by Ashley West
"You're quiet a lot, you know," Caldir said, and Sorrin didn't turn around.
"I know." Because what was there to say? Anything he said would eventually come back to what had happened to him, and he relived that enough in his own head to not want to talk about it with other people.
"You don't have to be like this, you know."
Now Sorrin did turn around. His eyes were narrowed, eyebrows drawn down. "Excuse me?"
Caldir looked up and sighed, shrugging a thick shoulder. "I'm not trying to..." He trailed off. "Look. I know what happened to you. Everybody knows by now. And we still talk to you. I know for a fact that Amalda from downstairs has tried to invite you for dinner no less than seven times this cycle. And you keep turning her down."
"Because she is looking for something I can't give her," Sorrin said. Surely even Caldir knew what Amalda wanted.
"Okay, granted," Caldir said. "But she also just wants to be nice to you. People are always nice to you, and you keep them at arm's length because...I dunno. Probably because you get off on this whole curmudgeon act."
Sorrin scowled at him. "Would you like to rephrase that?" he asked, in his best no nonsense voice. It had led to confessions from people with more mettle than Caldir.
But apparently Presha didn't scare easily because Caldir just looked at him flatly. "No," he said. "I don't. No one blames you for what happened. No one thinks you're worthless because of what you went through."
"I do," Sorrin pointed out.
"Yeah, I know. And you keep everyone away from you because you think they're gonna feel the same way. Which isn't really fair, when you get down to it."
"How is it not fair? To who? You and the other strangers who want to involve themselves in my life for some reason?"
"Sure," Caldir said. "To us. And to yourself. People weren't made to suffer alone, Sorrin. I don't care what clan you belong to or what you are, people aren't built that way. You ever wonder why there's not just one colony? Probably the first people who wanted to break away could have done that on their own, right? They could have started their own colony and existed independently."
Sorrin furrowed his brow. He'd never really given it much thought. "Or they assumed that they would be taken more seriously in a bigger group," he said, shrugging.
"Maybe," Caldir said. "But you know what I think? I think the first ones were scared to do it alone. I think they wanted company. And look at how good everything is for them. Luz might be a bit of a hole sometimes, but it's better than being under the thumb of some dictator or warlord on another planet."
"What is your point, Caldir?" Sorrin asked. Because he was sure this had to be going somewhere.
"I'm just saying that some things are better with other people. Sometimes you have to ask for help or whatever. Something like that." He motioned Sorrin closer. "Turn this on for me."
The screens were keyed to only respond to his touch to turn on, so Sorrin did as he was asked, laying his hand flat on the screen and watching as it lit up to read his biometrics before it flared to life in earnest.
Caldir smiled. "Good to see I'm useful," he said. "Thanks for letting me help."
He turned and headed back for the door, and for the first time in the entire time Sorrin had known him, he seemed fully mature. Fully in command of himself. It was odd.
"Oh, and Sorrin? Amalda's made a big pot of something, so she'll be knocking on your door either tonight or tomorrow night. You might give what I said some thought. Okay bye."
And with that, he was gone, leaving Sorrin behind with very little idea what had just happened. He wasn't used to getting words of wisdom from Caldir of all people. The world was a strange place.
Time, as it was wont to do, always passed quickly. Sorrin contented himself with doing odd jobs for people who weren't worried about using a former warrior for things he had never been trained for and training himself. Just because he wasn't a warrior anymore didn't mean he wasn't going to keep himself in shape. The Camadors would be back one day, and it wouldn't do for him to be floppy and out of shape when it happened. He needed to be at his prime, both mentally and physically, ready to act when it was necessary. Because it would be.
He spent his days alone for the most part, preferring to keep to himself. Caldir had a point when he spoke about keeping people at arm's length. It wasn't that Sorrin didn't trust people. It had never been about that, to be honest. He trusted plenty of people to do right by him and he trusted the intentions of everyone who had ever claimed to want to help.
He just didn't trust himself.
Sorrin was responsible for the deaths of so many people, and he never wanted to find himself in a position like that again.
So he didn't let people get close. Didn't let himself need anyone, and didn't let anyone need him.
His apartment in the building he lived in was sparse when it came to personal effects. He had the things he needed to survive, the things he needed for basic comfort, and the things he needed to train and to track the Camadors. That was about it. His bed was serviceable and unadorned, just a frame that came out of the wall with a mattress on top, sheets and a blanket. Standard issue, no frills. His couch and chairs were similar, designed for function rather than comfort.
Most of the living room was condensed into the smallest space possible to make room for his workout equipment, and it was a good thing there were vaulted ceilings because he was currently doing pull ups on a bar, biceps bulging as he pulled his considerably muscled frame up and then lowered himself again. He'd lost count of how many he'd done at this point, but he could feel the burn in his arms and knew he still had a ways yet to go.
