by Lea Linnett
“What is it with you and drinking on the job?” she asked, but she backed up to let him in nonetheless, her gaze lingering on the red bottle.
“I’m making the most of the job,” he said as he entered. “I’ve been lucky enough to find myself with cheap liquor, time to kill, and pleasant company. Might as well enjoy it.”
She shut the door and frowned at him as he dragged a squat table into the center of the room and placed the bottles on top of it. There was a rickety dresser in the corner by the door that neither of them had used since arriving, and he pulled two dusty-looking cups out of it, which he took into the bathroom and rinsed with water.
Taz wandered over to the table, inspecting the bottle of Kirena. It was full and fresh, its metal clasp showing no signs of being tampered with. “Where did you even get this?”
Kamanek re-appeared, shaking the cups dry. “Downstairs. Our Madame is quite susceptible to flattery, it seems.”
“She sure didn’t seem that way to me,” she muttered, returning to the bench and turning her back to him. “You might as well put one of those cups away,” she added.
The levekk sat down on the floor across the table from her and folded his long, notched legs. “Oh yeah? Why’s that?”
She scowled at him. “I’m not drinking.”
His face fell slightly, but he didn’t hesitate in snapping off the metal clasp and wrapping his clawed fingers around the Kirena’s cork. “You won’t even have one?”
“I can’t. I’m working.”
“You can have a drink while you work. You did the other night.”
“That’s…” She hesitated. “That’s different.”
“How?” He met her gaze, his brow plate shifting. “Have a drink, and watch the window. You can do both at once.”
“Why are you so intent on getting me to drink?” she asked, turning to face him a little more fully. “What’s your motive?”
His mouth turned up at the corner as he haphazardly poured the Kirena into his cup. “My motive is to get you to relax. Staying in this room is driving us both crazy, and we deserve a break, or at least something to ease the boredom,” he added when she opened her mouth to argue. Then, he sobered. “I meant it when I said I’d back off. I won’t try anything. I can’t promise I won’t flirt, though. I’ve always been mouthy.”
He cracked a grin, leaning over to place the red bottle beside her cup. This was his way of giving her a choice, she realized. He was always giving her choices. She’d learned to be wary of males pressuring her to match them drink for drink when she worked at the hub, but Kamanek wasn’t doing that. She watched him add the sweet senathar to his cup and place the open bottle on her side of the table, before getting up to fetch something to stir his drink with.
How could he make her feel so on edge, and yet so at ease, all at once? Even when his claws had caressed the softest part of her neck, she’d felt strangely safe, the thrill running through her body feeling closer to excitement than fear. It had confused her, so she’d pushed him away, but a part of her almost felt… disappointed.
She shook the thought away, snatching up the bottle of Kirena and fighting down the blush that threatened to heat her cheeks. One drink wouldn’t be enough to muddle her judgment, and it might even calm her swirling thoughts.
She poured the Kirena with a steady hand, eyeballing the shot with well-learned accuracy, and then added the bright blue senathar. It turned the concoction a deep purple. One part alcohol, three parts sweet, just how she liked it.
Kamanek raised his cup to her, looking pleased, and then the two of them drank. Taz only sipped hers, but she relished the burn as the Kirena slid down her throat. Kamanek, on the other hand, downed his in one gulp and winced violently, before reaching for the bottle again.
She smiled to herself. She didn’t know how much a grown levekk male could take, but it would be interesting to see. Kirena wasn’t an easy liquor.
“Ask me something,” said Kamanek as he poured his second drink. “Anything.”
“Like what?”
“Where I’m from, where I’m going, what my favorite weapon is… something.”
Taz raised an eyebrow, watching the levekk drink down another half a cup before he paused, looking up at her expectantly. She glanced back at the warehouse, where she was supposed to be looking, and found it as quiet as ever, devoid of movement apart from the slowly rotating security cameras. “Why?”
Kamanek smiled. “Because we’ve been trapped in this room together for days and we still barely know each other. Come on. Anything.”
For a moment, she considered fighting him on it, but she was curious. “Fine,” she said, taking another sip of the Kirena and drawing in a breath through her teeth. “When did you start in the military?”
He cocked his head, narrowing his eyes in thought. “Well, I was sent to military school at the start of my eleventh orbital year on Origin. I don’t know what that is in your years.”
“But you were… young?”
“Oh, yes. A child.”
“They start training you that early?” Taz asked, surprised.
“Some are sent off sooner, but one of the caretakers at the batch home was sure I’d show a proclivity for the sciences, so she held me back.”
Her brow furrowed in confusion as she watched him drink his whiskey. “What’s a… batch home?”
“Exactly what it sounds like,” he said lightly. “It’s an institution where children are raised by the government, usually after a year in the nursery. They house us together, teach us the basics of arts, science, mathematics. They look for certain aptitudes: physical, mental, artistic, that sort of stuff. And then, sometime before adolescence, they move us on according to what suits us best.”
“But… what about your parents?”
Kamanek scoffed. “My parents? You mean my ‘donors.’ Only the children of proper bonding pairs get ‘parents.’”
Taz stared at him. “I don’t understand.”
