Now that I’m out of material, these updates will slow considerably, but have the newest chonk now, if you please.

Content Warnings:  Vomiting Mention, Heartbreak, Inequitable Class System, Slavery, Dehumanization, Violations of Personal Space, Sci-fi Racism, Violence, Threats of Violence, Murder, Graphic Gore, Drug Abuse, Self-harm, Delusional Fandom Behavior, Abusive Relationships, Weapons.

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CENTENNIAL HILLS CONTINUES

by Bébé Mélange

The gun felt so heavy in Pep’s hand.  They always did.  Bullets weigh so much more than you’d think.  But was it worse because of the extra blue steel added to emulate the look of Han’s blaster?  Or because of the way he had debased himself to chase this dream?  The weight added a miserable reality to the scene that cut a painful hole in his enchantment.  His eyes wavered between Tmai – the headmaster calling him in from the academy’s acreage after a schoolboy caper gone awry – and the lightsaber.

More than the alien wielding it, that weapon was the dream.  Magic was real, and it could be his.  He just needed to play this scene right.  Pep exhaled deeply and his trembling stopped.  He stared clear-eyed through the rain dripping off his brow.  “Do not fuck this up for me, Communion.  I will end you.”

Tmai looked at Pep, then the komber.  Not that Pep could tell, with Ainavian eyes focal muscles concealed beneath the black surface of their orbs.  Whatever he was saying didn’t really matter.  The gun mattered to an extent, but what the Earthling did not realize was just how powerless he had become in the world.  They all had deadly weapons, but so did the government, and no murder ever went unpunished.  Whoever survived the exchange would be throwing away their life in another sense, and as the only people in the standoff with a full understanding of that reality, Tmai and the komber needed to reach an understanding – and they had to do this without words, under mortal duress.  The moment couldn’t last.

The komber deactivated the lightsaber and put a gentle hand on Pep’s thigh.  It was time to go home, it seemed to say.  Pep looked down at the creature with more emotion than he’d ever felt in his life, unable to speak through the lump in his throat.

Tmai was relieved.  Zigilous kombers were abnormally aggressive creatures with higher rates of violent crime, but they were still intelligent beings, in command of a full apprehension of the society in which they lived, the accord between species, and more.

Then the komber lit the sword up and used telekinesis to launch it into a whirlwind of sizzling light, slashing Pep into dozens of chunks in the blink of an eye.  The billionaire slid to the street as a pile of gloppy red and black dog food.

The komber spat at Tmai’s feet and put away the weapon.  It wasn’t truly a weapon, not truly a sword, but a tool for deglazing binarx coils at the algae brick factory.  The electrokinetic creature lugged around a piece of its job as a means to terrorize, and it worked.

For Tmai’s part, they never raised the pistol again, even by reflex, knowing instantly what the moment meant.  The komber knew Pep was uncontacted, no rights, a creature to be abused with impunity.  There would be no legal reprisal for his murder, unlike Tmai’s.  Killing him was a way to deny the Ainavian their property and insult them at the same time.  The zigilous creature knew some beings have gentle affection for their pets, and if that described the Ainavian’s feelings, so much the better.

Tmai holstered their pistol and watched unmoving as the komber ambled away.  What a nightmare.  They felt obliged to look at the ruin that was once a person, smoldering in the rain.  Vile.  Outrageous.  Piteous.  At last, they closed their eyes, covered their face with both hands, and let the disgusting weather massage their skin.  Could it ever be clean again?

 

High Jdibitong had allowed Eliza and Shammy to stay in the same room with Scuzz, because they were such well-behaved pets.  It was part of the grand room where he held court, sequestered with sheer drapes and appointed with puffy furniture and amber sculptures.  The only lights around her golden cage were sunk in the floor at random intervals.  Shammy had convinced Eliza to pull their beds up close to the cage so Scuzz could know they were there for her, physically, emotionally.  He dangled an arm between the bars and she held his hand while she cried softly.  Eliza rested her back against Shammy’s front, and despite the awkwardness of the positions, they all dozed off.  Eliza’s snoring was a chainsaw buzz on forty-five rotations per minute.

