by Dan Davis
“I’m so fat I’m going to throw you across the room in sparring tomorrow,” Ram said. “Again.”
Te laughed. “That’s the spirit, bro.”
“I'm going to go get some sleep,” Ram said, standing. “I know he’s probably still recovering in his quarters but I hope Mael doesn't take revenge for Alina’s attack tonight. He didn’t look badly injured, did he. Just a bit beaten up. And the thing is, I shouldn’t tell you this but Milena said he’s pretty much planning to attack me anyway. And now, I’m the one closest to Alina, it would make sense for him and the others to try something tonight, what do you think? I’m going to sit up all night, be ready to fight if they get through my door.”
“Want Sifa to sleep with you?” Te said, jerking his thumb at her.
Sifa looked up. “I think that's a good idea,” she said, unfolding herself and standing up. Even so simple a movement could be elegant and beautiful when she did it.
Ram looked back and forth between the two of them. “Okay.”
She followed him to his room, further along the barracks as the lights faded into a soft glow. The common area was empty but still he kept one eye on the three huge central tables and another on Mael’s closed door.
When he got into his own sanctuary, Sifa slid in behind him, shut the door with a bare foot and peeled off all her clothes without another word, looking him in the eye the entire time.
Having sex with Sifa was a world away from the businesslike coupling he had been experiencing with Alina. There was no romance involved with Sifa, certainly. She was no dewy-eyed girl losing herself in the moment. They were not making love or anything like that. But the handful of times Alina had commanded Ram to screw her, she had remained distant throughout, as if he was simply a sex toy with a sturdy base. Sifa, on the other hand, seemed to be present in the moment as she sat astride him, looking down to make eye contact every now and then, clawing and pawing at his skin and squeezing his shoulders and arms, pushing down on him. Her dark skin was sleek and shining with sweat as she bore down on him, throwing her head back and arching her spine.
Ram tried to be good at the sex. He wondered if Milena was tweaking his hormones back in her office or in her quarters. The thought of it was suddenly hot, almost as though Milena was in the room with Sifa and him. Sifa’s driver, on the other hand, was a German named Oskar, who seemed like a twat. He hoped Oskar wasn’t all up in Sifa’s hormones but he probably was, the dirty little prick.
“Focus,” Sifa whispered, smiling at him.
“Yeah,” he whispered back.
No matter his wandering thoughts, it was hard for him to take his eyes from her beautiful face, from the way her lips twitched and curled as she reached another height of pleasure and then another. And then there were her breasts. It was crazy that the UNOP surgical team had made a combat body with pretty big tits but there they were. Ram had, for years, never expected to see and feel real life breasts again and yet there they were, in his hands. Although, the breasts were as artificial as Sifa's whole body. Indeed, the hands that cupped them were not really Ram's hands either.
A thought at the back of his mind intruded and then would not go away again. The thought that this might be the last time he ever slept with anyone. His own death seemed so close at hand. Whether it was that night or in the morning or on another day soon, Mael would get him and that would be it. The Director and everyone else behind the scenes would not only allow it to happen, they had made it happen, had planned it and implemented it. He was living out someone else’s plan. A plan drawn up by an AI and signed off by the UNOP leaders. Ram was no more than a cog, deep in a machine, spinning and whirring away in the darkness without ever seeing the output.
“Hey,” Sifa said, placing her hands on either side of Ram's face and turning his head gently to have hers while she peered down at him, a small smile on her lips. “Where are you going?” She kept riding him, slowly, leaning over and her breasts bouncing beneath her.
“I'm sorry,” Ram said. “I was—”
She leaned down and kissed him, squashing her lips against his. Ram had rarely ever kissed anyone before. A girl or two at school, back when he was a boy and not quite yet grown to truly repulsive volume but those girls didn't count. And since then it was only really the call girls that he ordered every few months when the need for real life human contact overcame his deep shame at his body. And that didn't count either.
Was it his first real kiss? He was about to tell her but stopped himself. It would be a truly weird thing to say so he said nothing. On the other hand, it might be that she would want to hear it. She might like to hear it. Still, it was embarrassing.
Sifa moved her mouth away from his, just a little and she looked deep into his eye.
“Rama,” she whispered. “Stop going away from the moment. I can feel you drifting. Drink it all in, moment to moment, be here. Like in fighting. You think too much. Do not think. You must feel.”
“Alright,” Ram whispered back, their voices little more than breathy whispers in the low light.
“Feel that?” Sifa mumbled, placing his hands on her breasts.
“Yes.”
She moved his hands to her muscular ass as she ground her hips down and back and forth onto him. “Feel that?”
“Uhuh.”
“Stay in the moment,” Sifa whispered into his ear. “Stay with me. Stay with me, stay with me.”
They came almost together, the waves of it rushing through Ram as they clung on to each other with fingers grasping, their sweating skin sliding over skin.
“Thank you,” Ram said.
Sifa laughed a little and nudged him with her elbow. “Thank you, also. We must sleep now, we must rest for tomorrow. I wish we could sleep naked in a bed together, a real bed. Well, a giant sized bed. But these things are too small and you are definitely too big.”
