Chapter Five

“Mmm? What’s going on?” I inquired as I walked into the lounge. Zafir, Sarah, Diana, Amara, Calder, Nikolai, and Maelor were all standing and crowded around the television.

“Some reporters are going around the Syldrari Sector and interviewing people live,” Sarah answered, glancing back at me with a worried expression. “We don’t know how, but they got permission to have the Syldrari drop their disguises, too!”

“Is it true there’s an imperial soldier who has been coming to this sector lately?” The female reporter’s voice drifted to me as I got closer. “Don’t you find that strange?”

“Strange? It’s not that unusual. There are humans coming and going all the time, such as yourselves,” a familiar voice answered.

My suspicions were confirmed when I walked around to Sarah’s left and got a good look at the screen.

Oh man…those pants are doing things to me. I crossed my arms over my stomach. Rel was wearing tight, black leather pants and a loose white tank top. Simple, but effective enough. His dark blue-grey skin glimmered faintly under the camera lights, though the crew’s lighting couldn’t compete with the glowing sections in his pale blue hair. “They’re interviewing Rel? We think someone’s been following me?”

“And is it true this soldier has been dining at your…establishment?” The reporter prompted. “I thought humans couldn’t eat Syldrari fare?”

“It is rare, yes, but not unheard of,” Rel answered the question with such a charming smile that the reporter and my fellow viewers seemed taken aback. “Our differing palettes are an evolutionary nuance, certainly, but it isn’t unusual for those who lived by the sea to have similar tastes to Syldrari.”

“Syldrari are so…odd,” Diana murmured softly. “They almost sound like they’re singing when they talk. Then there’s how he looks…”

I glanced over at her. “Hmm? What’s wrong with how he looks?”

“Nothing ‘wrong,’ just so…odd. I don’t understand why they look so different from us.” Diana shook her head quickly.

“Odd? I dunno, I think he’s pretty— You know what? Never mind.” I decided to stop that train of thought there. They didn’t need to know that I found Rel attractive, or the kind of places my brain was going with him in those pants.

“Pretty?” Zafir asked dubiously.

I sighed and pressed my fingers to my temples. “That wasn’t the end of the sentence. I was going to say he’s handsome, though I guess ‘pretty’ works too. Especially if you consider the other alien species we have wandering around in the city. Syldrari may actually be the closest to looking like us—and even a lot of humans don’t look human anymore.”

“It may be the similarities that put people on edge,” Zafir offered, rubbing his chin. “Some humans experience the feeling of ‘Uncanny Valley’ when they meet other species who look similar to us but aren’t us. With some, the more you look, the more they look like us. It is the opposite with Syldrari. Their more aquatic evolutionary path and likely different origins have made them more unlike us.”

“You think he’s pretty?” Sarah peered at me doubtfully.

I tilted my head. “You don’t think the glimmering and glowy shiny stuff is pretty?”

Sarah quickly held up her hands. “I mean, it is, and it’s a really pretty shade of blue right now but—”

“Ahhh, I see,” Zafir remarked, glancing my way. “Due to your loss of memory, you haven’t been trained to see inhuman species as grotesque. Our colleagues here are likely too well-trained to admit if they find a Syldrari, for example, attractive.”

…yeah, let’s go with that. I smirked. “If being untrained means I have a more open mind and can enjoy more things, I don’t mind.”

“—think Lethe and this soldier girl may be the same person?” The reporter’s question made all our attentions snap back to the television.

“Why would I think that? Friendly humans are not that rare.” Rel tilted his head faintly and rubbed his chin. If he was faking being unaware, he was doing a damned good job of it. “Besides, the government is hunting Lethe, is it not?”

“The government rarely finds the time to protect its Syldrari citizens—perhaps this soldier was fed up and hatched a plan to take matters into her own hands?” The reporter suggested excitedly. “It can’t be a coincidence—”

“Their speech rhythm may be the same, but that is where the similarities end, I’m afraid.” Rel shook his head slowly and fastened his gaze on the reporter. “Rhythms are determined by where one lives the longest. It is likely they grew up in the same city, and nothing more.”

“Oh? Well, last question—if you had to choose between the two of them, who would you pick?” the woman asked, an oddly sadistic grin spreading across her face.

“…pardon?” Rel asked slowly.

“You know, if you got the chance to stick that—”

Thankfully, Zafir promptly switched the television off. Within moments, he was on his phone with someone, giving them a rather impressive tongue lashing for allowing the reporter to conduct herself in such a way.

“Wooow…” Sarah inched away from Zafir and toward me. “That…was…really weird. What the heck were those reporters after?”

“Mmm… Amara, Amara, what did he answer?” Diana tugged on the woman’s sleeve as she tapped away on her data pad.