As he worked out, he thought. Sorrin let the faces of the dying keep him motivated. His second in command as the light bled from blue eyes, the heads of the three squads under his leadership, taken out by a single blast. His parents, whose faces he hadn't seen, but he could remember the charred husk of their home when he'd gotten to it. He could taste the ash in the air, and knew what it felt like to be a failure.
Before he was even considering being done for the day, there was a knock on the door. Without even looking, he knew who it would be. Most of the other people who lived in the building were content to leave him alone most of the time now that they knew that was what he preferred. Only Amalda seemed to have trouble with that.
Sorrin sighed and let himself hang from the bar for a moment before he dropped to his feet and went to the door. He was sweaty and it showed. His shirt was thin and sleeveless, showing off his skin with its light silver blue tint, and the sweat that ran down his arms. The tattoos he had were visible too, thick lines in a dark color that wrapped around his arms and led up to his chest.
When he pulled the door open, Amalda stared.
And stared.
And then, for good measure, stared some more.
"Did you need something?" Sorrin asked briskly after she'd just been looking at him for a good two minutes.
She shook herself and licked her lips, giving him a warm smile. "I just wanted to see if you'd like to come down for dinner," she said. "I know you're going to say no, but I made my famous casserole, and I can't eat it all by myself."
"You shouldn't have made so much, then," Sorrin said bluntly. It was rude, but he didn't see how else to get her to take the hint.
"You're right," she replied. "But I always do, and it would be a shame to let it go to waste."
Sorrin sighed. "You should ask Caldir," he said. "He probably has trouble feeding himself and would benefit from it more than I would."
"Oh, I don't know about that. You look like you could use someone taking care of you."
Sorrin arched an eyebrow and Amalda flushed a dark red. It wasn't that she wasn't pretty. As far as Iglins went, she was lovely. Tall and slender with a lovely face and green tinted skin. If this had been before the incident, he wouldn't have thought twice about taking her up on the food and whatever else she wanted to offer.
"Not that you don't take care of
yourself," she was spluttering. "I mean. That's not what I meant at all. I-." She cut herself off forcibly.
"Amalda," Sorrin said. "I appreciate it, but I'm not interested." Before she could say anything else he was saying his goodbyes and shutting the door lightly. Not quite in her face, but hopefully she would get the message this time.
He moved to go back to his workout when the sound of a chime from his comm device made him stop. It could be a message, but it had been months since anyone had bothered to message him. No one would call, and it wasn't the right noise for that anyway. That only left...
Sorrin practically ran to it.
He unlocked the screen, and there it was. Two hits in one news bulletin. The floating city had been seen.
Someone had found the Camadors.
Chapter Two: Stall
It was sort of amazing how much a life could change over the course of a few months. Someone could be a brilliant student and then go on to be well on their way to being a successful adult and then have that ruined in an instant. If something catastrophic and unstoppable happened, then that same person could be trapped in a life they had never wanted or imagined for themselves with very little hope that it would ever get better.
For Abigail Warren, this was less of a hypothetical situation and more the exact reality she was facing. In the span of about five months, she'd gone from having bright and happy dreams and plans for her future to...well. What she was now.
A tired, dirty young woman, with lank hair and dull eyes, trapped in a prison that she didn't think she would ever get out of. She didn't know what had happened to her parents or her sister. She didn't know if most of her friends were safe, or even still alive. She didn't know what was happening outside of the walls and bars that kept her in.
Even though Abby was pretty sure she was still on Earth, it may as well have been another planet for all the good it did her. The floating city that had come down out of the sky one day was a world apart. A world within itself, honestly, and nothing that was happening down on the planet proper was reaching the ones who were trapped in this prison. Maybe everyone on Earth was dead. Maybe they were being made into slaves or being harvested for some sinister purpose. Abby didn't know, and thinking about it made her head hurt.
All she knew was that she wanted to get out of here. That didn't make her special, really. Everyone wanted to get out of this hell hole and get back to their families, but when their beautiful captors heard their pleas for release and mercy, they just laughed and continued moving.
They were the most bizarre things, these creatures. Abby had always thought that creatures from other planets would be monstrous looking. They'd have sharp teeth and horns and claws or something, or else they'd look like the green or grey men that she saw in movies and television shows about aliens coming to Earth. She'd never seen anything about extraterrestrials who looked like supermodels.
There wasn't really a better way to put it, either. That's what they looked like. Every single one she'd seen so far had been tall and thin with nearly inhumanly beautiful faces. The only real variation between the different members of whatever this race was, was hair color and facial structure. Some of them had more chiseled jaws, some had rounder cheeks, and others had sharper faces. Without fail, they all had golden eyes, though, and they were so bright that Abby always felt the need to shield her face whenever one of them turned those eyes on her.
"Like they're seeing right through you," was whispered to her by one of the women who shared her prison, and Abby had to agree.
As far as the prison went, it was much like the captors themselves. For all this was cruel and unusual and they were being held against their will, the prison was made beautifully.
