Astra: Synchronicity (30 page)

The stunning grace of Amii and Magnius on the
dance floor captivated Nadine, who had been unable to do anything
other than watch them. The music had long since changed, and they
now danced a sultry tango. Lust oozed with each step and every
longing stare. Their movements had become less technical and
conveyed raw passion. She knew Magnius' feelings went beyond
theatrics but Amii…she couldn't tell how the woman felt about
him.

Nadine turned to Xander. "I didn't know Amii
was such an amazing dancer."

He took a deep breath before answering.
"Neither did I. She's right. Amii probably is the one seducing him
out there. Best put a stop to it right now. If you'll excuse
me."

***

"I'd appreciate it if you took your hands off
her."

The tone startled Magnius, and when he spun
around, Xander stood right behind him. Although the scientist was
tall and slender, his loud voice projected through the crowd.
Magnius backed away from Amii, a bit surprised he'd allowed the two
of them to dance for this long. She offered him a weak smile as
Xander took her hand and led her away.

Magnius walked to the bar, where he sat on a
stool and caught his breath. How had Amii been able to keep pace
with him out there? His parents had been competitive dancers before
the Great Holocaust, and they taught him everything they knew since
he was a young child. The art of classical dance had almost been
lost to more practical hobbies and art forms. Most people treated
the dance floor as a place to wriggle and bounce and have a good
time doing so.

He didn't see the chairman approach and take
the seat next to him. "One of those nights, eh Matt?"

His head snapped in the direction of the
voice, and when he saw the chairman, he exhaled. "Seems like it.
Where's Isabelle?"

"Dancing the night away with some Asian
fellow. You know me—two left feet." He ordered a drink before
turning around and glancing out toward the dance floor. "So who's
your sister? Really?"

"Some robotics scientist I met on the
Kearsarge
last month."

"Sleeping with her?" the chairman discreetly
inquired.

He shook his head.

Chairman Dodd collected his drink from the
bartender. "Well, what's stopping you? Don't expect Lyneea to have
a change of heart. They never do."

While he took a long drink of the clear
liquor, Magnius could see why the man had been married five times
in the last twenty years. He'd disliked the chairman since the
moment he met him—an opinion unlikely to change. Dodd wielded the
seductive charms of his office like a perk the position offered him
with airtight premarital agreements that left him unscathed.
Underneath his unimposing façade lied a master of manipulation the
likes of which the AC had never seen before.

"You should know that Leslie White was
inquiring about you."

Magnius shouldn't have been surprised, but
his curiosity piqued. "What did she want?"

"She asked about your sister and what I knew
about your parents' death. I doubt I told her anything she didn't
already know. I've always had the feeling her interest in you went
beyond the mundane…"

But Magnius stopped listening. Thirty years
had passed since his parents were found murdered in their home.
Both had been gutted and diced after being force-fed a wide range
of internal organs and excrement—evidence suggesting they'd been
tortured for days. The entire living room had been painted in their
blood. Their heads were found on stakes in the front yard, having
been garroted and carved up with a bone saw. The house needed to be
burned due to its permanent stench of death. No similar cases were
ever reported, and to this day the case remained unsolved.

"I'm sorry, Chairman." The sudden memory of
his parents' death made his stomach writhe. "I think I'm going to
call it a night. My head's been killing me for the past couple
hours."

"Take it easy." With that Dodd put his hand
on Magnius's shoulder and left him alone at the bar once more.

He glanced toward the dance floor, where he
noticed Amii dancing with Xander in an awkward display. At first
glance, he figured Xander was to blame, but upon closer inspection,
he realized Amii was the one mistiming her steps and not taking
cues from his lead. She stumbled over his shoes and grimaced at her
error before continuing on. Her movements looked negligent as if
she was unsure of the steps.

"How is that possible?" Magnius wondered.
He'd just led her in a magnificent tango that set his heart on
fire, and now a slow waltz gave her trouble. The simplest dance
there was and she couldn't handle it. The paradox defied logic.

