words in another language.

  “Would you like a taste?”

  Torg didn’t have to be asked twice… He devoured a pound’s worth and declared, “More.”

  Resigned, Laorcq resolved to pay for the entire strange roast, all while keeping his distance: it was giving off an aroma that reminded him of horse dung.

  The culinary interlude came to an end, and they continued their exploration. Laorcq found one detail extremely interesting: he didn’t see a single Gibral in the area.

  He began to think this whole thing might not be a good idea. They were extremely conspicuous. A scarred human and a red-and-black giant weren’t going to be able to find out what had motivated the attack against the Vohrn ambassador. He mulled over how to learn more about the Xilfs. He had to find a way to gain their trust, or, failing that, of someone who knew them well.

  Laorcq looked around, hoping for a stroke of luck. He realized that many of the Xilfs were moving in the same direction.

  He strode toward the extraterrestrials and planted himself in front of one of them. “What’s going on? Why is there such a crowd?”

  Not stopping in his haste, the Xilf replied succinctly, “Eating competition!”

  At first, he thought the translation software had failed. Then he noticed a disconcerting glow shining in the cybrid’s big blue eyes. Unwilling to waste more time on Torg’s passion for food, he tried to dissuade him. “Come on! You just ate six pounds of meat. Isn’t that enough?”

  “Irrelevant. I need to take revenge on the Xilfs. They really pissed me off at the embassy.”

  Laorcq moaned. “Obviously. It has nothing to do with the opportunity to fill the black hole in your stomach…”

  Torg wasn’t listening. Following the flood of aliens, they arrived at an open area. The omnipresent wooden columns formed a ring that encircled a Xilf. Laorcq looked at him: he was almost six and a half feet tall, and his carapace was both thicker than his peers and a lighter color, almost whitish. Some of the facets on his ocular globes were almost black, which made them stand out. He looked ancient.

  The old Xilf launched into a brief speech. Once again, the navcoms were unable to translate. The cybrid was un
fazed. He called out to a nearby alien and asked for an explanation.

  Laorcq thus learned that the competition involved eating live creatures of increasingly larger sizes, until all but one contestant could no longer continue. The last one standing would be declared the winner.

  Four extraterrestrials stepped forward, intending to compete. Under Laorcq’s reproachful gaze, Torg followed suit.

  The old alien came to join the spectators, while other Xilfs emerged from behind the wooden pillars surrounding the arena. They piled up a number of plastic boxes in the center. Some were as small as a thumb, while others were as much as six feet long.

  There was a required entry fee. Once again, Laorcq had to pay. After resolving this final detail, the competition began.

  The Xilf contestants stepped forward and picked up the smallest boxes. They opened them and swallowed the contents: a ringed worm with a wriggling, pink body. Torg imitated the other competitors.

  Laorcq became increasingly appalled as he watched them move on to green centipedes as long as a fist, a hairy octopus that let out a harrowing cry as it slid between a Xilf’s jaws, and then a sort of oyster so big the cybrid had to pick up the shell with both hands.

  With each challenge, the giant’s hemispheric head tilted backward, revealing the sharp teeth bristling in his wide mouth.

  “Hmm… that one’s not bad,” he commented as he gulped down an organism that looked like a three-foot-wide amoeba.

  Laorcq pretended not to hear. He watched the Xilfs, whose spindly bodies proved surprisingly capable of distending. Their torsos morphed into barrels, swelling with each of the aliens’ culinary exploits.

  He contemplated the scene and felt a vague urge to vomit: it was all fairly disgusting. Out of politeness, he tried not to show it: no one here cared a whit about human standards…

  The first capitulation came when they had to consume a Scolopendra oozing thick brown liquid that smelled like licorice. One of the extraterrestrials bit down on it and chewed. Instead of swallowing the mouthful, its two necks and the eyes at their tips began to tremble. He violently expelled the contents of his swollen stomach.