Purity War

by Laurel Night

  Chest heaving, Emily stared at me in wonder. My entire body crackled with a delayed rush of adrenaline that came too late to save my life. Which, apparently, was okay, because I had my personal Wonder Woman to help me out.

  Em walked over slowly and collapsed next to me, panting. “Holy shit, Lu.”

  “Yeah,” I gasped. Once again, I was lost for words. “Em, are you okay?”

  “Dude, I’m fine. Are you okay?”

  “Yeah,” I repeated. “Yeah, I’m fine.”

  “Holy shit,” Em said again. “Lu, you almost died!”

  “But I didn’t. Because you somehow sprinted twenty yards in a split second, caught me, then tossed me over your shoulder like a damn bean bag, Em!” Now that I wasn’t in imminent danger, my tone grew much more excited. “That was amazing! See, I told you! You’re freaking Wonder Woman!”

  “I don’t know if I’d go that far,” Em replied, although she blushed prettily and smiled at the comparison. Despite being filthy and sweaty, she still looked gorgeous. Her blue eyes were bright with excitement, and the sweat gave her that ‘just worked out glow’ that models in magazines had. As opposed to real women like myself who became covered in ugly red blotches whenever they exercised, pooling sweat in embarrassing places.

  “Well, you’re stronger than the average Bat Girl, so I don’t know what else to call you. You should ask Todd if the Vimpiri can make you some bullet-blocking cuffs or an invisible airplane.”

  “Hilarious,” Em answered drily. Come on, let's get out of here.” Pulling me to my feet with apparent ease, Em linked her arm through mine and steered me toward the door.

  “Wait,” I stopped, pointing at her earlier target. “The beam?”

  “Seriously? You almost just fell through the floor. I don’t think jumping on this rotten wood is a good idea anymore. Maybe we should get your head checked.”

  “You didn’t have any problem earlier, I think it was just that spot, with the weight from that old desk, that did it in.”

  “Oh, come on, Lu, you know I can’t do it. How many times did I try?”

  “I don’t think you were really trying, Em, that’s my point. You didn’t believe you could do it, so you didn’t. After that performance,” I gestured to the hole she had just rescued me from, “You’ve got to be more confident.”

  “Well…”

  “I’ll stand back over here, okay? Come on, one more time, and just know that you can do it. Believe that, internalize it. You can do it!” I disentangled my arm and stepped back towards the door. “Hit it!”

  Em shot me a dirty look and wiped her forehead with the back of her hand, leaving a dark smudge on her face. That one tiny flaw brought a smile to my face, reminding me that Em was, despite appearances, human just like me. “Fine,” she huffed. “One more time, then I’m done. Okay?”

  “One’s all it takes, Em. You can do this.”

  Em glanced dubiously at the floor beneath her, jumping lightly to test the strength of the floorboards again. Satisfied, she stared at the beam for a moment, then closed her eyes and shook her arms out as if trying to loosen up. Suddenly she crouched, lowering down into a squat before leaping from the floor in a move so fast I almost thought I imagined it. The loud, echoing ring of her hand slapping the beam convinced me otherwise, and by the time my brain caught up she had already landed and was staring up at the beam again.

  “Lu, did you see that??” Em shrieked. “I did it! I just jumped ten feet into the freakin’ air!!”

  “I knew you could,” I smiled now, my grin stretching across my face with enjoyment in her excitement. “I told you, Wonder Woman!”

  “It’s so awesome! I wonder what else I can do?” She glanced around the derelict building to find new challenges.

  “Okay, slow your roll Super Girl, let’s get out of this creep-show and see if we can come up with some tests that have less inherent risk.”

  In the end, we determined that Em now had super speed, super strength, and despite not being able to fly she could jump more than a dozen feet high. She also possessed extraordinarily fast reflexes and sharp senses, and could react to something in a fraction of a second. In just a few hours, Em performed feats of strength and agility it would have taken her a lifetime to develop. Em had never been a klutz, but the improvements to her balance and overall physical performance were uncanny. She still looked the same; she hadn’t sprouted bulging biceps or 6-pack abs overnight. It was just like everything about her, inside, was changed.

