The Fly House (The UtopYA Collection) (5 page)

To do it was as cold as ice seeds, but he had to make his point.  He didn't respond, even as she sucked at his lip and ground her hips against him.  

"You want me to believe you prefer the men to me?"

"In some ways, definitely."  He tried not to laugh as he untangled himself from her. 

"Don't tell me that you are
shebele,
Diem.  I know better."

"I wish I were.  Men nag me for my mating far less than you do."  He crossed the floor to upend his cup in the sink basin. 

"Maybe you are shebele," she said, her eyelids drooping until her lashes dusted her cheeks.  "Now that you mention it, I've never heard of your offspring in any House.  Maybe you should make your intentions clear, so you do not insult the daughter of a Rha by presenting yourself as available for mating."  

This wasn't playful banter anymore, it was pure insult.  To be shebele was to disappoint, since the shebele were uninterested in helping to populate the race.  Diem felt the fumes of his anger rise with Wind's manipulation.  She was threatening his position of power
, his seating as the Fly House Rha. 

With the human population still teetering on the verge of extinction, sex was highly encouraged, even insisted upon, even though official mating ties drew the opposite reaction.  Early on, it was recognized that mating a couple together created extra competition and made for warring between the Houses.  In the beginning, a mating happened once a woman became pregnant.  The man would leave his House and join the woman's House.  It created hardships for the Houses that lost a man's strength and it created horrible confrontations and power struggles in the Houses they joined. 

There had been a shift because of it, and for a while, women became the ones who moved to the new House after mating.  That hadn't worked either.  Women brought extra mouths to feed, an extra body to clothe, and some of the Houses were already too impoverished to care for themselves.  Fights among the women were as hard to handle.  The women fought with their links and with one another, cried for home, and often ran away.

Finally, the decision was made that women would be planted with the men's seed, but couples would remain unlinked, both remaining with their own House.  A mating would only occur when a man could pay a cost to the House that he wished to take a woman from.  The Old likened the cost to what they called a
dowry, in old words.  Some consideration and trade took place on the rare occasions that a House was lopsided with one sex or another.  

In only a few years, matings came to be considered separate from impregnations.  Matings seldom happened, since the payment was far too extravagant for even most of the Rhas to afford.  But Wind knew Diem's pockets were deep enough and it was her ego, as much as her desire for prosperity and position, which made her pursue him with a vengeance.

"Tell me what you want from me,"  Wind pressed.  His answer was solid.     

"Nothing."

"Nothing?  You've never taken me, not once, but if you did, I know you would want everything from me."

"We are not meant for one another, Wind."

"Prove to me, at least, that you are not shebele.  Have me and then you can tell me you don't want more." 

She turned away from him, bending deep at the waist.  Her skirt climbed the back of her thighs; the soft rim of her bottom peeked from beneath the fabric.  She wore no underclothes, as was custom for women who were available to be planted with young.  His breath hitched at the sight.  There was no denying that her body was amazing.  She stretched further, her fingers finally reaching the floor, as she spread her legs slightly.  The skirt hiked up over the puckered knot of her rear, like a curtain framing the glistening, pink flesh of her ready sex. 

He stirred.  He was raised with the archaic manners by Gra Breathe, which told him to look away, but he tried not to give a damn about archaic, which was his right, once he became a man.  After all, he'd seen women on more occasions than archaic would ever allow.  When he was very young, the girls in his House had shown him theirs and he'd shown them his.  They'd spent a great deal of time inspecting one another in wonder.  But the way his Gra had raised him meant the archaic manners nagged at his conscience.  

When he became old enough to plant a woman with young, he'd avoided it.  It was in the time when men were expected to leave their houses.  Although it brought him tremendous guilt to withhold his much needed contribution, he was terrified of leaving Gra Breathe and his sister, Karma, the only real family he had.  When the rules changed again, and women were expected to join the man's house upon being planted, Diem's closest friend, Eon, had brought in a girl who gossiped and fought with him and eventually ran away.  Diem wanted no part of it.     

