Chapter 12

“Morning,” Fiona said leaning over me. I’d already been awake a couple minutes thinking back to the night before with marvel and a sense of belonging to something grander. The events were burned into my mind far deeper than any prior sexual experience. It was for a purpose, but I was not entirely clear on the science of it. Did the newly-installed uterus create the necessary counterpart for reproduction? “Last night was fun. I guess I can reach fulfilment in this body, but the sensation is nowhere near that of scattering.”

“Besides the pleasure, what is scattering?” I asked.

“Well, I’m a bit young to know,” she replied. “But I’ve heard rumors that later on it is how Zaxi give life to worlds they find. It sounds too good to be true. Creating life while getting such amazing pleasure from it, but I understand that human beings have a similar system in place. If it feels good, it’s more likely to happen and becomes a more special sort of event.”

“Do you need another Zaxi to do it?” I asked.

“Not necessarily,” Fiona replied. “But getting there by yourself is difficult. Imagine just floating in space while trying to achieve a release and all around you people are watching you do it. That would make anyone nervous. When Agi and I did it, our energies swirled together to channel the burst for both of us. It was something akin to Zaxi procreation without creating new life.”

“Wow,” I said. It was good to know all of this, though I had no idea why I’d ever need it. Perhaps if Doc succeeded in turning my human body into a Zaxi, I’d have a leg up on the other new stars. The thought was scary, but also funny. I smiled and kissed Fiona. Nothing beyond gravity held me to world’s surface, though both my parents were buried here. My life on the surface of this one rock floating in space was quiet until Fiona danced with me. “So two female Zaxients can create a new life, not just a male and a female pair?”

“We don’t really have genders,” she replied. “Though we have different energies and internal networks. Observe.” She made a circle of light with a wave of her hand in the shape of said circle. It was like a screen, floating in the air.

“Is that like a touchscreen?” I asked and tried to touch it, but my hand went right through it.

“Not exactly,” Fiona said clicking some parts of the display to enlarge it. “Where touchscreens are solid and operate by capacitance of touch, this is a projection and operates with energy absorbance. In short, it’s a touchscreen that only Zaxi can use. The projected energies have different shapes and colors. I have a purple circle, so I identify with a female human more, due to the softness of the shape. Others might have different shapes and colors, like square and triangle screens. They also open with different motions.” She waved a circle again to close the screen.

“What does the color mean?” I asked wondering if it had the same connection to color of light in science. Variants of wavelength determined color, the excitation of light.

“Something like the temperature of our minds,” she said. “Though it doesn’t change. Remember Agimalina? She’s red, so she acts hot-headed and stubborn, but it also makes her very passionate. My purple is on the opposite side of her mindset, calmer and more ghostly. Her side considers this color gloomy, or at least other Zaxi see me in that way because of it.

“I guess stars have issues, too,” I signed. “Well, this is a lot of new info. I need a bigger brain to contain it all.” Fiona opened her eyes wide.

“That can be arranged,” she said. “I mean that if you joined the experiment, you could become like me in our little colony of stars. It comes with a few perks.”

“Before you sell me on the idea,” I interrupted. “Had there been any successful conversions?” Fiona rolled over on the couch with a worried look.

“Well, no,” she said. “But I think Doc is really close to a breakthrough. He’s smart, that one.” It bothered me a bit.

“So who is this Doc person anyway?” I asked. “How do you even know him?”

“From what I know, Doc’s always been a liaison for Zaxient kind on Earth,” she said. “It seems he and the Zaxi you call ‘sun’ came here together, so he’d been around for a great many enids. One enid is a hundred million years.”

“Yeah, I read that in the pamphlet,” I replied. “Who invented that measure of time anyway, some ancient Zaxient?” Fiona smiled and kissed me with hair spilling onto my chest.

“If I tell you any more, your head’s going to explode,” she said, but continued regardless. “Within the first enid all Zaxi learn everything our kind needs to know of history. By two enids, we are matured and ready to venture out to explore for ourselves. That’s the last I will say on this matter. As much as I want to see what happens to you when you know all this, I fear your head will just pop like a balloon.”

“One last thing,” I said. She nodded to ask. “The eating of memories thing. How- no, why does it work?”