  Which led me to wonder: Had anything else changed that we couldn’t see?

  ***

  LUCY

  After our little experiment, we went home to get cleaned up and start dinner. While the stew simmered in the kitchen, we sat on the couch and discussed the implications of what we discovered that afternoon.

  “It’s so cool, Em! I can’t wait until you tell Todd and Mick. They’re going to be stoked!”

  Emily shifted in her seat. “About that… Lulu, I don’t want to tell them. Not yet, anyway.”

  “What? But this is something they need to know, Em. There may be more to it than we know of.”

  “I know, and we will tell them… soon. I just want some time to handle it on my own and think through all the consequences.”

  “Consequences? What consequences? You’re freakin’ Wonder Woman now! This is AWESOME!”

  “Well, once Mick knows he may need to tell his mom, and that might make them upset or feel like they need to run tests on me. I’m not ready to go through all of that yet, you know? I kind of want to figure out how I feel about it, first.”

  I considered that for a moment. “That’s fair,” I admitted. “I hadn’t thought about how the queen might react. Okay, then we won’t tell them tonight. It’ll just be a regular date-night-in. Deal?”

  “Deal,” Em grinned. “Okay, now we’ve got to do something about your hair.”

  ***

  LUCY

  Our date night went about as well as I expected. Despite her best efforts Em was distant with Todd, which made him uncomfortable and concerned. Mick remained infuriatingly aloof; kind and gentle, and yet not remotely suggestive or ‘interested’. On paper, I had nothing to complain about. He complimented the cooking, gushing over our attempts to make a meal familiar to them. He held my hand, pulled me close to watch the movie we picked out—Em changed our plans last minute from a board game to something that required less interaction and encouraged snuggling.

  Even so, it felt as if there was an invisible barrier keeping us separated despite our physical closeness—or maybe a line he refused to cross. If there is a natural order to how flirtations and romance work, it felt as if Mick was coming up to a ‘STOP’ sign I didn’t know was there and refusing to move further.

  As confused as I was with Mick’s behavior, I was more concerned about Emily. She really put on a herculean effort to act normal, but I knew her better and apparently so did Todd. I didn’t know if it was their unexplained connection or just the close nature of their relationship. Either way Todd knew something was up, and although he said nothing I could tell from his facial expressions that it worried him.

  Altogether, the evening was a bust. It was supposed to be a fun, relaxed evening in which we sorted out a few things and moved closer, but it turned out to be an awkward, quiet night in which no one said what they were thinking.

  Including me.

  ***

  MICK

  Disaster.

  There was no other way to describe the evening we just passed. Todd agreed, which was unusual—he typically thinks everything goes well. However, Emily was not behaving normally, and she didn’t offer any explanation to Todd, which didn’t help. Her manic attempts to act happy and cheerful were a thin disguise to the unsettled emotions she clearly experienced. Trying not to overwhelm her, Todd hadn’t explained to Emily that part of their connection was he felt her emotions. Not all the time, of course. Just when they were close, if she experienced strong emotions they affe
cted Todd’s emotional state. He had to concentrate to isolate his own feelings from hers and then consider why she might try to conceal her true emotions from him.

  “I don’t get it, man,” Todd said. He made an excuse for not staying over and was riding back to my house with me. “She was nervous, scared, and excited all at the same time. It was a potent combination of emotions for her to not want to talk about at all.”

  “What do you think it could be? Is there something that she could be happy about, but worried that you wouldn’t be?”

  “That’s stupid, anything that makes her happy will make me happy,” Todd argued.

  “I didn’t say it was rational, I asked if she might worry about something.” When Todd didn’t answer back, I glanced swiftly to the passenger seat before swinging my eyes back to the headlights that flashed on the dark road. “Todd?”

  His voice was hoarse when he answered. “You don’t think…” he trailed off and didn’t finish the thought.