Ram made a bed upon the floor, sighed with satisfaction of the madness of it all and closed his eyes.
It seemed like not a moment had passed but then his door lock beeped, startling Ram into consciousness. Sifa lay on her front in his bed, her back rising and falling with steady breaths, black skin shining in the darkness. A noise again. Was someone doing something to unlock his door from the other—
The door burst open and Ram jumped to his feet against the rear wall. Sifa crouched up on the bed, arms up ready to defend herself.
A bulging body filled the doorway, shadowed face swollen and purple, misshapen but easily recognizable.
“Come out, both of you,” Alina hissed. “We must act quickly.”
22. UNSTOPPABLE
“What's going on?” Ram said, tiredness fading as his heart started thumping in his chest. “Why aren't you in medical, Alina?”
He glanced at the screen on his desk, faintly illuminating the on-ship time.
0327
There was no way Dr. Fo would release her in the middle of the night. The Victory ran on a very tight schedule and night time was for sleeping.
Alina's face was swollen and purple and black, with cuts at her lips and eyebrows and cheek that had been stitched-up and glued together. She held a roll of wide medical tape and a bandage in one hand.
“You escaped,” Ram said in the darkness at the back of his room. “You broke out of medical.”
“Being there had served its purpose. Come.”
Ram glanced at Sifa. She was just as shocked as he as she stepped down off his bed.
“You intended to get put in medical?” Ram asked. “Why would you do that?”
Alina turned and strode back into the common area. Ram scrambled after her but Sifa beat him to the door and they both slipped through. It was still the low night lighting in the space between the bedrooms. All the other doors were shut.
“This is not good, Rama,” Sifa said, all trace of softness gone from her. “Do we stop her?”
“I don’t know,” Ram muttered. He wanted Mael dead, he knew that much.
Alina threaded between two of
the three tables that ran down the center line of the long communal space.
She was going for Mael's room.
“No,” Ram hissed. “You'll get yourself killed.”
Sifa darted forward after Alina but the bigger woman turned and held up a palm to Sifa. “Do not concern yourself. Mael is in no condition to offer resistance. Not now.”
“Wait, he was not badly hurt,” Sifa said, voice low and urgent. “He looks better than you do.”
Sifa turned to Ram for confirmation but Alina crossed the last few steps and threw open Mael's door. It was not locked but perhaps he had never imagined needing a lock. Who would ever be dumb enough to open his door without an invitation?
Ram held his breath and Sifa stood tense beside him across the common area from Mael’s quarters.
Alina stopped in the doorway and simply stared inside, shoulders hunched up. She marched into the darkness of Mael's room. Ram held his breath, waiting for the sound of struggle to start. If Alina had lost just a few hours before and now was already badly injured, then Mael would overpower her easily. And his followers outnumbered Alina’s group.
Soft rustling, then a resounding thump. Alina backed out, bent over and dragging Mael's unconscious body out through the doorway by the ankles. She pulled him all the way out and into the space between the wall with the rooms and the long tables in the center.
Mael was awake, his eyes fixed on Alina, his face screwed up into a fury so intense that his face with crimson and veins stood out all over his forehead. Alina had stuffed the bandage into his mouth and then taped it in place so that he could not cry out.
“You've flipped his paralysis switch,” Ram said. “How did you do that?”
“Dr. Fo obliged me,” Alina said, standing over Mael.
“How did you get him to do that?” Ram asked.
Alina did not respond to him but instead addressed Mael below her.
“I wish we had more time together, Mael Durand, you disgusting waste of flesh. We have locked the doors thoroughly but the Marines will be forcing their way in here soon. Your minions I have also disabled, they are lying in their rooms right now, as helpless as you are. They are followers by nature and once you are dead they will be mine, believing in me as their champion. You know, Mael, it would have been very pleasant to have had a few hours with you, alone, just me and you and a few small, serrated blades and pairs of pliers. Sadly, time is a luxury unavailable to people like us so I will have to beat you to death with my own hands.”
“No!” Sifa shouted. “You must not. Whatever your differences, you must think of the mission. The mission is the only thing that is important.”
Te threw his door open and stepped out, his mouth falling open. Alina paid him no mind.
“But I am thinking of the mission, Sifa. Once your head is smashed into a pulp, Mael, I will be Subject Alpha. With the support focused on me, I will achieve higher performance than you. And I will beat the alien. Anyway, do not concern yourself with such things. Just know that your time is over. You lost. You were not the strongest. All you need do now is die like the worm you are.”
She lifted her knee high and stamped down on Mael's face with her heel, crushing his nose in a shower of blood.
“Alina, no,” Te and Sifa shouted together.
Ram stood looking at the scene, wondering if he should stop her. His own life would be safer if Mael died, surely. But it seemed as though Alina was also insane. Would she rule the subjects as Mael had, killing those who she took issue with?
Had she not already started?
Alina lifted her knee up high and stamped down again, smashing Mael's chin with a blow so powerful it broke his jaw. The sound of it was like a steel bar being snapped inside a vat of Jell-O.