“Looks like he acted appropriately offended and a producer dragged the woman offscreen,” Amara answered, turning the data pad to Diana and then to me and Sarah. Sure enough, a dark blue Rel was fuming with his arms crossed, his glow having turned a pretty shade of red, while the producer repeatedly apologized.

“That was suspicious as fuck,” Maelor stated flatly. “That woman had some other motive.”

“Yes, sir… I’ll send her right away.” Zafir hung up his phone and sighed heavily, looking over to me. “The higher ups want you to go patrol the Syldrari Sector as Lethe. They’re concerned that the reporters were a distraction from some other issue. You have full permission to stop any conflicts you encounter while there, with however much force you deem necessary.”

“Guess I won’t be stuffing my face with candy all night after all,” I remarked dryly. “Alright. To the garage I go.”

* * *

A short while later, I found myself perched atop a roof and looking down at the busy streets of the Syldrari Sector. It was much busier than it was during the day, though most of the people were Syldrari. There were a few people belonging to a much more…amorphous species as well, though I got the impression they weren’t exactly welcome.

Look for signs of conflict, huh… I stood up and quietly paced along the roofline, looking for potential fights.

After a few blocks, I came across the reporter and her camera crew arguing with each other. Rel was still there, though two more men had joined him—and a producer was still attempting to rein in the reporter. That’s odd, why are they still…

I narrowed my eyes at the group, and my visor zoomed in. Sure enough, the strange shape I’d spotted on one of the camera men was the barrel of a gun. A quick survey revealed that all the humans except the producer were armed.

“Capture targets if you can. Otherwise: eliminate.” Zafir held up the written instructions before disappearing from the in-visor feed. I was just glad he’d remembered my suggestion—no talking because the Syldrari might be able to hear what was said over comms.

I crept closer toward the human group, doing my best to keep fully out of sight. Once close enough, I channeled electricity around my gauntlets and dropped into their midst, disorienting the ones I’d landed on, and swiftly striking out to punch the closer few.

“Stay back!” Rel barked the order at the terrified producer, moving the human behind him. “Lethe, what—”

“Guns.” I leapt at the ‘reporter’ and punched her hard enough in the gut to make her keel over. After tossing her toward Rel, I turned to face the remaining humans. “Keep an eye on that while I take care of these bastards.”

I strengthened the charge around my gauntlets and dashed toward my opponents. With a few well-aimed strikes, each member of the crew was laid out on the floor, unconscious. For a moment, I considered fully overloading their brain chips…but stopped myself. They might have useful information.

“Now then.” I shook out my hands, causing the gauntlets to retract up my forearms. “I’ll… Really? A human holding a Syldrari at knifepoint?”

I crossed my arms over my stomach and stared at the ‘producer.’ The Syldrari looked appropriately unimpressed, though they were playing along for the moment. Zafir flickered into my peripheral vision again, holding a sign that read, “They will get into trouble if they attack a human, even if in self-defense. Kill or capture the producer. Be advised: the camera feed is still projecting to live television.”

…wonderful. Just what I needed. I considered my varied abilities for a moment, unsure of if I wanted to reveal more than my lightning and water ‘magics.’

“I-If you want him t-to live, show your face! To the world!” The producer stammered, seemingly unaware his blade was doing quite literally nothing against Rel’s neck. Even though he was pushing hard, there was no indent against the Syldrari, let alone a cut.

I rolled my eyes behind my mask and started walking toward the group. The producer started spluttering in terror and pulled his arm back as if he’d decided he was going to stab Rel, but that gave me all the space I needed. I dashed in, squeezing myself past Rel, and grabbed the human’s arm. With a savage yank, I dislocated his shoulder and used my momentum to turn him, sending him toppling face-first into the ground. A nice jolt of electricity knocked him out cold, and I dragged the bastard over to the pile of humans.

“Good thing I brought zip ties, I guess…” I muttered, before glancing over at the fallen cameras. Only one was still running, so I promptly strode over to it and stomped its lens out, then looked for the controls to turn off the broadcast entirely.

“Military is waiting until you zip tie them to move in. Suggest you hurry.” Zafir’s sign popped up again. As if on cue, I heard sirens approaching from the distance.

“Found their behavior that offensive?” Rel inquired, amused. I glanced to the side, finding a long pair of leather-clad legs filling my view. Hooboy.

“I was checking around to see if anyone was causing trouble. Saw you seemed to be having an altercation over here…noticed their guns.” I shook my head faintly. Changing up my speech pattern was difficult, and I got the impression from his smirk that it didn’t help any.

“Rel—,” One of the other Syldrari spoke up in a chastising tone, spewing out some long series of sounds I had no hope of replicating. “—thank the woman!”

