Authors: Rain Oxford
“In our culture, blood is the most unsanitary
substance,” Jos explained. “If you get even the smallest of scratches, we request
that you report to the medical center to have it healed and tell us where you
were at the time so we can have it sanitized. Even though you can heal
yourself, we have measures in place that are traditional.”
“His heart rate is increasing just talking about
it. Either he is afraid we won’t believe him, which is unlikely, or they have a
very real phobia of blood,” Mordon said. “If they become our enemy, we should have
no problem; we can just threaten to bleed on them and they’ll run screaming.”
“Mordon, let’s just assume for today that they’re
not going to turn on us.”
“Okay. For today. Tomorrow, we prepare for them
turning on us.”
“If you are in agreement with these stipulations,
please sign your name in your native script.”
Since she said our native script, I signed in English
cursive. Mordon signed in Sudo, even though Modo was his native language,
because it was more common on Duran to sign in Sudo.
She then turned to another page. “This is to verify
the payment for… one night…” she wrote it down in a blank place. “At the price
of…” She said a price, which didn’t translate because there was no Sudo word
for their money system.
I signed this form and let her scan my wristband with
a metal wand. It made a happy beeping sound, and she signed under my name. Her
signature was two overlapping circles with lines and loops through it. Kela
left for a moment, then returned with three sealed bags of clothes, one smaller
than the other two. She also handed us a small mesh sack.
“If you place your dirty clothes in this bag and put
it outside your door, they will be returned to you clean by the end of the day.
If you need anything else, we are located at the end of the hallway. Our door
has a sign on it stating that it is the residential office. Please enjoy your
stay.”
They left. Trying to adhere to their culture, Mordon
gave Sammy a bath in the sink while I took a shower. After getting undressed, I
stood outside of the tub in case the water came out too hot or cold. “Shower
on,” I said. As soon as the words were out of my mouth, water felt from the
metal disk like heavy rain. I held my hand out and felt that the water was
warm. “Hotter,” I said. The water quickly grew hotter until I told it to stop.
It was so much better than hydrosonic showers.
All too soon, Mordon was pounding on the door.
“You’ve been in there an hour! I want a shower, too!”
I got out and dried, but didn’t shut off the water. I
quickly dressed in the white clothes, which were similar to scrubs and made me
feel like a mental patient. “Shower, scolding,” I said, opening the door before
Mordon could break it down.
I found Sammy sitting on the floor in his room,
playing with toys. It was odd seeing him in white clothes. He looked up at me
and smiled.
“Sammy? Do you understand when people are talking
around you?” I asked, mostly curious.
His eyes darted away as if checking for Mordon, then
he looked me right in the eyes. “Yes,” he said.
“What about when we speak in Sudo?” I asked in Sudo.
Half of the time, Mordon and I spoke in Sudo, especially on Vaigda, but Sammy
always appeared to be listening. When he tried to scare Jos, we had been
speaking in Sudo. I couldn’t imagine where he had heard it before.
“Yes,” he said again. He went back to playing. A
moment later, he looked up at me and beamed. My breath caught as his Byzantium
purple eyes flashed with a bright purple glow. “Play,” he insisted, holding up
a red block. There really wasn’t anything else to do until Mordon was finished
and we could get some food.
Mordon found us making block castles. “Want to get
some food?” he asked, leaning against the doorframe. Sammy jumped up and held
his arms up to be picked up. Mordon started to reach down but I shook my head.
“Talk if you want something,” he said.
“Up!” Sammy begged.
Mordon picked him up and frowned at me. “Is there
anyone who looks good in white?” he asked.
His skin was just a little more tanned than mine, but
the outfits looked like they were designed to be unfashionable. I wasn’t a guy
who cared about matching the colors and patterns of my clothes, unless I was
trying to look good for Divina, but I didn’t like looking like a mental
patient. And I couldn’t imagine white was anyone’s color.
“A woman with very pale skin. Divina,” I said after
thinking about it.
“Divina looks good in anything.”
“Without anything, too.”
We left the room in search of the vending machines.
