“Perhaps.”
With the two of them halted, the room fell silent. He raised his head. Dust drifted in the light seeping through cracks in the walls as well as from the lights they carried. No footprints decorated the floor. No droppings from beasts.
He grounded the butt of his gun, adjusted his grip. And found himself wondering if the truth was best after all.
Lies will out. Osta had said something like that, hadn’t he? Macbeth had obsessed over a lie too, he vaguely remembered. Something about getting out spots…
“Osta…you want to know how much of me is still him? Well. Though his persona was dead, neural tissue does survive longer than the humanoid soul.” He’d never used that soul word before. What other word could describe the part of a person that expired, when other parts of their body could be revived?
“I could, at that point in time, worm certain parts of my neural tissue beyond my body limits.” Could he still do that? He hadn’t tried for ages. “I did that to Osta. I invaded his head. I left intact the systems that control parts of the body that do automatic things. Such as controlling the heartbeat, registering pain, pleasure. That is what is still Osta. The non-thinking parts.”
She screwed up her nose. “Left intact?”
He saw the error. Left intact implied he’d chosen.
“Truly…” Big lie coming. “It was all that was left of him.” Liar. “None of my thinking comes from him. None.” That part was true.
After a moment, where he could feel her running down the logic, she nodded, curtly. “Okay. Let’s search this place.”
That was it? After all his worrying, she’d accepted his explanation without any debate.
While they searched the store, JI ruminated on what sort of hell a mech would go to, if Earth gods existed here. Or alternatively, whether Aerthe would rise up and smite him if she knew.
He’d deliberately obliterated whatever was left of Osta, had rummaged through his defunct brain, hunted and killed off cells. Humans had many sayings about murdering and immoral acts. All of them bad.
He decided he’d rather go with the Aerthe version. She could be one vengeful world, but she wasn’t so good at tracking down individuals – that he knew of. No hell for him.
This store had been a destination for those wanting to buy what Fern termed hardware, most of which had been made of perishable material. One hundred years caused deterioration. Things fell apart in his hands or Fern’s.
What seemed to be plumbing pipes were plentiful but useless. They disintegrated at the press of a finger.
“It’s not so bad, JI.” She hooked her thumb into her belt. “Your idea about bringing water from that little reservoir of water was pretty damn silly anyway.”
“Silly?” He eyed her, unhappily.
“The grounders won’t be here much longer, and the distance is insane to try to cover with some sort of plumbing system. Carrying the water in buckets will do… I can even ask mechlings to help, now they’re powered up.”
He let her ramble. There were other items he’d been looking for and had found. He bent to pick up the heavy coil of plastic rope. Transparent still, and flexible. Assuming this was how it began.
“Do you think the salt air is to blame, JI? This hasn’t flooded. Some of the metal equipment might have survived. I saw a storage area past a crushed doorway. It could be cleared. We should tell the grounders. And I did find some paint.” She bumped the toe of her boot on a slatted box containing cans. “Watercolor, I think, from the one I opened. Some of the mechlings were asking about ID marks. I figure I can teach them to paint.”
Painted mechlings? He’d had an attraction to polka dots.
Something scuttled across a far aisle. He’d noticed that Fern would see them then ignore the movement. Those were mechlings. They followed her almost everywhere, if at a distance –though not to the dark, underground lair of that water lurker. Smart mechlings.
They were more attached to her than to him, and she could talk to them, while he was limited to sensing their presence in a fuzzy way. It bothered him.
He steered back to his course. She’d called him silly. That made him want to do something to her. Not due to anger. He just felt he should. Punishment. It was an excuse really. JI smiled. An excuse for doing something to this sexy, hot girl.
This see-through rope would be old and might part with stress but it would do for what he planned.
He walked to her, letting the rope pay out onto the floor, holding a length between his hands.
She saw him in the last few seconds and mouthed an O of dismay.
Elation spun through her a second later.