If that was Rel’s full name, I now understood why he said a human couldn’t pronounce it. Thinking of trying made my jaw hurt, and half of it sounded more like music than words.

“Ah yes, my manners. Thank you, Lethe.” Rel chuckled, then crouched down beside me, his long tail swishing behind him. He held up one hand, dangling several zip ties in front of me. “I believe you dropped these.”

“…thanks.” I took them and returned to securing the idiots. “I need to get out of here before the military shows up.”

“You’re looking a little flushed. Is using magic so difficult for interesting humans such as yourself?” Rel tilted his head faintly as he examined me, looking much more like a lurking predator than a concerned acquaintance.

“No.” I returned my full attention to tying up the humans. For some damned reason I had an incredibly strong urge to jump Rel’s bones on the spot, and looking at him made it so much worse to deal with. I never feel like this around him in the cafe. Is this the suit’s fault…or is he pulling some kind of Syldrari bullshit to try and get info?

“You said you were looking for conflicts?” Rel probed as I stood up, rising to his feet as well. “For what reason?”

“The city is a cesspool. I’m doing what I can to stop criminals in the act, when I can find them,” I stated flatly. The sound of soldiers coming down a nearby street caught my attention. Grimacing, I turned and scaled a pipe up to a balcony. “That’s my cue to leave!”

“Be safe.” Rel shot me a mischievous, borderline evil smile before turning his attention to his comrades. “This is going to be a long night. Answer the humans’ questions honestly, and we might just get some sleep before the morning.”

What the hell were those reporters up to? I ground my teeth as I sped over the rooftops and in the direction I’d left my bike. However, a few blocks over, an unfamiliar cloaked Syldrari dropped from somewhere above to block my path.

“You’re this ‘Lethe’ we’ve been hearing so much about?” The distorted, digitized voice somehow managed to sound condescending. “I suggest you stay out of Syldrari affairs.”

“…you want me to just let idiots pull guns on Syldrari?” I growled, feeling anger—and the feral—rising within my chest.

The Syldrari turned his head as if listening to something, or as if he’d sensed something near us. After a moment, he returned his full attention to me. “The Syldrari do not need your protection. Humans who interfere in our matters will only die in the crossfire—or get more Syldrari killed. Stick to your own sectors.”

“I’m not going to turn a blind eye to absolute imbeciles doing stupid shit like… Ugh!” I winced, bringing a hand up to the side of my head as a piercing noise rang through my skull. When I recovered, the Syldrari man was no longer in front of me.

I whirled, summoning my gauntlets and catching a sword of all things against them. This close, I saw the lower portion of the man’s face, and the infuriatingly amused smirk resting there. I couldn’t, however, tell the color of his skin in the low light and with the color tint my visor gave to everything.

“Interesting…” He pressed down against my gauntlets, holding his sword one-handed. “Alas, your strength is still no match for a Syldrari. What do you think you can offer that we do not already have?”

“I don’t give a shit if the military dislikes my interference. Someone has to do their job for them, and I know damn well the Syldrari aren’t allowed to protect themselves.” I twisted out of the deadlock, whiffed a kick to the man’s ribs, then punched his damn sword out of my way.

“And if a Syldrari dies trying to save you from other Syldrari?” The man’s tone shifted from amused, to cold and deadly. His voice reverberated through the air as if it was coming from all angles.

“I’m not worth dying for but sitting on my thumbs doing jackshit is criminal.” I growled in frustration. “You seriously want me to just ignore—”

The man’s hand lashed out, grabbing me by the face and lifting me off the ground. Though his hands weren’t that much larger than a human’s, he seemed to have no issue. I had a feeling the energy I felt bouncing between his fingertips was the reason. I grabbed his wrist and let out a low growl, attempting to dislodge his grip.

“The R’selkti will protect the Syldrari Sector. Keep your nose out of it.” The man’s fingers twitched around my face. “I could kill you right now without needing to squeeze. Each and every Syldrari is capable of such. We are only permitting you to continue living because you genuinely wish to help.”

“R…selkti…” Intense, nearly blinding, rage clawed at my chest as my feral attempted to take over. The Syldrari’s lips parted briefly, before he dropped me and leapt back. “You’re the ones who turned an entire city into human jelly and I’m supposed to trust you to do anything protective?”

I winced, my head spinning as my anger threatened to go out of control.

“We—” His tone turned placating, his hands raised to calm me.

“Get out of my way,” I spoke calmly, watching the man stiffen and freeze like stone. A second later, he nodded as if responding to someone and moved aside.

“A…human with…” He whispered to himself, but the rest shifted to Syldran. I grit my teeth and stalked all the way back to my skybike. Fucking hell.