Our boots were left behind because while socks were provided in the bags, shoes
were not. It only took us a couple of minutes to find one of the big machines,
and we were lucky that there was a small family there. Dressed in Greek attire,
a middle aged woman, a little boy about twelve, and a little girl about the
same age stood discussing what they wanted. They were looking through one of
the three menus. I grabbed one of the remaining menus and opened it. Inside
there were about twenty-five pictures of food, along with many symbols. While
many things looked appetizing, I had no idea how to order.
“Excuse me, can you help us?” Mordon asked the lady.
“We can’t understand the menu.”
“Of course,” she smiled. “Do you have anything in
specific you want?”
Mordon pointed to the noodle dish. “This looked
really good,” he answered.
“This here is the price,” she pointed to a symbol.
“This is a description, and this is the number you type in for your selection.
Pass your identification band over the scan-plate and I will enter the number
for you,” she volunteered.
There was a keypad with symbols on it and a black
slit above it. In the middle of the machine was a shelf like the food maker in
the kitchen at Casten. Mordon waved his bracelet over the slit and the woman
pushed several buttons. The devise made a happy beeping sound and a loud click.
A black shield came down over the small shelf for a second, then lifted to
reveal a large bowl of steaming noodles with chunks of meat in it. It smelled
really good, but I wanted to try what looked like chicken wings covered in a
thick red sauce.
I showed the lady which one I wanted and then waved
my hand over the slit. I memorized which buttons she pushed and in what order.
“Is this stuff okay for babies?” I asked.
Sammy twisted around to peer up at me like I was nuts
for asking, as if I would ever consider not sharing with him.
“Yes, but I would only feed him the noodles, because
yours is a little spicy,” she warned.
We thanked her and headed back to our room. A young
man passed right by our room and nothing happened, but when we reached it, it
slid open. “Technology out the wazoo,” I declared to myself.
“The what?” Mordon asked.
I just shook my head. We ended up sharing all the
food between the three of us, as Sammy demanded some of the meat. It may not
have been chicken, but it definitely tasted like poultry. The sauce was rich,
sweet, and spicy like a good barbeque sauce. The noodles were also a little
sweet, but it was more of an aftertaste. They had more depth to their flavor.
After eating, we found our way to the child district.
There were more colors in the walls and toys around here, but everyone wore
white. Most of the men wore clothes like scrubs, while most of the women wore
the white, Greek-style dresses that bordered on slutty.
The playground had soft flooring material, colorful
toys, and many climbing structures. There were even slides and swings. I sat
Sammy on the kiddy slide, but he just frowned at me in confusion so I nudged
him until he slid down. He giggled happily and hit the ground running back for
more. He slid a few more times before I took him to the swing and pushed him.
After a while, I looked up to see Mordon sitting on a
bench seat, chatting with a woman. She looked to be in her late thirties and
was still in her prime, but I didn’t like the way she smiled at him. She wanted
something from him that she shouldn’t. I was actually surprised that he didn’t
realize her intentions were unkind; he was normally so good at reading people.
A few minutes later, he still hadn’t picked up on her bad vibes. Maybe we were
so deep underwater that it was messing with his senses.
I stopped the swing and leaned down to whisper in
Sammy’s ear. “Mama’s not paying any attention to you. You should go play with
him.”
Sammy didn’t miss a beat; he climbed from the seat
and ran full baby-force at Mordon, screaming “mama” at the top of his lungs.
Mordon looked surprised, but picked Sammy up without hesitation. The woman got
up and left, but he didn’t even give her a second look.
“Who was that?” I asked.
I didn’t like his upset expression. “Later,” he
answered quietly.
I assumed he needed to collect his own thoughts
before talking about it, since he could have just told me telepathically if he
wanted to talk in private about it. We went back to the room soon after that
and luckily, we didn’t run into the woman again. Sammy went right to sleep when
I laid him down.