She didn’t retreat or move as he set the length of rope to her lips, then wound it around the back of her head, finishing with both strands held in his fist at the front. The rest tumbled to lie loose over their boots.
She eyed his hand, where it bumped at her chin.
“Wha’ are oo doing?”
“Tying you up.”
“Mm-k.”
It was safe. The only open exit was where they came in. She backed where he directed her, between two rusting but sturdy, ceiling-high scaffolding frames. Their boots scuffed the floor, leaving a blurred trail of prints in the dust.
When her back found wall, he leaned into her with his mouth on her forehead, then lower, over her mouth. They kissed despite the rope now lodged between her teeth. Her desire ebbed and flowed, playful as the tide searching one of the pools at the beach.
A hand on her breast had her moaning. He tightened his hold on her breast, kissed her harder.
Each little act of possession caused a thrill to run through Fern. It was what he needed – to know she wanted as he did.
“Do you fear me?” he whispered, his lips catching on and brushing over hers as he spoke.
Fern shook her head.
Good.
“I really should have that collar.” JI swallowed, thinking of how it would look on her, circling her neck. The jagg collar was outside in the saddle bag. If he tied her here, to the metal frames to either side, would it be safe?
Surely that was a yes.
“Stay.” He bumped a finger on her nose, then knotted the rope behind her head, having looped it there. One strand of rope he led to the left and tied it, then the other to the right. By her mouth alone, he’d fastened her in place. She stood, blinking, gagged by the transparent rope. Her hands flexed, fisting in then extending, while he walked backward.
“Watching you,” he murmured, before he exited.
Mischievous, was that the label for this feeling? There were more names for feelings than grains of sand on the beach, or flowers by the roadside.
He found the big spiked collar in the bag, wondered if it’d tighten enough. The jaggs when carnivorous had been frightening balls of energy. Fern, wearing this would look…edible.
Other images crawled in. Wire with barbs wrapped between her legs, around her breasts. Her, splayed in bondage, and fucked and licked in a massive orgy, by males and females. Ryke’s fuckspears buried in her then pumped in and out.
Metal splinters threaded down her belly with blood trickling from the puncture points.
He found himself staring sightless at the collar.
Calm. He wasn’t doing that. Fevered dreams, that’s all.
Even so, with every step he questioned his mental state. Had something gone wrong with the transfer?
Why now? It’d been a very long time since he took over Osta.
The mechling echo? Fern? This city?
Then he saw her again, waiting for him, tied by the rope running through her mouth and he shuddered at the terrible possibilities.
He’d been going insane and dying in the baby mech. Maybe he still was.
Collar in hand, he walked over and stood before her, disturbed beyond reason by the onslaught of things-he-might-do.
Yet he feared hurting her irreparably.
He fitted the collar to her and sighed at how perfect it was for the
small female. It would fit, with more holes punched for the tongue, and those spikes reminded him of that other fantasy – fucking her with them.
Images cascaded in as before. Blood and fucking. Though he wanted orgasms from her too, as well as…
He undid her shirt and stroked the undercurve of her breasts, smiled at her shiver. Binding these and tying them to the frames. Gods. Yes. The dust and ancient scents in here were overwhelmed by the scent of her. He’d swear she neither blinked nor breathed while he caressed her.
“Do you want me to hurt you, Fern?”
He felt an affirmation of her desires long before she nodded. She trusted him. Or the echoes of their emotions had undone her sanity, as well as his. He knuckled his forehead, dead center.
Then he jammed his fists into the wall either side of her, screwed them in. The pain brought him awake to what he must do.
Fern only looked up at him, perplexed, but waiting for him to make his next move.
He couldn’t. Fuck no. He did not trust himself.
JI released her from the rope, untied the knots, coiled it, then walked away.
Fern stayed there, against the wall. Her confusion was clear.
“Come. We have to return to the tower. Bring what you want.”