“Why can we consume energy within a person’s mind?” Fiona asked, in turn answering the question. “It’s energy, so we can replace it with a shroud of our own instead. As for the memories themselves, those we sort of digest, but not all is absorbed into the Zaxient body so we expel gems that hold those human emotions. Like this one.” She dangled a gem with a swirl of yellow and pink from her neck. When I touched it, a powerful joy burst into my mind for no particular reason. When the crystal left my hand, I reached for it again, feeling just a bit colder without it.

“You wear it?” I asked.

“It counteracts my gloomy disposition,” she added though I’d never seen her gloomy side, and haven’t seen her wear the necklace before. Was she addicted to something she created herself? Maybe it was only because she had to be in a human body, someone else’s body.

“I guess it’s like love,” I said realizing how cheesy I sounded. “To human beings at least, something that focuses the mind to one positive idea is the feeling of love. It’s not as much emotion, but a culmination of a whole bunch of them.”

“You’re talking about the human gem, Finn,” Fiona said. “That’s what you get when you put all the emotion gems together. When worn by a human being, it stays aging to a certain degree. Every one thousand years feels just like one year. Still barely a significant fraction of an enid though.

“What? How? Oww…” I asked, and was met with a headache. Too much information was flooding my brain with new questions. “Too much at once.”

“Do you want me to eat your memory a bit?” Fiona asked.

“Won’t that hurt you?” I asked. “Agi said that eating memories of yourself is painful and doesn’t always work.”

“That’s true,” she replied. “But I’d rather take your pain away if I can.” I smiled.

“It’s ok,” I said. “I just need some painkillers and rest. You’re amazing, Fiona. I’m somewhat afraid to sleep. If I were to wake up to find this just some complex dream, I’d be very sad. I love you, Fiona.”

“And I love you, Finn,” she said, kissed my forehead, and got up from the couch. “Rest up.” She walked out into the kitchen wearing nothing over her human skin.


alter


Is the story even real, or are you just making me dream it? If it was real, I’d be the same person in your mind as in the story, no locked memories, no overlaying plot to cover plucking your main character from this story to use him as a journal and only friend.

“I thought you were on board with this, Finnelgamin,” he says. “You know how chaotic your story would become if I let the ‘you’ from my mind enter the story as you are? You’d often be talking to yourself, or I’d be some scary voice that talks through you. Far too many things could ruin this story I’ve been weaving. Oh. Wait, is this just-.”

I nod my head realizing his utter stupidity. I have to gripe. It’s in the contract of a deal we made. I hope you’re holding up your end of the bargain, JJ. I don’t see a girl on your arm, no baby in her.

“I’m trying,” he says. “There are other things I must do before that reach, but I’m taking steps, so don’t stop being you, Finn.”

Start with friends. Meet some new people. The star may be your goal, but accept that she is unreachable for now. Seek more for yourself. Be a bit selfish. Crave comfort, not patience.

“Enough,” he says. “If you derail the story again, I’ll shrink your penis an inch.”

Well, fuck you, then. I’m trying to help you, but all you want to do is hurt me. I get it, it’s harder to love than to feel hurt, but one has rewards where the other only regrets.

“Sometimes I wish I could write other stories instead of yours,” he says thinking about an idea he had a day ago, a lavender-colored raven. There was no story behind it. The strange beast was just an idea, like I once was, but he wanted to put a story around it, make a pet of it, like the torodemyt he once created. There was an emptiness in his heart that the cat named Clyde could not fill. “Let’s just get back to it. You have yet to find out whether the night of impregnation yielded results.”

Yielded results? Just get me back in there, you goddamn poet.


alter


“How do you feel?” Fiona asked leaning over me to adjust the cold compress on my forehead. She was sitting over my hips, almost touching my crotch, but fully clothed. Her breasts were also bound again, but as she switched the towels on my head, that soft skin brushed against my lips. Just for that, she was getting a standing ovation waiting for her to lean back. When she noticed, her legs lowered to sit on the tent, locking my body down to the bed. The purple flames lit her eyes once more, and just as I was about to remove the tarp from the said tent, Agi walked in.

