The tubes worked exactly as I feared, with an octopus-tentacle amount of assistance. No matter how nice—and weirdly sexy—that bath had been, my first experience with the tubes truly lit up the “you cannot stay here” portion of my brain.
Especially since Aengus-Diarmuid, who I’d decided to privately call A.D. for short, stood over me the entire time, “In case you are in need of our aid.”
Thankfully, I only needed one of the tubes for my first visit, even if it felt like I should file charges after it was done emptying my bladder.
My holoscribe brain wouldn’t let me not ask. “What are the two top tubes for?”
“The one on the right will dispense healing to whatever area you apply it, and the other one is for feeding. You may use it right now if you have hunger. Otherwise, we will bring you a physical version of last meal.”
“I’ll take the physical version, please!” I immediately answered. “Thanks!”
At least the meal he brought into the cavern on a tray less than an hour later wasn’t some weird sci-fi version of real food.
Medallions of something that smelled unmistakably like the mega-deer I’d seen outside, charred and still faintly smoking. A small heap of greens that tasted like eating nature straight, without any factory production. And something dark and jammy in a shallow bowl that had no modern equivalent I could name but tasted better than any fruit I’d ever bought at the store. All of it was served on a bronze plate with a rough-hewn fork.
The meal was simple but shockingly delicious. I’d eaten most of it before I looked up and realized A.D. was just sitting there across from me with his legs folded in a loose lotus position. Staring with a ravenous look.
But not at the food.
My cheeks heated under the intensity of his emerald gaze. “Aren’t you hungry?”
“No. We have already consumed our required sustenance for this day.”
“You’ve got tubes in your bathroom, too?” I tried to ignore the squicky feeling that came at just the thought of eating from a tube located directly above where it would come out.
“No, those are only for emergency use. We have cultivated the herd of megaloceros giganteus that you sighted beyond the station’s east wall. There are also several wild herds of beasts all over Zone 4 from which we can hunt. Drakkon enjoy hunting. We are engineered for it.”
For some reason, when he said this, a gloomy look came over his face.
Personal questions…
This was my weak spot as a holoscribe. My style was more like a tennis ball machine, lobbing question after question until answers I could use came back. I thought of that signed Taffy Brodesser-Akner photo on my wall and wished I had more of herlegendary skill for turning celebrity interviews into pieces that made you feel like you knew her subjects personally.
I didn’t quite know how to follow-up that drop about his species’s hunting instinct. Instead, I asked about something my former editor would have sent back with an“unnecessary detail-delete”tag. “So that’s what you call Ireland? Zone 4?”
“Yes, we have labeled this collection of islands and some of the land mass east of it Zone 4.”
“And what exactly are you doing here in Zone 4?” I asked. “I mean, are Drakkon some kind of apex dinosaur species that my time’s scientists never found out about? Like, did you evolve here, or…?”
“No, we are not reptiles.” A.D. gave me a look that could sour buttermilk. “And we do not hail from your primitive planet.”
“Well, to be fair, the version I come from is way more advanced,” I pointed out before I got back behind my tennis ball machine. “So you’re aliens. Are you here on a cultural visit or something? How did you decide on the Zones? Are there more of you?”
A.D. gathered my plate and fork and placed them back on the tray. “This is a longer story with more answers you will perhaps not like. And we can see from the way your flame dims gray at the edges that you are tired, even if your ever-burning curiosity is lighting up your heart center. You will sleep, and we will resume this conversation tomorrow at first meal.”
I wanted to protest, but he was right. The massage was beginning to wear off, and my brain had that same sluggish feeling as when I’d been pushing too hard on a story that hadn’t quite gelled. Not from lack of sleep, but from too much input with no framework to hold it.
“Thank you for the last meal.”
“You are welcome, Dorcas.” He unfolded himself from the lotus position and stood with the tray balanced in both hands.An impressive amount of agility for someone pushing eight feet tall.
I was not nearly as graceful, scrabbling to my own feet. “Um, about the knife-wielding incident from last night. We’re cool, right? I’m not going to wake up to more shouting and you putting another one of your blades to my throat?”
It was a joke, meant to elicit a simple promise. But A.D. didn’t laugh. Or even smile.
“We are sorry about that,” he said again. His eyes shifted to the side, then came back to me. “We would not wish for it to happen again. But if it does, know that a simple command will make it cease. You only need to ensure you issue it as an order.”
I frowned, wondering if he was kidding. “So you’re saying that if I find you at the foot of my bed again, I should just say, ‘Hey, Aengus, Diarmuid, or whatever you want to be called when you’re like this. Don’t try to kill me. That’s an order.’”