He saw Nadine shuffle across the room toward
him with her crimson lips drawn into a coy smirk. "It's a beautiful
night. I'm going to send Amii back to my room. Wait ten minutes and
meet her there."

The idea roused his soul, but her eager
coupling of them tonight made him wonder. "Why are you trying to
make something happen between us?"

The second lady sighed. "Then stay here. Or
go back to your room. But both of us know you won't."

Nadine headed out to the dance floor and
talked to Amii and Xander for about a minute. Afterwards, the two
of them left the large ballroom. He'd seen the Vice President not
long ago and wondered if that had been her motivation to usher them
out. But he couldn't help thinking there was some other method to
her madness. Part of him felt her pulling on the strings of fate in
order to make something happen. She knew he was lonely and about
his infatuation with Amii, and in her own way she wanted to bring
him some measure of happiness.

He waited ten minutes just as Nadine asked
him to before heading down to the Vice President's room. Before he
knocked, he hesitated. Part of him was perturbed she'd manipulated
him into doing this without admitting she'd had a vision. Even if
Nadine hadn't said anything, he would've tailed her. He wanted
something to happen yet had a hard time willing himself to let it
happen.

Suddenly, the door opened, and Amii gasped
when she saw him standing outside. She'd changed back into her
black catsuit and jacket.
His
leather jacket. She would've
looked stunning wearing anything. Or nothing at all.

"Would you like to go for a walk?" he asked
her.

"Sure."

They walked toward the nearest exit at the
brisk pace set by her long stride. Magnius held the door open for
Amii when they stepped out of the palace. A brisk gust of warm air
blew Amii's hair around her head, and she combed it behind her ears
to keep it in place. The moon smoldered in the sky as dusk settled
across the land. The dappled dot of light punctuated the clear
night with its heady view of the stars. But being alone with her
thrilled him more.

"I was rather disappointed the Xuranians
haven't given us a tour of the city," she said.

"Only the real politicians got that. At least
they didn't make the rest of us sleep in tents outside. Thank Astra
we weren't born a thousand years ago, right?"

Her continued vacant stare made him
uncomfortable. He felt like she was busy judging him for the
numerous flaws and mistakes he'd made his whole life without even
being privy to them.

He glanced into the heavens and sought solace
in the pale light bathing the city. "My parents could never get
over how different the stars looked in the sky compared with from
Earth. Hell, the fact that people lived on stars that only used to
be a tiny spot of light in the sky astonished them. Have you ever
been on a planet where you couldn't see Sirius in the sky? I
couldn't even tell you what any of these stars are."

She watched him for a few moments before
responding. "Has anyone been back to Earth since the Exodus?"

"Not that I know of. People think it turned
into a post-apocalyptic nightmare. The amount of radiation in the
atmosphere is consistent with a nuclear winter. Nobody likes to
think about it."

"I wonder if anyone's still alive there."

"I don't see how."

Thoughts of death and destruction prompted an
image of his hoverbike to pop into his head. He'd vowed not to ride
it, but the urge proved too strong to resist. Nadine assured him it
would be okay. He had no reason to doubt a woman who'd saved him
from Tiyuri's iron grasp.

"Would you like to go for a ride with
me?"

She raised her brow at him. "Do you bring
that bike everywhere you go?"

"Not everywhere. I'd sleep with it every
night though if I could."

"I wouldn't want to come between the two of
you…you know, in case you need some alone time with it."

He took her hand. "Come on."

The two of them headed to the landing area.
Magnius was well aware of the law that permitted no motorized
vehicles on the streets. But being here with her…the temptation won
him over.

Amii waited near a few crewmen while Magnius
walked the hulking bike off of the ship. Its violet paint shimmered
in the soft moonlight. He turned it on and was greeted by its
familiar roar and the ionic yellow glow that radiated underneath on
the paved lot.