“Well,” he began, his expression turning somber, “the Constellation is a pretty huge system, right? Lots of planets, colonies, sub-species. So, it follows that there need to be plenty of levekk to keep them running smoothly.”
“You mean soldiers?”
“Yes, but not only that. You can’t have a functioning society with only mindless attack drones. There’s a place in the Constellation for everyone, as long as they dedicate themselves to it. Scientists, communicators, artists, writers. My people can be… single-minded about their hobbies,” he said, flashing a grin. “Obsessive, even. It isn’t so useful in my case, but that single-mindedness has produced most of our brightest minds and our greatest accomplishments. It’s the key to the Constellation’s success.
“The only problem,” he added, “is that, when someone is that devoted to their craft, they don’t usually have much interest in… reproducing.”
Taz frowned. “They don’t want children?”
“That’s right. It’s so far down the list of priorities for them, that there was apparently a time, before the Constellation really existed, when our species almost died out. So, they need a little encouragement.”
“And your paren—your donors—needed encouragement?”
“Yeah,” he said, his gaze dropping to the table. “Many levekk are able to fall in love, enter a bonding pair, raise a child, all that. But the best specimens often aren’t interested. So, whenever the Guides on Origin notice population estimates falling, they’ll call for a reproductive drive, and the citizens oblige. They sign up, get tested, and then they’re matched with someone with whatever genes the government wants disseminated into the population.”
“Wait, so they don’t even know each other? Why would anyone agree to that?”
“It’s for the good of the Constellation. But also, credits,” he added with a shrug. “The better the genes, the better the incentive. My donors got funding for their scientific projects. Hence, why my caretaker was so sure I’d follow in their footsteps.�
�
Taz’s jaw dropped, her fingers gripping her cup with white knuckles. She’d never heard of anything so… alien. It made no sense. “That’s…”
Barbaric, was what she wanted to say. She didn’t remember her parents, but there was safety in that mystery. To know that your own parents never wanted you, and never intended to look after you…
She shook her head, unable to grapple with that.
“How do they know where to send you?” she asked instead. “You’re children.”
“It’s all very structured, with lots of metrics that I don’t understand. Not a scientist, remember? But when you’re being compared with others all the time, the differences become clear.”
“And they saw you as a soldier?”
Kamanek grinned. “They saw me as a troublemaker that couldn’t stand research or art or anything that required me to sit still. Kind of like you.”
“Do the children with parents go to batch homes?”
“No. They can be educated privately, or in community schools. Batch homes are for governmental offspring.” Kamanek smiled wryly. “The unwanted ones.”
“Don’t say that.” The words slipped out, and she turned her face away to the window again. The shadows outside had changed while they spoke, growing longer as the afternoon stretched on. “Did you ever meet them?”
Kamanek was quiet for a moment, his smile dim. “I met my sire, once. He came to my graduation from senior division. I don’t know why. I wouldn’t have even realized if one of the mishaan, our teachers, hadn’t introduced us.”
“Maybe he wanted to get to know you.”
“Well, he was twenty years too late,” said Kamanek, his voice flat.
In the ensuing silence, Taz looked down at her drink. “I never knew my parents,” she said, and then hesitated, surprised at her own admission. She didn’t like speaking about them.
But Kamanek’s gaze softened. “No?”
She shook her head. “Never met my dad. And my mom, well…” She met his gaze with a wry look, trying to mimic his uncaring attitude. “All I remember is a dark set of rooms with a lot of drapes. And a lot of women with not much on. Probably best I don’t remember.”
“Ah. That’s unfortunate.”
“I think maybe it’s better than what you went through, though,” she whispered, just loud enough for him to hear. “I don’t know what happened to them, or whether they would have kept me if they could.”
“But I had others like me for company, and a place to live, at least.” He sent her a sympathetic look that would have infuriated her had it come from anyone else, at any other time. “You… wouldn’t have had that, I’m guessing.”
Taz brightened. “I did, actually, thanks to Cara. She found me when I was really young—we were both still children. I was scrounging through trash beneath the New Chicago Space Harbor when she found me. According to her, at least.
“You don’t remember?”
“I was young, so it’s hazy. My earliest memories are… the brothel,” she said with a shudder, “and Cara.”
Kamanek’s brow plate dipped. “I’m sorry for what I said that day, on the way to the brothel. About you belonging where you were born.”
“No, I… I wasn’t being very fair to you, either.” Taz sipped her drink, finally emptying it. “Besides, without Cara, I very well might have ended up in a brothel. There’s not a lot of options for a human woman with no family, and it took Cara years to find real work—work that could make us enough to afford a room of our own to sleep in, rather than a piece of floor in an abandoned building.” She bit her lip. “She worked really hard to make sure neither of us would have to resort to sex work. She’s the reason I didn’t end up like that girl, Samantha. Or like them,” she added, gaze drifting back to the warehouse.
“Sounds like she did a good job looking after you.”
“She did.” The corner of Taz’s mouth lifted. “You know, it’s funny. I never had a mom, but in some ways, Cara’s been my mom, my sister, and my best friend. She’s like a part of me. I don’t know who I’d be without her.”
