Oddly enough, unlike Paris, who had shown up at his H-Anon meeting of all places, he didn’t believe Nadine had been put in the office to turn him. No, Nadine had simply been there to act as a sponge, absorbing any information she could for the Eastern Province.
This did, however, make him wonder why Paris had been going to Bill’s H-Anon meetups.
Maybe she’d already known Roman worked at the immigration office. It wasn’t something he’d ever mentioned in the class, although he probably had mentioned it on their first and only date.
And if she’d done all that just to have someone push Ian Turlock’s paperwork through, it seemed like there would have been easier ways to go about it.
No, Roman suspected there was more to that story.
“Are you getting tired yet?” Nadine asked with a yawn.
“I think I am, hard to tell. I haven’t been sleeping so well.”
“Do you want me to sing you a lullaby?”
“You’re not serious.”
“You’re right; it would probably wake our daughter up.”
“I’m not your fucking daughter,” Lisa hissed from the top bunk.
Nadine started to laugh, then placed her hand over her mouth to stop from making any more noise. Roman wanted to laugh alongside her, but he was too busy trying to position himself in a way that his slight erection wasn’t pressing into her.
It was a gift and a curse, really.
Roman awoke a few hours later as a pair of men entered their cabin. He had been holding Nadine quite tightly; their natural movements in the night had lifted the bottom of her shirt, exposing a swath of her flesh.
As he moved his hand back, his fingers brushed against a thick scar running along the side of her body.
Nadine didn’t say anything as she rolled out of the bunk and stood on her tippy toes, reaching for her bag on the top bunk.
For his part, Roman just sat there, observing the Eastern Province soldiers.
They wore form-fitting uniforms, emerald green, and each soldier had a small circular hat on the back of their skull. One thing he noticed about the soldiers was that they were less muscular than the typical Centralian soldier. These guys were lean, stringy even, and each of them had a silver bracelet on their right hand that emitted a light as they looked over passports.
The Easterners and their tech, Roman thought as the lead soldier handed their passports back to Nadine. He glanced up as the soldier waved at the depressing yet shining beacon on the top bunk across from Roman. Lisa didn’t say anything and the soldier looked away, back to Nadine who was finishing up her conversation with them.
The two men left and after Nadine returned the passports to her bag, she made her way back over to Roman’s bunk.
“You could go back to your own bunk now,” he suggested quietly.
“We’re keeping up appearances; don’t for a minute think I’m enjoying myself,” she said as she moved back into his arms.
“Right…” he started to say.
“I will admit, though, sometimes it’s nice just to be near someone. Do you ever have that feeling?” she asked softly.
“I’ve had that feeling for the last two years.”
“Hmmm... is it nice sleeping next to your dolls?”
“I don’t know how to answer that question.”
The train slowed and then picked up speed. It hummed along at a faster rate than it had been traveling before.
“We should get there pretty quickly now,” Nadine said. Roman was inches away from the back of her head, and he could again smell the light, minty lavender scent of her shampoo or body lotion. “That was the last stop back there to pick up passengers, and after the soldiers do their check, it becomes a rapid train between here and the Eastern Central Station.”
“We’re not going straight to the city?”
“No, anyone traveling via train into the Eastern Province first makes a stop at the Eastern Central Station, which is now a city but was originally just an outpost where people changed trains. Oh yeah, I forgot to tell you, we’ll probably run into someone of importance at the station.”
“Who’s that?”
“Her name is Abby. She’s the Type IV, Class A psychometrist who will be looking into your wife’s case. She’s traveling to Centralia on the same train.”
“Thank you, Nadine,” Roman said as he pulled her in closer. Her muscles tensed for half a second and then relaxed, allowing him to bury his head in the back of her hair.
Chapter Thirty: This Isn’t Over Yet
Turquoise gasped for air. As she coughed, blood trickled out of her mouth, staining the front of her exemplar getup.
Kevin used a tissue to wipe the blood away, the same tissue he’d used just moments ago to wipe a tear from the corner of his face. He’d been at her side for the last hour, looking her over, helping her adjust her weight whenever the pressure became too strong.
The option of going to a hospital didn’t exist for someone like Turquoise, who was most definitely undocumented and who had taken part in an attack on a government building, a terrorist attack if ever there was one.
Kevin didn’t need to mentally reach out to breaking news sources to know the incident at the immigration office was the top story of the night. The people he’d worked with who were still alive would speak and identify him, and the investigation to follow would forever make him a notorious criminal.
None of this mattered to Kevin as he stood over Turquoise, his tired mind firing, grasping for answers, searching for any strategy he could cobble together to deal with the situation.
He had killed Paris, suffocated her with her purple scarf, and he felt no remorse for doing it.
The dangerous Western spy hadn’t had much info; even using Obsidian to intoxicate her to get better answers hadn’t worked. Paris was much more in the dark than Kevin had anticipated, which meant he would need to pay another visit to his twin brother.
And when Kevin paid that visit in just a few hours, he would do whatever it took to get his brother to tell him where they were keeping the healer.