  “I don’t think what?” I prompted.

  Todd cleared his throat. “Well… since I’m no longer… I mean, since I can’t… since I’m human now, we’ve been doing things…”

  “Doing things? What things?”

  Todd fidgeted and looked out of the window. “Human things.”

  It took me a minute, and then I understood. “Ah, you mean that since you can no longer mate the vimpiri way, you have been trying to mate the human way.”

  “Yes,” Todd answered quietly.

  “And?”

  “I don’t think I’m very good at it,” he paused, then suddenly the words poured out of him in a torrent. “It’s strange and messy, and awkward and embarrassing, and a lot of work, particularly for the male…” the mild disgust, combined with dissatisfaction in his tone, drew a laugh from me.

  “So, let me make sure I understand: You’re upset because you’ve paired with a female and you think mating with her is too much work?”

  “I knew you wouldn’t understand, I shouldn’t have said anything,” he huffed.

  “Well honestly, if you expect me to feel sorry for you, now that you’ve found a mate and are no longer a Lost Bachelor, I think you know I will disappoint you. Awkward or not, I’m sure most of us would love the opportunity to pair, whatever the cost.”

  “Oh yeah?” Todd’s voice took on an aggressive tone. “Then why haven’t you begun pairing with Lucy? What are you waiting for?”

  Abruptly, my humor was gone. “That’s different.”

  “Is it?” Todd challenged. “It seems to me you just said you want it, but yet you haven’t made a move.”

  “It’s just more complicated for me, for my family,” I hated reminding my friends of my birthright, but sometimes I couldn’t get out of it.

  “Didn’t you also just say that you’d love the opportunity to pair, whatever the cost?” His voice turned accusing now, having caught me with my own words.

  “If you must know, I’ve been forbidden. Okay? Are you happier now, knowing that?”

  “Forbidden?” Instantly contrite, Todd’s voice calmed. “Why would they forbid you to be happy?”

  “Well many of our people don’t see your pairing with Emily as a good thing. They fear it is the beginning of the end of our society. Mother has forbidden me to pursue pairing with Lucy until she can smooth the waters.”

  “Wow. I had no idea. I suppose I see their concern, but it’s not as if we had anything to offer the future of our society, anyway. Why wouldn’t they want us to be happy?”

  “I don’t have all the answers, Todd. All I can tell you is that if I were you, I would do everything in my power to learn how to do ‘human things.’ You know,” I teased, “Human society doesn’t mandate a lifetime pairing. If she isn’t pleased with your performance, she may no longer desire you.”

  “Whatever,” Todd scoffed. “She feels our connection as strongly as I do.”

  “Are you sure about that? She was acting strangely tonight, and you’re the one who brought up the idea that you may not be good at mating the human way. Perhaps that is why she was distant?” I was still teasing, but I was also angry at his selfishness. To complain about having found a mate to another Lost Bachelor was the height of rude. If he needed a reminder of how lucky he was, I was happy to provide that.

  Todd rode the rest of the way to my house in silence, hopefully contemplating how he could better serve the human needs of his mate.

  However, I couldn’t help but wonder if there was something more to the change in Emily’s behavior.

  EVEN MORE SURPRISES

  LUCY

  “Okay, we’ve got to tell them.” Emily’s knee bounced erratically as she contemplated her coffee rather than drinking it. She chewed on her nails, too tense to need the boost of caffeine she typically desired in the morning.

  “Well, that didn’t take long,” I commented mildly. I did need the sweet, sweet nectar that was warming my hands through my cup, and I blew on the rising steam to cool it to a comfortable temperature for drinking. “Why did you suddenly change your mind?”

  Her fingertips slipped from her mouth and she rubbed the nail beds instead. “Well, last night was awful. I don’t enjoy keeping secrets from Todd. It felt wrong, and I know he could tell something was up.” Apparently finding another shred of nail to nibble on, her hand went back to her mouth.

  “Really? I didn’t notice anything. Did he say something?”