Across the common room, Te held back Sifa who, though she hated and feared Mael, believed him the greatest warrior of them all. Sifa wanted to stop Alina. Was Te holding her back because he disagreed and wanted Mael dead or was he simply trying to protect his friend from Alina's murderous rage?
The door to the barracks resounded with a series of bangs. Someone on the outside, trying to break in.
“I think the Marines are coming,” Ram shouted.
He wasn't sure if he was warning Alina so she would stop or so she would hurry and kill Mael before they could stop her.
Alina's next stomp down on Mael's jaw snapped it lose. Snapped it with such force that it tore the skin under his ear, blood pouring out as it was torn away.
It seemed unreal. Sifa and Te cried out at the sight of it.
The pounding and scraping on the door sounded like they were attempting to lever it open from the far side.
“Do not go anywhere,” Alina said to Mael, who's eyes were mad with agony and fury. She kept talking but it was not to anyone present in the barracks. “Diego, are you still in control? Very good. Allow them to open the barracks door, let a few in. And execute stage two.”
“What are you doing?” Sifa shouted.
“You may wish to take cover, my friends,” Alina said. “And brace yourselves against something.”
The barracks door slid open with a juddering, grinding clatter.
Alina ducked behind the bench closest to the entrance just as four marines ducked in, their automatic assault rifles firing as they stepped through. Ram leaped to the ground, scrambling toward the nearest room.
Not before he was hit.
Two shots slammed into his shoulder and arm in immediate succession. The force knocked him sideways. Pain shot through him even as more rounds clanged all around, spattering into the ceramic tiles and bouncing about, hitting the benches, the open doors.
No blood on his shoulder. Two more rounds hit him, pain jolting through him. The rounds had hit his leg but the pain writhed up and down his whole body.
Non-lethal rounds. Electrical slugs. Of course, they had to protect their investment and they couldn't risk damaging the ship through firing proper bullets.
Ram crawled toward the nearest bedroom door but it was shut, no doubt locked and the doors were designed to be secure against even a subject's mighty strength. Still, there was nowhere else to go.
Alina roared. A huge sound from deep inside her belly, so loud that Ram could feel it rumbling through the air and the tiles under his chest. He risked a glance over his shoulder and saw her rising from her cover behind the bench.
The non-lethal rounds were fired on semi-auto, groups of slugs smacking into the bench seats, the tabletop, the legs. Cracking into the floor and walls.
The four marines stood in front of the open door, spaced apart from each other and all hunched behind their weapons, firing in bursts. Even as Ram watched, the door behind them slammed shut, cutting off the other marines lined up in the doorway beyond.
Te and Sifa were ducked down behind the second table, relatively safe.
But Alina was roaring and rising and she leaped up onto the top of the bench, coiled like a spring and jumped forward. The slugs smashed into her chest, her arms and legs and her face. It was as if she felt nothing. They did not slow her.
Ram felt strange, lightheaded. Perhaps the rounds that had hit him were more than electrical, perhaps he had been hit with a drug or something similar.
Alina covered the distance to the marines in a second. Two of them in the center scattered in opposite directions. The other two backed away into their corners either side of the door, still firing.
But nothing could save them now.
Alina reached the first marine and punched him in the face, crushing his skull, breaking his neck and sending him back in a ragdoll heap into the door. She spun and caught the next one by his helmet and yanked him backward off his feet and into her grasp, wrapping one of her mighty arms around him. The marine looked like a child compared to her. Alina drew his combat knife and sawed into his throat, spraying blood.
The other two kept on shooting her. They must have been down to their final few rounds as they were pinging single shots into her body now, co
nserving ammo.
And it was working, finally. She was slowing, her movement strange.
Or was it Ram's imagination? He climbed to his feet, the pain from being shot already faded into nothing. Yet he felt strange, like he was in an airplane or roller-coaster simulation.
Alina threw her knife into one of the marines. It curved strangely in flight but sank to the hilt in the marine’s face, smashing through their visor. Alina turned and bound over to the last one and smashed her down with the weight of her body, finishing her off with a palm strike that crushed her skull.
Silence.
Not quite silence. The other marines outside the door hammered and scraped at it. Alina's breath echoed.
Mael's coughing from where he lay on the floor, spattering blood out of his ruined face and dislocated, shattered jaw. Unable to control anything but his own breathing, he must have been drowning in the blood leaking from his wounds.
Te and Sifa stood up from their cover behind the second bench.
“Alina,” Ram shouted. “What are you doing? The marines are going to get through that door-”
He broke off when his stomach lurched and he felt like he was in a car, going over the brow of a hill. Blood rushed to his head, his body was lighter.
The ship's simulated gravity, created by spinning the rings, was fading fast.
And then, Ram's feet left the tiles underfoot.
Sifa and Te clung to the tables. Mael's body rose into the air, his eyes still wild and staring up with fury.
“The gravity,” Te shouted. “Hold on to something.”
Alina worked quickly with the bodies around her. She took rifles from two of them nearest to her, even as they all rose gently off the floor. Expertly, she unloaded the magazines and allowed them to float away but she stripped more magazines and loaded them into the rifles, stuffing a couple more into the waistband of her pants.