“—ethe? Lethe? Do you cop— There you are!” Zafir exclaimed, leaning forward on his desk, looking rather worried. “We’d lost all contact! What happened?”

“I’ll brief you when I’m back and once I’ve cooled off,” I stated in a tone that I hoped left no room for further discussion.

* * *

I gnawed irritably at one of my Syldrari candies while watching Calder, Nikolai, and Maelor go through the drills I’d assigned them. Off to my left, Zafir was watching a data pad stream the three men’s vitals.

“Want one?” I offered the jar to Zafir, who answered with a dubious stare. “What? Not going to expand your horizons by only ever eating human stuff. You never know, you might like it.”

“…a small piece, then,” Zafir relented. He hesitated before putting it in his mouth and, a few seconds later he was scrambling for a glass of water. “I thought that was candy, why is it spicy?!”

“Huh. It tastes sour-tart-sweet to me. Like how lemon or lime candy does, except it doesn’t taste like citrus.” I glanced down at the stuff, then back over at Zafir. He’d taken the candy out of his mouth, but looked like he was contemplating putting it back in. “Well?”

“…have you ever tried candied ginger?” Zafir glanced at me.

“Yeah?”

“It tastes like that, but with much more heat. It’s…good, but painful.” Zafir placed the candy in a napkin, then an idea seemed to strike him. “Ah, but like candied ginger, I bet I could put this in tea or coffee. I will report back on that later.”

“See? Expanding horizons,” I remarked dryly, turning my gaze back to the training boys. “So, any verdict from the bosses yet about last night’s disturbance?”

“The humans you caught are still being questioned.” Zafir shook his head. “Another city was destroyed by Resonance yesterday, so their focus has been on that. They’re currently transporting the survivors to a facility for recovery and stabilization.”

“They’re not coming here?” I asked. Another…? Really? Was it the R’selkti or…

“No, the attack was on the other side of the planet. The survivors were seriously injured, so the response teams deemed it necessary to stop at a base closer to the strike zone first. Once the survivors are stable, they’ll be transferred here.” Zafir shook his head, then sighed. “We haven’t the faintest idea why they chose to attack that city…”

“Tch, damn R’selkti!” Maelor snapped, a particular brand of rage gleaming in his eyes. “They aren’t gonna stop until they’ve destroyed every city on this planet! Those bastards—”

“Zafir, get out of here.” I leapt up and summoned my battle suit as Maelor’s engulfed him.

Darting forward, I kicked Maelor across the chest and spun into an uppercut, sending him sliding on his back across the floor. When I heard the doors to the training room open, then close, I summoned a lightning strike by Maelor to see if I could startle him out of his feral haze. Nope. Hard way it is then.

Maelor conjured a boulder and hurled it at me, forcing me to dodge around it. As I came back into view, I visualized a pit of dark sludge behind Maelor and ran at him, kicking him hard in the chest. He fell back into the sludge and began panicking as it sucked him downward into the floor, tendrils of the dark goo latching around his limbs, covering his face, and probing at his body.

It wasn’t until his panic got to the point of him screaming and begging for me to spare him that I let the illusion disappear. Maelor cowered on the floor, shaking, and dry heaved a few times. My head spun, and I staggered backward, landing on my butt. Wincing, I shook my head, trying to clear it.

“You okay, Elara?” Calder knelt next to me while Nikolai tried to get Maelor to calm down.

“Yeah, I’ll be fine. Go check on your buddy.” I shook my head again, trying to dislodge the odd feeling that had come over me. The feeling made me feel…like a god. Like I could crush their lives in an instant if I wished. That’s new… maybe I’m still a little shaken up from last night? And why am I so…dizzy…

I dragged myself to my feet and fetched my candy, then exited out into the hallway where Zafir was waiting. He looked much less worried than I expected.

“Was that…real, or an illusion?” Zafir inquired with a frown as I leaned back against the wall.

“Illusion.”

“I feel there must be more to it. I’ve never seen a feral submit, let alone behavior like that. The other two should have chained into ferals as well, yet…” Zafir looked and sounded baffled. It was kinda cute. “You look tired. Should we call it here for today? There are less straining subjects we can attend to if you aren’t feeling up to this particular task.”

“Just dizzy. Something less active would probably be a good idea.” I grimaced.

“Indeed… and you don’t intend to visit the Syldrari Sector today?”

“Me or ‘Lethe’ need to chill on visiting there.” I made a quoting motion with my hands. “I’m still waiting for you to pick.”

“Ah… I believe we should have Lethe work elsewhere for now to prove this isn’t specifically about the Syldrari.” Zafir adjusted his glasses before swiping through his data pad. “You as Elara seem more likely to learn information during your visits. However, I would ask you to wait. The higher ups are debating one of my proposals. If it goes through, I want you to deliver it.”

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