He shot a small toop on the way back, when it jumped across their path, hung it from his saddle by the neck. The blood dripped down its limp furred legs and left a trail. If any predator followed them home, he’d make it rue its choice.
Anger. Was this anger?
Chapter 14
It’d been a day since the episode of strangeness.
JI rode beside her, his coat swept by wind as their mounts negotiated the street. The dawn light sheeted the sky in pinks. The murmur of the sea was punctuated by distant bird sounds as a flock flew overhead. Aunt M rattled about the rooftops and remains, above their heads, keeping watch or having fun. The feral mech was inscrutable to her.
She hesitated to open conversation with JI. He’d removed the collar, the rope, and walked away. Then…mostly silence. Previous boyfriends had been like this. Prone to bouts of angry silence, and she was sure he was angry. Why though? Nothing she said would draw an explanation from him.
Was it some awful secret? It…tasted like a secret. That was her best explanation. She was getting so she felt this inexplicable insight into his mind – knew things without any solid evidence. Bizarre? Was it her imagination only?
First JI’s strange behavior at the store, then the aftermath. It’d underscored how alien he might be. He’d been an AI inside a mechanical war machine.
That he was now a man would surely give rise to weirdness?
It would, she decided. So she must give him leeway.
She could even be of help, guide him in the craziness of being a person.
People were crazy. Everyone knew this.
She tried again, sidled Martha closer to Arthur. With this many legs and hooves the sound of the jaggs could be like the rattling of a train. “If you ever need to ask me anything.” She peered across at him. “About being a person, please do. I’d like to help.”
His appraisal was measured and calm. “Thank you, Fern. I might do that. However, we have almost reached the beach camp of your friends.”
“And of the scavs.”
“Yes. And they know me as Osta. Make sure you only call me Osta. If they knew what I am, or was, they might decide to kill me instead.”
“Oh.” She sat straighter. “I see. I will…Osta.”
He nodded.
A worrying thought. Scavs did mostly hate mekkers. And if they knew a mekker machine was inside their dead leader…yikes. This was complicated.
They rode single file through the gap that led onto rocks then sand. This beach stretched twice as wide as the one she and JI had explored together. It was, supposedly, the prime site for the monsters to migrate to.
Above the tide line, at the edge of the building remains where walls had been eroded open by weather and wave, the scavs and grounders had made camp. Colorful cloths were pegged to the buildings, creating tent-like shelters – part solid structure, part cloth. If the weather worsened, Pilf had said they’d retreat farther inland.
A scav limped toward them down the slope of sand. His shiny, mostly-bald head told her it was Pilf, before his face was visible.
Fern trotted over then slid and jumped from Martha. She ran to him, arms out. The hug was good, warm, if smelly. “Pooh! Have you not washed lately, Pilf?”
“It’s the fish! We caught some this morning, and I cleaned them. Come and have a meal with us.” He included JI in his welcoming gesture and they followed him up the sand. Martha and Arthur stayed where they were then ambled toward a patch of grass.
“They okay?” She jerked her chin at the jaggs, remembered. “Osta.”
He smiled. “Yes. They never go far.”
It was the first smile in a day. “Good.”
His hand slid up her back as they walked then he leaned down to kiss above her ear. “I’m going to resize the collar so it fits, but for now.” She felt it settle on her neck and then the movement as he fastened it. “For now you can wear it loose.”
“Why?” She touched it.
“Scavs like human girls far too much for me to leave you unclaimed.”
“Oh.” She gulped. “That’s alarming and nice, all at once.”
“Nice?”
She liked this too much. Being his. Despite her offer to talk about everything, this was too much to say, here. “Later, I’ll explain.”
The meal of cooked fish and a flat bread, with berries and mushrooms, was more delicious than the plainer fare she’d had at the tower. Maybe it was the sea, washing in behind her, or JI being beside her, his thigh touching hers.
If anything, the collar seemed to raise more eyebrows than being bare-necked might. She ignored the stares of the scavs who’d wandered over and sat talking and eating.