She stared at it with awestruck curiosity
before she approached and tossed her left leg over the seat behind
him. After she'd settled into place, he felt her chilly arms around
his chest as she scooted close to him. "Xander warned me about
hoverbikes. And in my own rebellious way, I hoped you'd take me for
a spin."

Magnius turned his head to look at her and
felt her hair graze the side of his face. She smelled like
honeysuckle, a scent he'd found intoxicating since he first
experienced it as a teenager. He closed his eyes for a moment to
center himself because he desperately longed to kiss her and knew
that no matter what, he could not.

He handed her his helmet, which she put on
without hesitation. "Hang on baby, and whatever you do, don't look
down." With that, he grabbed the handlebars and sped away from the
palace, leaving behind nothing but the lingering glow of his
machine.

He hadn't had the chance to take a midnight
romp through the streets on his bike for a long time. Not since
he'd been married, in fact. Lyneea frowned on him riding the
hoverbike at all because she thought it was too dangerous. For
normals, he agreed with her. But Magnius used his telekinesis to
keep the bike upright, and he had as much control with it at high
speeds as at low ones.

Whipping around the square, he didn't give
much of a thought to the idea he'd get caught. He just wanted to
take a fantastic ride with the wonderful woman behind him. The
intersection of his two desires sent a surge of adrenaline through
his body; the lust flowed through his hands and translated into
acceleration.

The only illumination came from his
headlights and the moon when he rode down the streets. Not a single
Xuranian roamed the capital city at this hour. He wove through the
great archways like a slalom run, and the rush left him hungry for
more. He sped through the banked streets, picking up speed and
freeing his mind of everything that bothered him.

For a while he forgot Amii was behind him.
Her body fused with his. Her breath on the back of his neck made
him shiver with desire. She'd been the first woman not afraid to
mount the bike and ride with him, and he fell even harder for her
because of it. His eyes might've been on the road ahead of him, but
she'd wrapped up his mind with sweet thoughts of her.

He decided to do something he hadn't done on
a bike since he was much younger and far less experienced than he
was now. Hoverbikes weren't just designed to glide over the ground;
they could hover over any solid surface. With enough momentum a
hoverbike would hover on the sides of buildings and around corners.
Though it was dangerous, the spectacular feats were the most fun a
person could have with their clothes on.

Magnius turned down a long street leading
back to the palace and leaned hard on the accelerator. He watched
his speed climb on the display below him. With one final surge he
held his breath and banked the bike sharply toward the sky.
Counteracting gravity was the least of his worries while he rode
upward in a spiral around one of the palace's towers. He used his
telekinesis to keep it from flipping and buoyed it on helium
dreams.

From above, the city looked small. They'd
been told almost a billion Xuranians lived on Xur, but no more than
several thousand inhabited this city, making Northampton look like
the Capital of the Universe. The breathtaking view of the ocean
reminded him how much he missed Fantasti. But he didn't want to go
back in time and change things anymore. Too much had happened.

Once he reached the top, he heard Amii gasp.
The noise surprised him for a moment during his transition toward
the ground in the safest way possible. The bike accelerated down
the building in near free-fall. He pitched the nose up and banked
to the left, using his speed and the sides of the buildings nearby
to buffer their descent. Fragments of broken shingles kicked off
several roofs underneath the bike before it returned to the
street.

He pointed the hoverbike straight south and
accelerated out of the city as fast as he could. A rocky path led
through the dense forest; he felt grateful they wouldn't have to
experience the trek on four wheels. The headlights were inadequate
for their surroundings but with no one else around to share the
road with, it didn't concern him. He checked his fuel reserves. In
Astra magnetic compounds had been embedded in the pavement,
drastically reducing energy consumption. At sixty-five percent he
had enough to ride for several more hours due to a hoverbike's
inherent efficiency.

After thirty minutes, the lush forest gave
way to healthy farmland with fields of edibles as far as the eye
could see. As they passed through it, she called out for him to
stop. At first he didn't understand why, but the reasoning became
apparent when he slowed.