Going without sex had been excruciating, but as Rha, mating took on whole new layers of responsibility.  Diem knew that many of the women he met simply wanted to be planted by a Rha, as it would heighten their status in their own House.  Especially Rha Diem's young, since his House was the most prosperous, for the fourth year in a row. 

Diem was annoyed that it mattered to him, but he couldn't escape it.  Even more shameful was knowing that he felt such a great need for a woman t
o want him in the same way that he wanted her.  As a man, he should need no one else, but he did.  Desperately.

He wanted the loyalty of a woman as much as he wanted her intimacy.  It enchanted him to imagine a Link that was as capable as he, that could live life with him, side by side.  He wanted a woman to bond with in ways that would make their relationship as strong and sound as he'd made the prosperity of the Fly House.

The women he knew weren't like that.  They raced to please his every whim, to be whatever he wanted them to be, and they fought among one another for his favor.  As much as it puzzled him, none of them held his attention very long.

He knew, as Wind stood before him, her glistening apple prone and begging for both his mouth and his manhood, that she was no different.  Her body was darkly hypnotizing and it was expected that women be taken, especially when offering themselves, and planted with young.  To turn her away would be insult, but what Wind was asking for was far more than just his seed. 

Wind wasn't a regular girl.  She was the daughter of Span, the Rha of Breed House.  Standing about 5'3, Span was undeniably the most deadly man left on Earth.  He mastered the elegance of archaic, charming women and appeasing men with his old manners, even moments before slitting a man's throat.  Through charm and violence and theft, Span had increased Breed House's portion significantly.  No one dared mention the odd coincidence that when Span wanted to add a woman to his House, a catch of dragon eggs or some restraint equipment or even that week's portion of gorne that the Plutians allotted each House, would come up missing from the woman's House.  Even stranger, Span's offer for the woman he wanted was usually the exact thing that the House needed, which, strangely enough, was what had gone missing. 

Diem could only guess what Span would do to him if he mated Wind and then refused to link with her.  But Diem knew it was just as dangerous if he refused her.  She was still the daughter of a Rha.

He stepped forward.  She tilted her hips back to offer better access, but Diem took a deep breath as he drew down the edge of her skirt.  She grunted as he pulled her upright by her forearm, twisting her to face him.  Her glare hit him hard. 

She didn't yell or attack him.  She did something worse.

She stepped away and spit on his feet.

"Gar nichts," she hissed.  Nothing.  It was Span's cultural archaic and he knew the curse when he heard it.  It meant that she would report his refusal to Span.  The guilt washed over Diem, that his entire House may have to pay for his refusal to plant a woman. 

He was ashamed that he could not be a man who didn't care who held his seed.  Ashamed that he worried over how Span would make his House miserable, rather than being the man who would strike first, harder and faster.  He was ashamed that his need to keep the peace made him reach for Wind.

"Don't be like that," he said.  She could have spun out of his reach, but she wanted to be caught.  She proved it by barely struggling in his grasp. 

"You refuse me and now you scold me too?  I offered myself to you!"

"You know I abide by the archaic manners."  He struggled to maintain a soft tone.  As much as it gritted him, he offered her a lie.  "I prefe
r to save this for the day when I am linked."

It was a sentiment that Wind usually attacked for its stupidity.  But in this case, aimed in her general direction, the sentiment was more like a good long stroke down the slick and winding back of her ego.  She smiled, turning soft in his arms.

"I will tell my father you'll be coming by to speak intentions with him," she said.  At least she wasn't spitting on his shoes again. 

Diem didn't contradict her.  It was a relief that she was appeased, for now
.

