Dhakhar

by Annabelle Rex

  He demonstrates, tugging his arm away from me.

  “So grip your wrist with my hand?”

  “Yes,” he says. “Doesn’t take much. That’s it. Now, just press down on my thumb. Bend it in on itself.”

  I hesitate, reluctant to hurt him.

  “You have to actually press,” Dhak says, a light teasing note in his voice.

  I look at my hand against his. My pale skin against his blue. I swallow, my heart fluttering in my chest.

  And press. Just a little.

  “Harder than that, Charlie,” Dhak says with a laugh. “You need to mean it.”

  “Don’t think I’m cut out for this self-defence stuff,” I say. “Too much of a wimp.”

  “Charlie, you hit a man across the back with a pipe. You aren’t too much of a wimp. You can do this.”

  “Maybe it’s just you I don’t want to hurt, then,” I say.

  I look up as I say it, my eyes catching his. For a long moment I just stare at him, words bubbling in my chest, desperate to be spoken.

  You’re the kindest person I’ve ever met.

  You’re the first person who’s ever told me I can do something.

  You’re the first person to believe in me.

  “The hurt doesn’t last, remember?” he says.

  I nod, then, with a slight wince, I press down harder.

  I can tell when it works. Dhak’s arm flinches, his body bending in to the pain just like mine did.

  “Good,” Dhak says, his voice a little strained. “Now, when I’m like this, you have all the power. You can move me anywhere you want me to go just by moving my arm. You’d only have to hook your leg against mine and you’d be able to topple me to the floor, no problem.”

  I let him go, and he straightens.

  “You’ll never win a fight with your fists, Charlie,” he says. “You’re right about being too little for that. But you don’t have to fight strong or fast - just smart. Use your opponent’s body, their weight, their momentum against them. I can show you how.”

  I nod. “Show me.”

  He starts teaching me different pressure points, but the session doesn’t last much longer. The hour comes to a close and Dhak has me do a quick cool down to finish off.

  “We’ll pick this up tomorrow,” he says. “Get cleaned up and changed quickly. Then come up to the bridge. This is your first time conscious through a gate, and it’s not going to be pleasant. Wear something comfortable.”

  This gate business sounds terrible. I do as I’m told, having a slime mist shower and putting my pyjamas back on. They’re definitely the most comfortable item of clothing I have.

  On the bridge, Dhak is talking to someone about approaching the gate.

  “You are cleared and ready to approach,” the person responds, their voice a little crackly over the speakers. “Please keep speed at fifteen percent and await final clearance before entering Nova Gate.”

  Dhak glances back at me. He hasn’t changed, I note, and I wonder why he felt it necessary that I did.

  “Strap yourself in,” he says. “Not too tight, but tight enough that you can feel the harness.”

  “All this prep is freaking me out a bit,” I say.

  Dhak grins briefly. “We’re about to pass through Nova Gate. You’ll have been through once before on your way out to Xentra, but going through conscious is quite different to being unconscious.”

  “Is it dangerous?” There’s a flare of nerves in my stomach and my palms grow sweaty. I try to wipe them on my trousers without him noticing.

  “No,” he says. “Gates are... imagine the universe as a great big ball. We’re on one side of the ball, Chasira’s system is on the other.” He balls his hand into a fist. “If we fly between the two the normal way, it’s like we’re traveling across the surface of the ball. But that’s a really long way, could take lifetimes to cross.” He traces his finger over the edge of his fist to demonstrate. “The gates open the way to travel through the middle. Much quicker, but - you’re flying through a hole in the fabric of reality. The world beyond the gates… It’s weird. Your brain won’t know how to process it. The more times you travel through them, the better you get at coping.”

  “But I’ve never been through one before,” I say.

  “Exactly. And I won’t lie. Your first time will be pretty horrible.”

  I can see the structure of the gate out of the front of the ship. It starts off small, but grows rapidly, a large metal circle suspended in the air. Inside it, a swirling riot of colour twists first in one direction, then the other, bright and difficult to look at. I can see what Dhak means about your brain not knowing how to process it. I can barely get my eyes to focus on anything inside the outer ring.

  “When I first joined the army, one of the things we had to do was to build up our tolerance of gates. If you go through them enough times, start getting used to it, you can go through more than one in quick succession. Useful, for getting people quickly between battles. I still remember my first time going through one, though. You don’t forget that experience in a hurry.”

  He hits a few buttons, then leans back in his seat, the autopilot or AI or whatever taking over the controls.

  “How long does it take to go through?” I ask.

  “Not long,” he says. “Twenty minutes, perhaps. It’s hard to tell when you’re on the other side. Time doesn’t exist there. Not in the same way it does out here.”

  It feels like the kind of trepidation you get on a rollercoaster, when you’re being dragged up a huge incline and you know sometime you’re going to have to come back down again.

  Then we’re square in front of the gate, and the person is back on the ship speakers.

  “We’re commencing your final approach now. Please shut down all autopilots and relinquish controls.”

  Dhak leans forwards, hits a few more buttons, then leans back again. The gate is so massive outside now, I can no longer see the metal ring that surrounds it.