They couldn’t stay asleep.  Scuzz would wake to cry like a fussy baby, feeling embarrassed, wondering how she still had so many tears inside, falling asleep again when the well ran shallow.  Shammy would wake from the discomfort alone.  He’d be paying for that handholding in the morning with a disjointed shoulder.  Eliza slept the best, but had a few panicked starts during Scuzz eruptions.

Then Eliza had another start, but this time no Scuzz to set it off.  Something was in the room with them.  The presence felt charged to her, the way a horror movie director could make a dude in a ridiculous costume feel cursed and powerful.  Without thinking, she sat up to her full height and backed against the cage.

This set off a flurry of motion in the shadows, rustling, tittering, breathless voices.  The irregular shape had her imagining a serpentine form with multiple heads.  Then it crept timidly into the dim light, there revealed to be a gang of Vinudian children.  It may as well have been Jason Voorhees, Michael Myers, and Freddy Krueger.  Eliza jolted to the far side of Scuzz’s cage, hands gripping the bars.

“Oh no…  oh no…  It’s them!”

The children had been surprised by the sudden movement and jumped, but they quickly crept back into the light, chattering among themselves in an excited hush, even as they stared at the Earthlings with their front eyes.  Their rear eyes were less transfixed, exchanging glances with each other.

Shammy and Scuzz were stirred by Eliza’s freakout, and had smaller fits of their own as they tried to wake up fast.  Then Shammy got a grip on himself, still in a crouch over the big cushion he’d been sleeping on.  “Who?  Why, it’s just some children.”

“I know,” said Eliza.  “I hate children.  They freak me out.”

Scuzz leaned closer to Eliza from the inside of the bars.  “You think they’re children of the corn?”

“A village of the damned,” Eliza said.

“The brood,” said Scuzz.

“C’mon, ladies.”

“Lords of the flies.”

Shammy sat up.  “Wanted to come see the weird aliens, huh?  Here we are.”  He made a vague gesture of greeting and dropped it in his lap.

“Don’t encourage them,” Eliza said.  “What if their parents see you with them, and get weird ideas?”

“What ideas?”

Scuzz said, “I don’t care, just don’t let them touch me.”

They all shushed as one of the mob took a few ginger steps forward and poked Shammy’s arm.

“Hey!,” he said.

“Oh christ no!,” Eliza sputtered, once again terrified.

The child withdrew for a moment, then put a palm more fully on Shammy’s belly.  It made buzzing noises and hopped around, then came at him again.  Others tentatively stepped toward him, emboldened.

“no no no!,” Eliza cried feebly.

Scuzz stood up and gripped the bars.  “Let go of him!  Please!”

Shammy wasn’t in pain, but it was starting to freak him out.  “Hands off, children!  This is just… not at all appropriate.  Hey!”

Scuzz shook the cage as she tried to get their attention.  “STOP IT!”

It was like the bars rendered her invisible and mute for all it discouraged them.  They were swiping and pinching at him, squabbling with each other to get a touch.

Suddenly, Shammy stood to his full height, towering above them.  The children lost their resolve and scattered like roaches.  “You’re darn right.  Good lord.”

Scuzz loosened her grip on the bars and slouched.  “Oh man.”

Eliza darted her head back and forth like a panicked barnfowl, imagining movements from all corners.

“Eliza, you have got to calm down.  Come over here.”

Scuzz looked feeble, but smiled a little.  “You should spoon again, aww.”

Eliza squeezed her eyes shut and tried to shake off the creepy feelings, hanging in place from Scuzz’s gilded cage.  At length she relented, and resumed the little spoon, but she could not return to sleep.