CHAPTER
FOUR

Present Day

Steven Burtman shifted on the chair to peer down at his angel again.  The creak reminded him of how many times he'd done it already, not in the last hour, but in the last five minutes.  In his old life, this kind of obsession would be comparable to hoping for a work bonus and doing little else than sitting at his desk and hammering the refresh button on his email throughout his entire work day.  But in this life, he hit the refresh by leaning off his chair to gaze through the window of the third Profanyl Chamber in the first row, making sure there were still no bugs burrowing into the lovely arrangement of his angel's amaretto hair or scaling across her peaceful, sedated face.  He spent his time wondering what color her eyes were, beneath the lids.  He hoped for blue.  Maybe green, if they were the right shade.  He scanned over her twice more, searching for any rustling within, or maybe a bulge scuttling up through the neckline of her clothing, or worst of all, the flicking tip of a jointed antennae. 

When he saw nothing moving inside the chamber, he sagged back from the container's edge, but the moment his spine settled against the chair, he was gripped again with the fear that there was indeed a bug
—hiding in her tresses or secreted away beneath her arm—that he hadn't spotted.  He craned forward once again.  The chair creaked.  There was no bug.

The Profanyl Chambers sat in their silent, soldier formation, rows of them stretching the length of the mammoth underground warehouse.  Neither hot nor cold to the touch, the meat lockers had nothing comforting about them, even, and maybe especially, when they hummed.  He'd learned that the deep hum, like a ventilation system kicking on, meant the chamber was compromised and that the person inside would soon suffocate, and despite his best efforts, die. 

He'd tried everything to save the people inside—unlatching the chambers, insulating the bodies with blankets, messing with the wires connected to the humans inside.  What happened was always ghastly.  The only painless deaths were the ones that came when Steven did nothing more than watch it happen, through the tiny window on the chamber lid. 

Steven didn't have a clue as to what he was doing wrong or how he could go about fixing the chambers.  He didn't know how to wake the people inside.  He couldn't even recall how he'd woken up himself or why he hadn't died before he'd popped the top of his own chamber.  He'd been so centered on not shitting himself and getting out of the tight little box as he thunked on the lid.  All he really remembered perfectly was the relief of the chamber door opening and how he'd surged up with an inhale, as if he'd been trapped underwater too long.

But it didn't do him any good.  He didn't remember the special combination that led him to life instead of death.  So, for the others, he could only stand by, screaming and sobbing and kicking dents in the sides of the freezer tombs each time he lost another.  He wasn't one of the goddamn Archive doctors that was supposed to be on hand.  He was just goddamned.

Miserably, the score remained:  losses: 10; sav
es: 1.   He was the only survivor so far.  When he'd climbed out of his tomb, he'd seen that the freezers stretched out in the underground cavern a lot further than he was willing to venture. 

It brought up a hazy memory of the day he and his wife had been led down to what was then a well-lit show floor.  The tiles were large white squares that shone like they'd been buffed with oil, the walls a serene beige, the white ceiling lit by long
fluorescents. 

Steven and his wife, Chloe, had followed their salesman, Clive, down a curtained hall which gave privacy to the other chamber occupants, already suspended.  When they reached the chambers they'd purchased, Steven peeked around the curtain separating them from the rest of the room. There was enough empty space beyond to accommodate the assembly of a naval destroyer.

"Business slow?" Steven had joked.

"Hardly," Clive had laughed.  "We're just awaiting the next shipment of chambers.  Honestly, the spaces are selling so quickly, I don't know what we'll do once this warehouse is filled."

Steven and Chloe, dressed in the soft Archive jammies, took cookies and spiked herbal tea from a man dressed up as butler.  It was like they were at some elite sleep over.  They'd laughed like wealthy people do, with Clive, about rising like swamp monsters when they woke in a few decades.  The details of the waking weren't crystal clear, except that Clive had reiterated how the Archive staff would be standing by, ready to assist. 

"What if the surface hasn't been stabilized?" Chloe had asked.