The bars were made of some sort of wrought, silvery metal that they already knew was indestructible. At least with any means they had. The bars divided the room into cells, and there were five humans in each one, along each wall of the room. There were cushions on the floor and piled in the corners, and when one of the humans had complained about being cold, she had been brought a blanket.
They were fed every day, one meal at first, but then one extraordinarily beautiful man had come up to the bars and announced that he had learned that humans required three meals a day, and then the food increased.
It wasn't anything Abby was used to or could say she'd had before, strange meats and vegetables and odd gelatinous blobs that actually turned out to taste pretty good, but it was food, and it kept them alive, which was more than she and most of the others had been expecting from their captors.
Honestly, that was one of oddest things about the whole affair. Despite the fact that they were most definitely being held against their will and most definitely the victims of some sort of invasion, it wasn't all that bad.
No one got killed, no one got probed, no one came to antagonize them. For the most part they just sat in their cells and waited. Though no one really knew what they were waiting for.
The minutes blended into countless hours, which turned into days and then to weeks and months, and while some people still made tick marks, wanting to keep track of what was happening, most of them had given up on that. What was the point of knowing anyway, right? If they were never getting out of there?
Abby tried not to think that way. She asked the man in her cell what day it was every couple of days, wanting to keep track. She'd never been one to suffer defeat lying down, and so she was determined not to give up hope.
Someone would rescue them. Somehow.
The government or the military or something like that. It would be fine. She just had to believe it.
"Do you think the Earth's a smoking hole in space by now?" someone asked as a new day started. As least Abby thought it was a new day. All she really knew was that she slept when she was tired, and woke up after a few hours of sleep. She still had her cellphone in her pocket from the day she'd been taken, but it hadn't been charged in months, so it was essentially dead weight. Sometimes she liked to pull it out and run her fingers over the screen, using it as a last tie to the world outside. Below. Whatever.
"Why would you ask that?" someone else muttered. The cells were separated by bars as well, so they could see the other people in other cells and all communicate well. Not that it was always a good thing.
"I'm curious," the first man said, shrugging a shoulder. He looked to be a bit older than Abby, scruffy with dark brown hair and bright eyes. He was just as dirty and worn looking as the rest of them, but there was a spark in him that the others didn't seem to have.
"Curious about if our planet's been destroyed?" Abby asked in spite of herself. Usually she didn't get involved in stuff like this. "Aren't you worried about your family and friends?"
He shrugged a shoulder, looking like he couldn't care less. "Don't have too much of either," he said. "And my family is the kind of family that deserves to be destroyed."
Abby made a disgusted face. "What a horrible thing to say."
The young man shrugged again. "You don't know my family. For some of us, this isn't as bad as it could be."
"Shut up!" someone snapped from the cell across the room, and Abby and the young man turned their heads to look.
A woman, probably in her thirties, sat huddled against the wall at her back. "Just because you want your family wiped out doesn't mean the rest of us do," she said. "My daughter's down there. She's only seven. Who's going to take care of her?"
She looked on the verge of tears, and Abby averted her eyes, not wanting to watch the display of emotion. She didn't know the woman, but in the time since they'd been trapped there, Abby had seen her try to reason with the guards to release her, begging them to let her go to her daughter.
Abby hoped she would be okay.
"I'm sorry about your daughter," the young man said, and Abby was surprised to hear something like that out of his mouth. They hadn't spoken in the time they'd been there, but then there hadn't been a lot of talking amongst the prisoners. Either way, he didn't seem li
ke the sort to be giving out heartfelt sentiments.
The woman turned her face away, shoulders shaking, and the man sighed and ran fingers through his hair.
"They're going to let us go," he said. “At the very least, they don’t want us dead.”
"How do you know that?" someone asked quickly.
"He doesn't," Abby said, rolling her eyes. "There's no way he could."
"Unless he was in league with those...things." The last word was said in a whisper, as if trying hard not to attract attention.
"I'm not," the man replied. "I just know things."
People were starting to pay attention, and despite herself, Abby was, too. There was something about people who said what they wanted to say with conviction. She had been one of those people back when she'd had a different life, and so she listened.
"What kind of things?"
He looked around, both for dramatic effect and probably to check and make sure that there wasn't anyone lurking around listening. "There's some kind of plan," he said. "Something they want to do with the Earth, probably. The day the city came down? Not the first day they showed up here."
"What do you mean?" Abby wanted to know.
"They've been walking among us. Not a lot of them because we'd notice a bunch of weirdly pretty people hanging around probably. But just enough that they could scope the place out."
"Is this some weird illuminati thing?" a woman asked, arching her eyebrow. "Like how celebrities are in a secret society and are all aliens or something?"
"No," the man said flatly. "This is real. I saw someone like them last year. I was at this bar, and this beautiful woman walks in, right? Tall, thin, hot face, long dark hair, golden eyes. At the time I was thinking that it was like winning the lottery, but she wasn't interested in me."