Because he wasn’t going to let Turquoise die; no, if there was one thing Kevin Blackbook would do in the time between now and his inevitable future death, it would be to keep Turquoise alive.
“There’s nothing more we can do now,” Obsidian said suddenly at his right. She was always the more mysterious of the two cat girls, the quieter one, but he could tell by the look in her eyes that she felt terrible for what had happened.
“This is all my fault; I should have sent Scarlett down to HR. And who was this asshole that was waiting for us? White hair, pink eyes or orange eyes? Doesn’t matter. Whoever he is, we will find him,” Kevin told Turquoise, who whimpered slightly at the tone of his voice. “I swear to you, we will repair your body and we will find this man.”
“It isn’t your fault,” Obsidian reminded him, her hand slipping into his. He noticed the poke of her finger on the palm of his hand, the way she scratched down the inside of his wrist. “Relax, Kevin. You need rest to make this work.”
Kevin noticed something flit against his lower back, likely her tail. He had been intoxicated by the two enough times to know what their neurotoxins felt like, the way the world seemed to fade away and ease up.
He licked his lips as Obsidian dug her nail in again, blood trickling down to his palm.
“You’re right,” he whispered. “I just need to relax.”
Obsidian lifted his now-bloodied palm to her face and licked his wound, Kevin’s shoulders relaxing even further as she did so. She took his hand and led him out of the room, away from Turquoise for a moment.
They found Scarlett asleep on the couch in the main space of their borrowed home, the owners dead, their bodies halfway across Centralia by this point at the bottom of a river courtesy of Scarlett.
Obsidian’s neurotoxin now ran through his bloodstream, and as she led Kevin into the second bedroom, he could barely feel his feet, or the drool starting to come out the
side of his mouth.
“Ready for sleep,” he managed to say.
“I know, sweet Kevin. It will only be another minute now.”
Obsidian turned Kevin to her and stood on the balls of her feet as she helped him undress, then eventually led him to the bed.
Kevin immediately rolled on his back, staring up at the ceiling as his vision dimmed.
He managed to tilt his chin to the left to watch Obsidian undress, the petite cat girl slipping out of her matching uniform, her nipples erect, her sweet little ass accentuated by the way she held her tail up.
He watched as she turned her back to the mirror and looked over her own shoulder at herself, her tail lifting up even higher. Obsidian used her tail to lift the back of her hair, which she then pulled into a ponytail.
With that, she turned to the bed, making her way over to Kevin.
She found a comfortable position next to him, her arm draped over his big belly, the side of her head buried in his chest.
His hand naturally found its way to her lower back, and from there to the place where her tail met her body.
“We’ll get through this,” she whispered, lightly pressing her nail into the side of his body. “It isn’t over yet.”
Chapter Thirty-One: Eastern Central Station and Beyond
“Roman, Abby. Abby, Roman.”
Roman offered the psychometrist a tight smile. The woman wore a trench coat, high-waisted slacks and a bolo tie. Her short brown hair was parted at the side, and something flared behind her hazel eyes as she smiled at Roman.
He kept looking for signs that she was doing something to his mind, but he didn’t find any. The telepaths that came through the immigration office went to a special section, similar to the one Nadine had worked in, but that didn’t mean Roman hadn’t been trained to deal with the enlightened class.
For the training, they’d had an actual Centralian telepath on hand to take over people’s minds, letting them know when they’d done so. It was a subtle feeling, and even with training, Roman knew it would take years to be able to adequately know when his mind was being fucked with, but of all the trainings he’d had, it had been by far the most impactful.
Which was why he was being extra careful at the moment, trying not to think anything except surface thoughts.
“I like it when they’ve been trained,” the hazel-eyed telepath finally told Nadine.
They stood on the platform at Eastern Central Station, a few bags flung over their shoulders, Lisa Painstake focused on the cargo hold off to Nadine’s left. They hadn’t unloaded the coffins yet, but when they did, she would be the first to spot them.
“Abby is the same person who would have been able to help us had we been able to get your wife before she passed,” Nadine explained.
“She’s a dream-walker as well?” he asked. Roman still wore the same clothing he’d come in on, and Nadine was in a collarless emerald shirt, her hair down for once, blending in better than he could ever have hoped to with his glaring white hair.
“I sure am. Why, do you need help with something?” Abby asked.
“No.” And instead of turning away as he normally would have, Roman simply crossed his arms over his chest and relaxed his thoughts, not letting anything past the surface level.
“No dreams you want to talk about?” she asked, tilting her head at him, her hazel eyes sparkling.
“Enough, Abby. We have places to go,” Nadine said as she saw how uncomfortable Roman was growing. “I really appreciate you doing this for us.”
Abby lifted her chin into the air and moved past Roman, catching him out of the corner of her eye. “I understand, and it’s the least I could do for you, Nadine.”
“I appreciate it as well,” Roman mumbled.
“I know you do, and I will see what I can find out about your wife and her kidnappers. I should say, sometimes the information I uncover is not what the person wants to hear,” she said as an obvious precaution.
“Oh, I want to hear it.”