* * *
I woke up to a happy giggling. From the lack of
sunlight in the water, I guessed that it hadn’t risen yet. When the giggling
got louder, I sat up. Mordon was still asleep, so I tried to be quiet as I got
up and found my way in the dark until I came to Sammy’s room. There were lights
shining in the water outside, possibly for security reasons. Pressed against
Sammy’s ceiling was one of the octopus creatures we had seen before. It wiggled
its legs and pressed them against the glass, almost as if dancing. It didn’t
look like it had malicious intentions, but I wouldn’t be letting Sammy around
any open waters for a while.
I really did want kids of my own. I hadn’t worried
about it before I met Divina; I always thought it would just happen. Divina
would make a great mother; she was loving and sweet, but also strict and
willing to put everything on the line to protect her loved ones. Unfortunately,
it seemed that I was her only loved one.
A baby girl with her silky black hair and deep blue
eyes would be the cutest child in the world. She would play pranks on her
classmates and break tiny boy hearts every day. With my sarcasm and Divina’s
stubbornness, there would be no stopping the child, good or bad.
But Divina was a god, and her body was created, not
grown. I knew she couldn’t have kids, and she knew I wanted them. Every time we
were in town and would pass children, she would distract me. Listening to
Sammy’s giggling and thinking I would never have one made my chest hurt.
However… there were always other means, like adoption
or surrogacy. I could never give Divina up, not even for children. We had only
been together for three years, but I couldn’t imagine life without her. I asked
her twice to marry me, and she never gave me an answer.
Now this stuff is
happening with the gods and the balance of magic…
If the gods tried to take Divina from me, I will
use my magic like I never have before and put up one Hell of a fight.
* * *
This time I woke up to Mordon throwing my clothes at
me. I rolled over and grumbled as he nagged about me sleeping in. “Breakfast in
bed works, too,” I complained, sitting up.
“I’m not your girlfriend. Tell Divina to wake you
with up like that.”
“Actually, when Divina wakes me up, it’s usually an
hour before I get breakfast,” I bragged. He threw one of Sammy’s shoes at my
face, but I caught it in time.
“Shut up. I don’t have a girlfriend to wake me up so
just shut up.”
“If you did have one, you wouldn’t be so crabby in
the morning,” I suggested.
Mordon stomped out of the room and I was a little
worried I had actually upset him. Soon he returned, though, carrying two bowls
of noodles. He set them on the breakfast bar as I pulled on my regular clothes,
since he was wearing his. We let Sammy feed himself noodles while we ate ours,
then I cleaned up his mess.
As Mordon washed the dishes, he stared off into empty
space. Normally, I would respect his right to be lost in his own head, but I
was worried about him beating himself up over leaving his father. I knew my
friend was driven by honor, and his loyalties were now split between protecting
his abusive father and helping me.
“What are you thinking about?” I asked. His blush
surprised me.
“Nothing.”
“Are you worried about your father?”
“What? No.”
“Then what are you thinking so hard about?”
“Nothing important… You know Divina is more powerful
than you, right? I know you keep her secrets, but she doesn’t tell you
everything. Do you really trust her?”
“Absolutely. You can smell that she has secrets and
even I know she lies to me, but have you ever scented a bad intention from
her?”
He thought about it before shaking her head. “No. I
think she loves you and would never hurt you. Not of purpose, anyway.” He
thought for a moment, then turned back to me. “How do you two even… do that?”
“How do we do… Oh, god.” I sighed. “I’m… I’ve never
had to explain it… Just hold your questions until the end. When a man and woman
are very drunk, or in love, they meet each other in a bar. See, a woman has a
hole that men don’t. It’s located in the same place that---”
“God, Dylan, no! I understand how sex works! I mean
that Divina is so dominating and you’re not. I’m asking how your relationship
works.”
“Oh. That is easier to explain. Divina is all about
power and control, and I’m usually happy to go with whatever she wants, because
I know she wouldn’t hurt me or my friends. But in the bedroom, I take control.
She enjoys that time when she doesn’t have to make decisions or fight for her
control. We don’t really have defined boundaries or expectations for each
other. It sucks when one of use feels like we can’t talk to the other about
something, but eventually we argue about it, and everything gets worked out.”