 

Snar’s computer vibed and rang out with an inbound call.  That could only be one person.  Well, fine.  Let the escort come get their weirdos and go, if the Vinudians would let them.  They picked up, resting the device on a pillow and signing at the screen.

“Hey.”

“Doctor.  I found Pep.  It’s over.”

“Nice.”

“It’s over because he’s dead.  The zigilous komber … I feel the need to tell somebody but I can’t do that to you.  Not after Earth.”

Snar rolled their head up to look at the ceiling and wondered why they were in a funeral chamber.  Maybe the zigilous komber had killed them too.  They idly signed “that’s a shame” but Tmai spoke aloud, “You’re signing off screen.”

Snar rolled back to face the computer.  “Oh. Sorry.”

“It’s fine.  I’m going to get those Earthlings, put ’em up in a hotel until my ship is fixed, then take them home.  Should be there in eighteen sabs, give or take.  Thank you for taking care of them, doctor.”

“You’re welcome, captain.”

The call ended.  Snar closed their eyes and instantly fell half-asleep, mind reaching out for any given phantasm or wisp of dream stuff, imagining the idle with fervor.  But everything slipped away, some heavy concept bullying its way into any given scenario or image.  It was obscure, unnamed, but demanding of attention.  Snar could only refuse for so long.

You did not take care of them.  It broke through the haze and their eyes snapped open, irritated by dusty film, near painful.  They sat up and restrained an urge to vomit, then wiggled their fingers around like manipulating a hand puppet, trying to physically organize their thoughts.  This matters because Tmai will be here soon to collect them, and you will have to face the shame of it.

Snar’s limbs were nigh useless as they struggled into the Princess Leia robe.  They tangled into a mess like some exotic form of bondage and flopped on the floor.  This was a problem with a chemical solution, but escape had to come first.  They dreamed of their embryonic aquatic stage of development, more imagination than memory, and wriggled boneless from the gauzy prison.

The floor was a colorful mess.  Why am I in a children’s pod?  Embryos aren’t mature enough for that.  More wriggling, more flailing, and they taught theirself anew the power of walking.

In the clinic they found the synthesizer and used the recent information to tell them what drugs they had taken, the AI to develop an antidote.  They didn’t want it.  Maybe a less than perfect antidote?  A chaser that limited short-term memory, slowed thought?  No.  If their mind had been sharper before the antidote was administered, they might have done it, but the cognitive impairment in this case conferred an ethical advantage.

They slouched their head against the machine and watched it drip chemicals.  More.  More.  They let it produce more than necessary – enough to fill a shallow basin – and dunked their face in it.  The juice hit their eyes and their skin first, with a cold tingle and a cascade of electric snaps.  Then it wriggled its way into their brain, feeling like a painfully cold shower.

Snar jerked free of the basin in a spray of blue drops and fell on the floor in agony.  They saw theirself in an observation mirror, remote and tiny like a bug, a doll doing a tragic expressive dance.

A sab later, they were upright, pulling the mirror closer to examine their face.  They looked old as hell, with a speckling of blue drops in the bottom of each eye.  As they tilted their head one way then the other, the drops slid with the movement.  Weird.

Snar washed their face and put on the princess robe, this time lucid enough to use the belt to make it a less clumsy garment, and set out.  The halls of the enclave were dimmed for the night, but still bright enough for Vinudians and Ainavians to move by.  The Earthlings, with their tiny pupils, would probably be near blind in those conditions.

They figured that if the place was wound down for the night, then the Earthlings might be poorly attended enough to just snatch up, escort downstairs, and let Tmai have them.  Easy.  Hopefully they had been left in the grand room where the bgrudjh held court.  That was where he had ordered Jdurtozh to bring them, right?

A swaggering young aristocrat in a loose robe and floppy footwear came to a beverage dispenser in the hall and was surprised to see the Ainavian.  He wagged his head side to side and made noises of genial amusement, but the doctor couldn’t be bothered to engage with that, and moved on.