“Yes, that’s what everyone says, but if it is someone you know, someone you trust…”
“I don’t know anyone in their right mind who would kidnap a corpse. Up until just a few days ago, I didn’t even know that was a thing,” he said through gritted teeth.
“Every day presents us with another opportunity to learn something new,” Abby said in a soft voice. She lifted her hand to Roman’s shoulder, and he whipped away from it.
“No, I need to touch you just to get a sense of who you are, and your deeper relationship to this woman.”
“I was her husband. I am her husband,” he said, his nerves tensing. He was glad he hadn’t returned life to Casper yet. She would have had a field day with this. “No, I’m a widower; you know what I’m trying to say here,” he said, looking to Nadine for support.
“Let her touch your hand, and then we’ll be done with this,” Nadine said firmly.
Roman trusted her—hell, he’d just spent the last several hours curled up next to her—but he also knew she meant business, and that she was in charge here.
So he did what he was told. Roman extended his arm, allowing Abby to take his hand. She held it with both of her smaller hands for just a moment, massaging her thumbs into his palm.
“Interesting, very interesting,” she said. “And I would love to meet your dolls, but that can wait.”
An announcement came on a loudspeaker letting people know that the train would be departing for Centralia in the next fifteen minutes.
“I guess that’s my ride,” Abby said as she looked away from him. “I’ll let you know what I find out.”
And with that, the mysterious telepath in the trench coat stepped onto the train and was gone.
As soon as they’d brought the coffins into a side building Nadine had arranged, Roman waved his hand dramatically, giving life to the two dolls in the coffins as well as Casper, who was tucked safely in his pocket.
“How long was I out?” the tiny doll asked with a yawn.
Nadine looked from Roman to the dolls sitting up in their caskets. They looked perfect as ever, not a hair on their heads out of place, nor did they look sleepy or give any indication they had just ridden in wooden boxes for the last several hours.
“A while,” Roman said as he helped Celia out of her coffin. Her heels hit the floor and she smiled at Nadine, her purple eyes tracing over the woman’s clothing.
“If you’re wondering if I have clothing for you two, yes, I have some,” Nadine said as she placed her leather bag on the table.
“So we’re all supposed to be your daughters?” said Lisa, her form half visible. It was clear her body needed nutrients, and she was trying to maintain her level of transparency for as long she could before she…
Disappeared completely? Roman had no idea what would happen to her.
“Yes,” said Nadine, “which is why I need you two to change into more appropriate clothing.” She handed the first set of clothes to Celia, and once Roman had helped Coma out of her coffin, Nadine gave her emerald clothing as well.
Not at all shy, the two dolls quickly started taking off what they were wearing, Celia zipping down the front of her outfit and pressing her shoulders out before moving to lower half, Coma turning to Roman and asking for help unbuttoning the back of her Gothic Loli dress.
“I guess this is as good a place as any,” Lisa said.
Coma turned to the bright yet semi-transparent woman as she took off the mask covering her face. “I’m sorry you can’t wear these clothes right now,” she said, no hint of sarcasm in her voice.
“But we can still pretend to be sisters,” Celia added.
“Wait, where’s my set of peasant clothing?” asked Casper, who had crawled her way from Roman’s pocket to his shoulder. “I want to look like I’m wearing a green potato sack too.”
“You aren’t getting any clothing,” Roman told her.
“That’s so fucked up.”
“No, it makes sense. Look, I can
just keep you in my pocket. And I don’t mean that in some weird way; it’s just more convenient. Hell, sometimes I wish I could just hang on someone’s pocket rather than deal with the real world.”
Nadine started to laugh at that.
“Yeah, I guess that sounded stupid.”
“It definitely did,” said Casper as she slid down the front of his jacket and back into his pocket. “This better be an entertaining trip, because otherwise, I’m going back to sleep.”
“What do you think?” Celia asked as she turned to Roman, her blouse barely extending past the bottom of her ass cheeks.
“Is that how she’s supposed to wear it?” Roman asked Nadine.
“Yes, it’s a certain style that girls her age wear, at least until they’re married.”
“It’s pretty cute,” Coma said as she slipped into her blouse, tugging the bottom part of the fabric over her hips. “You sure I can’t wear my mask with it?”
“Actually, it would be a little more convincing if you did,” Nadine said. “Sure, wear your mask. If it’s in style in Centralia, it’ll be in style here, at least for those who follow fashion. But nothing else, like your exemplar headgear,” she told Celia. “We’re trying to keep a low profile, remember that.”
“What about my casket?” Lisa asked.
“Like I told you on the train, some of the railroad employees will load it on our gana to the Brattle Region.”
“We’re taking a gana?” Roman asked, excited for once to use public transportation.
“That’s right. You didn’t see the large track a few platforms away?”
Roman thought back to getting out of the train and realized he’d been so focused on masking his thoughts that he hadn’t taken a chance to look around the station.
He shook his head.
“Well, now that everyone’s dressed, you’ll be able to see it firsthand.”
Roman, Lisa, and his dolls followed Nadine out of the private room. Two railway attendants waited outside the room, and Nadine instructed them to place Lisa’s coffin on the “gana to Brattle,” as she called it.
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