  “No, it was more of a… feeling. I could feel that he was concerned.” She paused in her chewing to glance up at me. “Does that sound crazy? I feel crazy saying it.”

  “Em, at this point do you honestly think anything sounds crazy anymore?” My smile was genuine, if a bit sad. It was true, after everything that happened in the last few months we couldn’t really be surprised by one more thing that might have seemed odd before. Thinking she could somehow sense Todd’s feelings wasn’t even the strangest thing we’d discussed in the last hour.

  “I know, but you know what I mean. I don’t feel like I know myself the way I used to. It’s like… everything is new, and I’m questioning everything I know or thought I knew. I’m just confused. That’s why I need to talk to Todd. Maybe he can help sort it out. If nothing else, it’ll make me feel better to tell him. It’s hard to describe, but it’s like… a hollow ache in my chest, keeping something from him. I’ve never felt that way before. Do you think that’s a weird vimpiri thing? Or maybe just because I’ve never been in real love before?”

  “Em, I have no idea. But truthfully, I’d bet my money on a ‘weird vimpiri thing.’ Obviously, there’s a lot we still don’t know.”

  Emily rubbed at her chest in discomfort. “It hurts, Lu. Do you think I’m sick? Maybe the whole vimpiri blood thing is killing me and it’s just taking a long time. Maybe my heart is dying. How would we know?” Her voice took on a distinct note of hysteria.

  “Em, Em, relax,” I soothed. “Honey, you’re fine. There’s nothing wrong with your heart. You’re not dying, at least any more than the rest of us are. You probably just feel guilty. Let’s go see the guys tonight and we can tell them, okay?”

  She folded her arms across her stomach as if she were trying to keep herself together and nodded. “Okay, we’ll go tonight and tell them.”

  “Are you going to be alright until then?” I intended the question to be teasing, but my tone changed in response to her appearance. No doubt about it, she looked strung out. The laid-back, happy Emily I knew was not here with me today. That, more than anything else, concerned me. I tried a different tactic. “What should we do with our lazy Sunday? The house is already clean, so we don’t really have anything we ‘have’ to do today. Should we go do something fun?”

  “Like what?” Em eyed me dubiously as if to say nothing could possibly be fun to her right now.

  “Well, we could go test out your Wonder Woman powers some more? Now that we know you have the ability, we could test your limits?”

  “I’m not sure that’s a goo
d idea. I’m kind of preoccupied with this guilt-pain in my chest, Lu.” Her tone was bitingly condescending as if I should have known better.

  “Okay…” I answered, peacemaking. “What about a movie?”

  “What’s playing?” Seeing a movie piqued her interest, even though we’d been to the movies two days ago.

  Quickly, I pulled up a list of showtimes on my phone. “Here’s a sci-fi movie that sounds good. It’s staring that guy you like. You know, the one that’s dating the chick from the mermaid movie?”

  “Scott Harrison?”

  “Yeah, him. Want to see that one?”

  “Sure, that sounds good and distracting.” A sly grin spread across Em’s face. “But let’s sneak in some rum for our cokes.”

  “Day drinking? Emily, I am positively shocked!” I laughed, then adopted a hoity-toity tone. “It’s barely eleven a.m. What would your mother say?”

  “She’d ask where hers was.” She was right, her mom was a party animal.

  “Okay, then let's go to the one-thirty showing. At least then I won’t feel as much of a lush if I’m drinking after lunchtime.”

  “Goodie,” Em smiled widely. Reaching for the table, she retrieved her coffee and blew across the top before sipping.

  ***

  LUCY

  The combination of the alcohol with the sci-fi flick featuring ridiculous space battles and brightly colored aliens served its purpose: Em was distracted and relaxed, for the time being. Unfortunately, by the time we emerged in the late afternoon sunshine, she was gnawing on her nails again. I watched her grow increasingly restless in our Uber ride and finally said something when we got home.

  “Em,” I said gently, “It’ll be okay. You’ll see. Whatever happens, I’m sure Todd will be right there with you.”