She looked up to find Kamanek watching her, his brow plate a flat line. He went to take a drink but found it empty. “You’re lucky to have her,” he said quietly as he reached for the bottle again.
“Do you have anyone like that?”
He paused mid-pour, his lips thinning. For a moment, she thought he might not answer, but then he glanced up at her, his eyes shadowed. “Not anymore.”
“But you did?”
He shrugged. “A long time ago.”
That piqued Taz’s interest, and she leaned forward. “In the military, then?”
He finished pouring his drink, and his lips suddenly turned up at the corners. “When I was still being trained in Senior Division, actually, as much as it frustrated the mishaan.” At Taz’s confused look, he added, “We’re not supposed to fraternize with fellow soldiers.”
Her heart beat faster. “Oh. So, a lover, then?”
But Kamanek shook his head. “Not exactly. Tanis and I were best friends. We enjoyed each other a few times during training, but that didn’t last long.”
“Why?” she asked, frowning.
He sighed. “Part of it was that we got caught by a mishaan once. He threatened to separate us into different teams if it happened again, and after that we’d be faced with disciplinary actions like expulsion.”
“They took the rules that seriously?”
“Oh, of course. If it had happened after we graduated and entered the military, it would have been a dischargeable offense.” At Taz’s horrified look, he continued, “The Constellation military sees personal attachments as ‘diversions from duty.’ They impair your judgment, divert your focus. Even you and your sister would be separated if you joined.”
“But…” Her eyes narrowed. That reasoning made no sense. “What about friendships? Surely they couldn’t stop you from growing close to your teammates.”
Kamanek shrugged. “I’m sure there were some, like me and Tanis. But after so many years being told to remain at a distance from our peers, it gets easier to disconnect.”
“But not for you?” she asked.
He gave her a long look. “I’d always struggled with rules and regulations—even in the batch home. I was a long-term project for the caretakers and the mishaan,” he added wryly. “Tanis was… different. She hated the rules as much as I did, but she was better at hiding it. She was top of our classes, a good strategist, mastered a variety of combat styles.”
“It sounds like you really admired her,” Taz murmured, a small smile pulling at her lips. “I’m a little surprised you settled for being friends.”
She expected him to joke about her being jealous, but somehow, she couldn’t bring herself to be. This was a side of Kamanek she hadn’t yet seen, and she wanted to know more.
Her heart leaped when he said, “That’s all we were. The sex was good, but as much as we disliked the military’s rules, neither of us particularly wanted to get thrown out at the time.” He paused. “But mostly we stopped because Tanis fell in love with another of our teammates, Rinek.”
He fell silent, his brow plate dipping, and Taz’s brow followed. A million questions were on the tip of her tongue, but none of them felt appropriate. “What happened?” she finally asked, and her heart dropped to somewhere in the vicinity of her stomach at his reply.
“They died,” he said, avoiding her eye. “I’m still kind of angry at them for that.”
She cocked her head, trying to read his expression. His story sounded simple enough to Taz: he’d lost a woman that he loved, in more ways than one. But when she looked for the jealousy that she expected to see on his face, all she found was sadness. Anger.
“How did they—”
“Why don’t you ask me something else?” he cut in, his voice more raw than she’d ever heard it. He softened it with a smirk. “Something fun. We’re supposed to be relaxing, after all.”
“I…”
“Which means you should get down here, get comfortable.”
“I am comfortable,” she said, but her voice lacked bite.
“So, ask me something.”
There were plenty of things Taz wanted to ask, but the levekk had made it obvious that they were no longer on the table. “Well, I’ve got nothing. Are we done now?” she asked, raising her eyebrows.
“Nope. I’ve got plenty of questions for the both of us,” he said smugly, flashing a grin at her horrified expression. “Here, an easy one for a bartender. Favorite alcohol?”
She sighed. “This one,” she answered, eyeing the window. Nothing had changed while they were talking. Maybe…
Maybe she could look away for a while.
She pushed the bench back until it hit the windowsill and sank down to the floor, sighing a little in relief at finally being able to lean back against something. “What’s yours?” she asked, before his burgeoning grin could turn teasing.
“Well, I’m not a connoisseur or anything, but I’m partial to the Pindarro.”
“Are you kidding? That’s like, beginner’s whiskey.”
“And I like it.”
“You have terrible taste.”
As the argument started to take a life of its own, Taz relaxed into the nook she’d created between the bench and the table. This was kind of… nice. Just sitting, drinking, talking. It reminded her of late nights after the hub had closed, killing time with the other workers before she and Cara stumbled home.
And Kamanek, for all of his excessive drinking, wasn’t unpleasant company, although she was loathe to admit it.
She could take this moment to unwind. Just for a while.
16
“All right, I think you’ve had enough.”
Taz reached over and snatched the bottle of Kirena, now less than a quarter full, out of Kamanek’s grasp, ignoring the disappointed sound he made. His other hand gripped the table’s edge, and he’d begun to sway. Back when she worked at the hub, Taz would have cut him off long before this point, but she’d had a hard time pinpointing just how drunk Kamanek was. Even now, his eyes seemed sharp as he looked her up and down.