That this group of grounders and scavs mingled at all surprised her – though most of the scavs stuck together at one end of this terrace of stone and sand.
“Is all going well, Pilf?” She set aside her plate.
“It is.” He tilted his head. “We are grateful for what Osta did for us.”
“You’re welcome,” JI intoned, shifting his butt on the block of stone he’d perched on, his legs stretched before him. “I hear this monster season…thing, is coming? Fern didn’t explain it well enough for me. Are these true monsters? I mean…” He indicated the beach. “You’re camped so close.”
Pilf chuckled. “They do look monstrous but that is more a deception, I think? Made up before my time, to keep others from coming. The waik crystals left after the sea monsters leave are easy to harvest and perfect specimens. They swallow them you see.” He mimed the action. “Down deep in the ocean. Find them on the bottom, maybe? When they come here, some crystals are left on the beach. Why? I do not know.”
“Ahhh. I see now. That makes sense.”
The biology of sea monsters. It did make her wonder at the reasons for the scavs staying and being peaceful. Everyone on Aerthe jostled for dominance. Waik crystals were valuable, and so were slaves. Was JI the reason? He’d changed the scavs’ minds so quickly that day.
It made her curious about Osta.
“You have a physician here, Pilf?” JI asked. “I have some questions for a healer.”
“Yes.” Pilf leaned back to point to the distant end of the encampment. “Down there. Man with a pony tail of red hair. Renuk is his name.”
“Good. Thank you for the food. Take good care of my pet, Fern, while I’m talking to him.”
Pilf watched JI weave away through the camp for a while before he spoke again. “Pet, hey? Still, you’ve done well for a human in the hands of a scav. He seems more reasonable than any other scav I’ve met. I didn’t expect a scav to come and help us the other day.”
“He is more reasonable.” She pressed her lips together. “I trust him.”
“
Then I pray to Aerthe he continues to be so.”
Over the heads of a female and two male grounders, she watched the nearest scavs. There were more than she’d known of – eight at least, and one standing on the sand by himself looking out to sea. He seemed different, a loner perhaps, in gray pants and long gray shirt. The butt of a large hand gun projected from a holster fastened over his shoulder.
“I want to talk to some of the scavs. That one, who is he?”
“Zerlin, I hear he’s called. I know nothing about him. He might be safer to talk to than some of the others.” Nervously, Pilf shifted his attention to the closer scavs. “Are you sure you’re allowed. I don’t want you hurt.”
“I’m your mission from Aerthe, I know. You don’t think you’ve done your bit?” Fern smiled, and stood, dusting off her rear.
“Perhaps?” He nodded. “Yes. Perhaps Osta is now your guardian. Even so, take care.”
“He won’t do anything to me that I don’t like.” She inhaled, exhaled, wondering who to talk to. The one with all the knives looked bad. “And he would kill any of those who tried.”
Well, she was fairly sure he would.
“Wish me luck.” She went in the opposite direction to JI – along the terrace with the beach to her left. The Zerlin scav watched her progress but said nothing. She only wanted some information, and it shouldn’t take long.
Fern listened for a while to some other scavs talk. They’d heard of the blessed mekkers now able to live on the land and seemed sure it would be best to kill them off before they gained a foothold – the usual sentiment she’d expect from an Aerthe warrior. Depressing.
Maybe they were boasting for her benefit. All of them had watched her approach.
She squatted beside the semicircle of the three scavs who’d tried to take Pilf and his people as slaves.
“Hi.” She directed most of her attention at theone with the heavily tattooed face and hands.
“Hello.” Tattooed man smiled, showing sharpened teeth.
Ugh. She managed not to flinch. “You all know of Osta, Yes?” She heard nodding helped get people to agree so she did that.
Tattooed scav nodded back. “Yes. Why?”
Exquisite Possession: A Dark Scifi Romance (The Machinery of Desire Book 4) Page 9