"Simple.  If the outer doors to the Supply room are sealed, it means we stay at the party down here a little longer.  Remember the luxury suites I showed you?  The two of you have a suite and access to all the amenities: the pool room, the spa, the five-star movie theater.  You can make meals in your suite or join us in the dining room for your choice of gourmet dishes from our menu.  It's a damn sad thing that the scientists are on the verge of a working atmosphere patch now, isn't it?  Who wouldn't want a couple weeks lazing around in the Archive's lap of luxury?  Gourmet meals, the massage parlor and sauna, billiards, bowling, a five-star theater...sounds downright miserable, doesn't it?" 

Clive had winked at Chloe, with a soft elbow nudge. 

"Awful," Chloe had giggled.  Steven looked away.

"But what about going back up?  It will be 17 years from now.  Things change."

"Steve-o!"  Clive delivered a mock punch to Steven's shoulder.  "Relax!  The Archive's services are there to make sure that you and your loved ones will have the smoothest transition possible, back into everyday living.  Remember, your assets and accounts will continue to be monitored and invested by the Archive's finest financial advisors, with your executor always acting as an overseer.  With the investors we have on staff, some Archivers are probably going to wake up trillionaires in 2030." 

Clive radiated such confidence in his product that Chloe had developed an unshakeable faith in the system.  Steven knew his wife had impeccable sense and a shrewd eye for detail, but the reason why he went along with the whole Archive idea, was that he couldn't say no.  She had the purse strings and he had no prospects.  Although their marriage had dried up to a passionless routine, it was still safe.  He preferred safety to risk and convinced himself that plodding through a predictable life was enough for him. 

After their snack, Dr. Welson had joined them.  He administered three shots.  One stung like a rusty thumb tack. 

Steven had kissed Chloe the same way they'd always kissed goodnight.  Chastely.  She'd gone first, gingerly stepping from the short platform they wheeled in front of her chamber, into the silver box, and smiling at him as the doctor had adhered monitoring wires to her.  She'd joked about how he could kiss her like Sleeping Beauty if he woke first and then, bam.  She was asleep. 

Any worries he had were put to rest with Chloe in that moment.  Steven climbed into his own box as if he were climbing into a Maserati on the show room floor.  He gave the doctor the thumbs up.  It'd been lights out immediately.

But he never expected to wake like he had, in the pitch black showroom, with him falling out onto the white tiled floor, now buckled and dusty and snarled with tree roots.  No waiting staff and no lights, save the bulb from his chamber door. 

The room smelled of compost and there was a tang of metal that caught in his nose.  The empty space beyond his chamber was now filled with only ten or so more rows of chambers stretching into the dark.  The chamber bulb made the space glow like a fridge opened for a midnight snack.

He finally remembered Chloe, and stumbled from the chamber to his right to the one at his left, unable to remember which she was in.  He shrieked when he found her, not out of relief, but because there was a dark orange bug creeping across her forehead.  He pried open the lid, intent on smashing the intruding creature.  But as he hoisted the lid, one of Chloe's wires popped off her neck like a wobbly elbow of macaroni and a soft beeping sounded from the side of the chamber.

The bug zipped into the air, flying away on thin wings.  The millions of dollars they'd spent on the fancy chambers, the hours they'd spent listening to the spiels of the beautiful oasis they'd wake to, and all the technical mumbo jumbo about the high tech safety measures—and there was no Doctor Welson waiting with a butler's tray of spare parts, to re-attach Chloe's wires or fumigate her chamber or to tell Steven what to do.  There was no manual. 

Chloe gurgled.  Her rib cage sunk, with an audible sigh.  Steven smiled down at her then, expecting her to open her eyes and look around and tell him what to do next.  But she didn't.  Instead, she turned blue. 

Steven didn't know CPR, but tried to do it anyway.  He cracked her ribs trying to pound a heartbeat back into her.  Nothing worked.  It took more time than it should have for Steven to realize Chloe was gone.  And more time than that to accept that she'd left him completely alone.