“Oh, hey,” she said. “Sorry, am I interrupting?” Fiona slipped a hand between us and clicked something. The vibration started right away, silent between our bodies.

“Not at all,” Fiona said. “Come closer. Let’s talk.” Agi came up with a confused look of why Fiona did not stand away from my hips. I writhed in pain a bit as Fiona turned, sealing the vibe between us into a pocket of flesh to face Agi. This exposed her back to me still clothed. They talked for what felt like years while I held myself back to keep the vibrator secret. Right as Agi left the room, I let go of a giant balloon of pressure I’d been filling, and reached a peak as silently as possible, which ended up coming out as a low roar.

“Wasn’t that fun?” she asked. “I think she knew what was going on by the end. Maybe she’ll think back to it later.” That was all I could bear before passing out again. This relationship would be the death of me.

When I woke up again, the place was empty, but there was food prepared for me in the kitchen. I wolfed down everything to recover my vitality and only after wondered if maybe I was here as a pet to Zaxients. I wanted to go outside, but whoever interrogated me would still be looking for me. What could I do?

A hand of gray smoke burst out of space just a few inches in front of my face and I jumped back in surprise. This happened before, but I wasn’t sure how it worked. Could he not see where he was about to arrive, or did he do it on purpose? Ernie stepped into the kitchen from the line of smoke, half covered in gray skin.

“Yo,” he said as the gray faded from his hand. “Agi here?” The billowing tear in the air dissipated like regular smoke, vanishing into the room.

“Don’t think so,” I replied. “I just woke up, but the place seems empty.” Ernie sighed.

“Better that way, I guess,” he said. I raised my eyebrows expecting him to elaborate, but he didn’t until he met my curious eyes again. “We had a fight. I kinda stormed out before it got heavy and am looking for her to finish it.”

“As in, like, break up with her?” I asked.

“No, no, like, umm…” he hesitated. I barely knew him, but he shrugged it away. “The way we usually fight is: one storms off, and the other finds them to make up. We both stormed off this time. So I decided to go after her, but I’m getting worried that she might not want me to.”

“That’s quite an unhealthy relationship you two have,” I commented, but they were two beings who existed as opposites of each other.

“Well, what do you expect from a Garamant and a Zaxient?” he retorted. “I’m glad there is even a connection, not that I care if our people ever make up. To a human, the two of us are what all that the world is made up of.”

“And whatever Doc is,” I said. “And maybe what Tisyros are.”

“Yeah, you don’t want to mess with those gluttons,” Ernie said. “Unless you want to live as a husk. They, like, consume your vitality, your emotional nexus.”

“The soul?” I asked imagining some sort of mage pulling the soul from my eyes as a white mist.

“Nah, but maybe,” he replied. “They call them like, chi plexuses, the part of you that regulates spiritual energy within the body.” The pain in my head was coming back with more info-pour.

“Maybe you should just wait for Agi to come back here,” I suggested. “You two could be missing each other at every place you check. Just call her, or something.

“Calling tends to just prolong our fights,” Ernie said. “What we have is very physical, magnetic attraction of extreme polar opposites. I think you’re right, though. I should stay in one place for a bit. Beer?” He walked over to the fridge and looked back.

“Yeah, thanks,” I said aware of the headache being present again. He pulled two bottles of whatever the fridge had stocked and winked before using his fingers to pop the caps off. He lounged on the couch, while I took the sofa chair next to it.

“I have a question for you,” I said grabbing his attention from what felt like heavy thoughts. He nodded for me to ask. I wanted to know more about his kind, but one question took priority. “When you were in my mind the last time, you mentioned a name. JJ, was it?”

“Ah, that,” he said and looked nervous all of a sudden. “I- uhh… I probably shouldn’t say.”

“Say what?” I asked feeling anger build. He knew something. “Is it shrouded or something?”

“Kinda more than that,” Ernie said with a grimace. “Imagine the shrouding being a cloth over memories you can see instead of them. JJ is under a shroud that’s like an invisibility cloak. It’s flawless in blocking stuff out, but I saw it waver a bit when I was there. I’m a bit afraid to even attempt to learn more. I could only see that flawless shroud within because dreams tend to weaken memories. I’d say it’s best to leave it alone for now, bub.”

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