  “Try to relax,” Dhak says. “I know that’s probably impossible. I probably shouldn’t have said anything. I just wanted you to know that if your brain feels like it’s turning itself inside out, that’s normal.”

  “Great. Thanks.” I resist the urge to close my eyes.

  Then with a pop that’s less a sound and more a sudden absence of it, we’re through.

  Colours. Colours everywhere. Light dancing around like fairies. Outside the windscreen, the world has become a swirling whirlpool of pinks and oranges. Only outside and inside don’t seem to apply here, because orange and pink are swirling around me, too.

  At first, it’s kind of pretty, but I can sense the overwhelm building in my brain, a pressure at the base of my skull that starts off barely noticeable, but soon magnifies to the point of intolerable.

  And then my brain is bending and I want to scream but my voice has run off with my breath and I’m full and empty at the same time technicolour and black and white and red and blue and everything and nothing.

  Nothing except the pounding pain. It beats and beats, louder and louder until it drowns out everything else.

  “Hey,” a voice says. “It’s okay now, we’re done. We’re through. It’s over.”

  I open my eyes and regret it, white hot pain lancing through my head.

  “Too bright,” I say, pressing my hands over my eyes.

  “I know. Warned you it would be horrible, didn’t I? I’m unplugging your harness. Then I’m going to take you to your room. You can have it fully dark in there. No annoying monitors like here on the bridge.”

  “Monitors are annoying,” I say, feeling the release of the harness. I fill my lungs, sucking the air down deep.

  “Come on,” the voice says, and hands are on my body, lifting me up out of the seat.

  Nice hands. Not bad ones.

  I know the difference.

  I snuggle in to the chest I’m being held against.

  “You smell nice,” I say, because it’s true.

  �
��And you’re lucky I’m far too much of a gentleman to use any of this against you.”

  Then I’m being set down in a bed and it feels so soft and inviting. I sink in to it, smiling.

  “Lights are going off now.”

  My eyelids go dark.

  “The worst of it should wear off in an hour or so.”

  “Okay,” I say, “will you keep me company?”

  A pause. “Got to fly the ship.”

  “Oh, yeah. That’s important, isn’t it?” I say.

  I think it is. Nothing much makes sense right now.

  Chapter 21

  Dhakhar

  Over the next few days, we settle into a rhythm. Up with ship’s dawn for a healthy, hearty breakfast. I review the flight paths and make any adjustments, while she returns to her room. Mid-morning, we start our training session together and work til late lunch time. After lunch, she’ll watch a documentary, or sometimes sit up in the bridge with me, peppering me with questions about anything and everything, her necklace glowing softly.

  The impulse to be near her isn’t fading with time. It’s getting stronger. I try to remind myself that she’s my responsibility, a dignitary from an unregistered planet. It doesn’t help. No matter how many times I tell myself these things, whenever I look at her, my Dravosic side can only think of her as ‘mine’. I’m starting to imagine this can go on forever - eating with her, laughing with her and having her pester me while I’m flying. I can’t stop thinking about her, all gate-sick and not quite with it, inviting me to stay with her. Keep her company. How easy it would have been to slip into the bed beside her, tuck her into my arms and breathe in the scent of her hair, her skin.

  Even researching inter-species mating bonds, finding no recorded trace of even a hint of a suggestion that it’s possible for them to happen, doesn’t put a stop to it. Partly because it’s so obvious reading the studies that they are propaganda - full of messaging and conclusions that are blatantly the words of someone against inter-species relationships. None of the studies include any hybrids. I’d get a more balanced answer if I asked the people of Low Town.

  I could comm Taph. He would have a way of finding out. He’s Menarzi, too, so he knows about mate bonds and how they work. But he’s also Taph - going to him with a personal issue is just… no.

  So I push her as hard as I can in our training sessions. Partly because I know some day in the near future we’re going to arrive back at her planet and I’m going to have to leave her there. If I can’t be there to protect her, I’m sure as hell going to make sure she can protect herself.

  But I’d be lying if I said it wasn’t also partly an attempt to push her away. If I keep working her harder, eventually she’s going to snap. If she hates me, maybe that will finally break the spell she has on me.

  Today, it appears to be working.

  She doesn’t say anything, but I can sense her frustration - see it in the way her eyes flash every time I order her to do something again. She grits her teeth and lets out little snarls of breath whenever she fails to do something correctly. Whenever I touch her, I can feel her muscles bunched and tight beneath my fingers.

  “Your arms are sloppy,” I say. “Hold them more upright, keep your muscles tensed.”

  “Widen your feet, lower your centre of gravity.”

  “Tighten your form.”

  “Again.”

  “Again.”

  “Again.”

  Finally, she snaps. With a wordless cry, she storms away from me, stomping over to one of the benches. She slumps down on to it, looking anywhere but at me as she folds her arms across her chest and closes her eyes, taking a few deep, steadying breaths.

  I should stick the knife in now. Tell her she’s not got the talent, or worse, the fortitude. Tell her I don’t have the time for such a terrible student, that we should stop these sessions now and she should just watch her documentaries instead. Tell her it would be more appropriate for a person of her station.