His legs began working again before his brain did.  He hobbled away from his and Chloe's chambers, his muscle memory retracing the path he'd followed into the place, back when he was clothed in the Archive's jammies.  The curtained walkway was gone, two aisles running down the room now, defined by the space between the chambers.  He stumbled his way along in the darkness until he felt a handle protruding from the wall.

Clive had shown him the crank.  The memory flooded back: he had to turn it and it would generate the lights.  Steven's muscles were linguine, but he cranked it, throwing his body into the motion.  A dim, blue light slowly glowed to life, leading him to the doors from the chamber room.

Steven stumbled through the pair of doors that swung like they belonged in a cafe kitchen.  The Supply stretched out in front of him.  Steven felt the wall for another crank and found it, turning it until his shoulder ached.  The light was soft and clear in this room.

For its military-sounding name, Supply was an enormous dining room.  The round banquet tables were still decorated with elaborate centerpieces, although the fake flowers drooped from their stems, weighed down with dust. 

Steven caught sight of the outer doors at the front of the Supply.  The salesman had given Chloe another wink, before knocking a knuckle on the metal doors. 

"Remember, if these babies are sealed, then hang out in the luxury of The Supply, the spa, or the library, with the other Archivers, until these doors unseal.  They're programed with all the latest technologies to open automatically under only the right conditions."

"What if they don't open?" Steven had asked.  Clive blew it off with a short laugh and a clap on Steven's back.

"They will!" Clive laughed.  "Don't you read the papers?  The scientists almost have a working atmosphere patch already!  This is just a great safety feature, Steve-O.   At Archivers, our priority is your safety.  It's just that if there is any chance of a delay, then the Archive is going to make your stay beyond pleasurable, with luxurious accommodations and a full staff, ready to serve you and..."

Clive had launched into another list of impressive amenities. 

Steven crossed to the outer doors and gave them a pull.  Sealed.  He turned and leaned his back against them, unsure if he was relieved or terrified.

He finally went to one of the Supply tables.  The tables and chairs were still covered in elegant, flowing, dusty linens, waiting for the ghosts to rise for an invisible feast.  Steven pulled out a chair, sending up a cloud that made him cough.  He sat down and refused to cry, even as th
e tears streamed down his face.

***

Steven sat for what could have been days.  He didn't know.  There were no clocks, no staff to tell him.  The watch he'd smuggled in, the Rolex that he wouldn't trust to throw into the Archive lock box, no longer worked.  The hands were frozen in a 5:45 frown.  Seventeen years on one battery was a too much to ask.

His hunger finally returned with a roar and he was happy to have it.  Anything was better than thinking of how alone he was.

He got up from the table and went into the adjoining room.  It was a huge pantry, lined with cupboards and shelves and counters.  Hoping to God that Clive hadn't lied about the food supply, he threw open the cupboards.

Huge and hairy with oddly jointed legs, a chamber bug shot out from the shelves.  The thing was the size of a small egg.  Steven's reflexes kicked in as the bug toppled from the edge and fell on the counter.  He grabbed a heavy can off the shelf and brought it down hard on the thing.  The bug made a gaseous sigh as its shell crunched beneath the can.  Steven whacked it three more times, until the legs went slack.  He left the can on top of it.

He almost cried when he saw the rows of dusty canned chicken on the shelf in front of him.  The sobs rose up the moment he reached into a drawer and cut his finger on the wheel of a hand-operated can opener. 

Steven twisted off the top and ate like no wealthy business man would ever be seen eating: scooping the chicken into his mouth with his fingers.  The salty chicken juice dribbled down his chin and left oily polka dots on his pajamas. 

He stayed in the Supply for what was probably days.  His life fell into a routine of eating, cranking the bulb, shitting in a fancy, faux toilet positioned over a deep hole in the floor in the hallway bathroom, outside Supply.  He made games out of his meal garbage to amuse himself and did rounds of half-assed calisthenics.