Cloth draped across the entrance to the grand room, a membrane that set the mood for any who enter.  Snar passed through, facing more resistance with their lack of hard bones than a Vinudian would, and annoyed by the indignity.  Then they had to navigate a labyrinth of drapes that had all been closed for the night, leaving the place quite unfamiliar.

High Jdibitong and his woman came through a set of drapes just ahead of Snar and kept on going without much notice of them, passing through the next set.  Snar moved to follow, crashing into each cloth they passed through like oversized spider webs.

They emerged into one of the lounges that had been concealed the first time they visited the grand room – with a disturbing feature that would have shocked them if they had seen it, a golden cage fit to hold one Vinudian-sized creature.  Bondage of that type was strictly governed by consent laws, which did not extend to the cage’s current occupant.  Why did Jdibitong have this thing in the first place?

He stood over Shammy and Eliza with his thorax puffed and began to speak a language the Earthlings would never comprehend.  “We heard you frightened the children, alien.  This is unacceptable.”

Shammy held a protective arm in front of Eliza and said, “I don’t know how you expect me to understand all that.  Try charades?”

Snar tried to focus on what to do, come up with a strategy, but nothing was clicking.  They hung in the darkness.

Googhi said, “You’re not as cute as Scuzz, Earthling.  Better watch yourself.”

Snar saw Jdibitong’s back fist flexing and rushed up to intervene.  In Vinudian they said, “Ah, sir, these creatures do not understand you.  While I do not speak their language well, perhaps I can try to convey to them some understanding of what you wish to communicate?”

“Snar!,” cried Scuzz.  “Save us, please!”

Eliza tugged on the hem of her shirt but also looked at Snar hopefully.  Shammy signed in Ainavian, “Hello Snar. Help with us, please.”

Snar signed back “shh” and spoke with Jdibitong.  “What do you think?”

The big man leaned back, front arm coiled on his chest and bulging with muscles.  “I’ve got an idea of how to teach them a lesson in Vinudian that requires no translation.”

“If you are considering corporal punishment, consider that such training is ineffectual if not connected in their minds to the deed which is being punished.  How would they know what it is they are supposed to stop doing?”

“Watch.”  He adjusted his stance for action and the Earthlings recoiled.

“Don’t do it!,” Snar tried.  “It’s just maltreatment, even of an animal.  All prosper the most when we act with compassion.”

“Don’t quote the Codex Preamble to me, doctor.  We aren’t school children.”

Googhi said, “You must be stern with animals, when you wish to protect your children!”

“What children could they have harmed?  I don’t understand.”  Keep them talking, Snar thought.

Googhi explained, “Little Jdinghris and Chtonoming came to us crying that this one had scared them, grabbed at them for no reason!  And why should we even keep these ones?  They don’t sing.”

“Pack behavior,” High Jdibitong said.  “They feel too confident with packmates around.  Cull the herd and those that remain will be safer to handle.”

“You aren’t seriously talking about killing them, are you?”

“Not yet, but it depends on how well they take to this.  Now do shut up.”

Snar shrunk in on theirself and took a half step back.  Eliza’s eyes grew wide with alarm.

Jdibitong pointed to Shammy, then to his back hand.  He held it at the height of a child’s head and mimicked their bobbing movement.  Then he pointed his front hand at Shammy and turned it into a stop gesture, followed quickly by a big punch from the back arm.  The bgrudjh pivoted on his heel to stand above them once more and Shammy crashed against the cage, spitting blood.

Eliza dragged him away, off the back of the cushion into the shadows on the floor.  Scuzz cried out in grief and slouched against the back of her cage.

Jdibitong looked pointedly at Snar with their rear eye.  “Attend me.  I want my children examined now.”  They took Googhi and walked out.

Snar gestured wildly to Eliza, “Snar with help, Snar with help,” then followed the tyrant out of sight.

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