  But I can’t do it. I can’t lie to her. I can’t bear the thought of being just one more person to make her feel less than the wonderful woman she is. And, faced with the reality of it, I can’t bear the thought of her hate, either.

  I’m weak. I shouldn’t torture myself with dreams of things I can’t have.

  I go and sit beside her.

  “I had this instructor when I joined the army,” I say. “Whenever we were close to breaking point and ready to give up he always used to ask us the same question: Why?”

  “Because there’s only so much a person can take?” Charlie says.

  “Not that why. Why are you here, why are you doing this? What are your reasons for being in the army in the first place. He always used to say if you have a good enough ‘why’ you can get through anything. So what’s yours? Why did you ask me to train you? Why did you want to learn?”

  She stares off into the distance as she thinks about it, her cheeks still flushed with effort, her hair mussed. I want to brush my fingers over her hair, smooth it back in to place. So while she’s thinking about her why, I think about one of my own. Why her?

  She’s beautiful, but that alone isn’t enough to explain it.

  “It passes the time,” she says.

  She was kind to me when we first met. That was the start of the transition from purely physical attraction to something else. That moment when she took my hand and thanked me in her Human way for saving her life.

  “I like the idea of being stronger, more capable.”

  She got excited about the markets on Denestra. Denestra. A dead end planet in the middle of nowhere and she wanted to see more of it. I wonder how much opportunity she gets at home to step out of the role she was born to play. Not a lot, I think, and it’s a tragic waste. To never see her with the sparkle exploring Denestra put in her eye would be to only ever see a small part of her.

  “I don’t want to be vulnerable to other people anymore. I know you’ll protect me, but when I get home... I’m going to have to look out for myself.”

  She bought that cheap crystal necklace because she thought it was pretty and she’s worn it every day since.

  She put her head on my shoulder, held my hand.

  “And I don’t want to let you down,” she says, her words jolting me out of my own head.

  “Let me down?”

  She looks up at me, blue eyes meeting mine.

  “All my life people have treated me like I’m too stupid or pathetic to do anything outside of this narrow little life they imagined for me. I’ve been told I’m not capable of being anything other than what I am so many times, I started to believe it. You don’t treat me like that. You believe in me. You push me to do better. And you have no idea how much that means to me.”

  Oh, veck.

  I curse under my breath. Everything I do lately turns to bovi-shit and I can’t help wondering if maybe the Vetruens and their ilk had it right all along. Maybe I am an abomination, cursed to screw things up all my life.

  “What’s wrong?” Charlie asks, a slight wobble in her voice.

  “Charlie…” I sigh. “You are so very far from stupid or pathetic. You walked halfway through a mountain on a badly sprained ankle and didn’t complain once about the pain. You figured out a plan to escape the people who took you and were brave enough to try it, even though the odds were stacked against you. You have proved yourself a survivor in so many different ways and I absolutely do believe in you. But that isn’t why I was pushing you so hard.”

  I realise there is something I can do. I can tell her the truth. Tell her the truth and watch as her expression melts into one of horror that someone like me could even think to have feelings for someone like her.

  “You want me to be able to protect myself,” she says. “Because of what I told you in the tunnels on Denestra.”

  My scales harden just at this reminder, a flash of rage ripping through me that has to come from my Dravosic side.

  “Yes,” I grit out. “In part.”

&
nbsp; She looks at me expectantly.

  “I was trying to make you angry with me,” I say. A close approximation of the truth, if not quite the truth.

  She frowns. “Why?”

  “Because…” Dammit, just spit it out. “Because I’m really attracted to you and it’s inappropriate. I was trying to distract myself from my feelings, but in doing so, I made them your problem, when it’s not your problem it’s mine. I’m sorry, I shouldn’t have...”

  She darts forwards, cutting off my words with her lips, pressing them against mine. I freeze, unsure what’s this is, unsure why she’s done it, unsure what to think.

  She draws back from me after a moment.

  “You don’t do kissing?” she says, the flush of pink across her cheeks so deep it’s almost red.

  “No, what… what is it? Just touching mouths?” I’m confused why anyone would do this. It wasn’t horrible, but it seems somehow unsanitary. I wonder if that’s just Vetruen cultural conditioning coming through, though.

  “It’s a bit more than that,” she says. “It’s something Humans do with someone they are attracted to. God, it sounds weird when you actually describe it. I think you’re fit, let me press my mouth on yours and lick your tongue with mine. But trust me, it’s good.”

  “Physical fitness makes Humans want to do kissing with each other?” I say, not quite understanding.

  “No,” she laughs. “Well, yes, sometimes. The word means two things. Fit like physically fit but also like extremely good looking. You are both.”

  My disbelief must show on my face.

  “Oh, don’t be all fake humble,” she says, swatting at me. “You must have noticed at some point in your life that you’re a hottie.”

  “Charlie, no one thinks I’m good looking,” I say.

  “What?” she says, her surprise evident in her tone and her expression. “That’s the most ridiculous thing I’ve ever heard.”

  And I must be a complete vecking vain idiot, but I’m ridiculously flattered and delighted to hear her say so.

  “Really?” I say.

  “Oh, now you’re just fishing for compliments,” she says, sticking her tongue out at me.