The Drenard officer ducked through the door. When he raised his head, the two large aliens locked eyes, and Molly could feel the tension sparking across the room. The Drenard said something over his shoulder to his two companions. One of the warriors appeared at the door, his lance at a higher angle than before.

“This situation is non-optimal,” Edison said. “And the spatial requirements of our combined forms are not adequately met by the dimensional constraints of my room.”

Molly waved him silent. His English might be hard to understand, but the deep growling tenor of his voice might be something that cut across alien divides.

Using slow motions with her arms, Molly directed their guests’ attention toward the prone figure in Edison’s lap. Anlyn looked to be stable, but the front of her body remained heavily bruised from her bout of SLAS. She hadn’t moved, nor shown any signs of awareness, since they escaped from the human Navy. For all Molly knew, they were returning to the Drenard system with a brain-dead husk.

As soon as the officer saw the female Drenard, something changed. The muscles in both arms flinched, and he nearly dropped his tunics. He threw the lengths of fabric over his shoulder to get them out of the way and crossed the crowded room with one large step. He leaned over Anlyn, reached into her armpit gingerly, his other hand resting on Edison’s chest. Not so gingerly.

“Don’t move,” Molly told the cub.

Edison’s face twitched with the effort, the fur on his face and shoulders bristling. Molly pleaded with wide eyes for inaction. Her friend begged her in return with narrow slits—for something else.

The Drenard touched Anlyn in a few places, then felt her cheeks with both palms, his massive hands engulfing her small head. He turned to the warrior and said something short and soft.

Molly looked back and forth between them, trying in vain to read their body language, to get some sense of whether or not her friend would be okay.

When the officer scooped up Anlyn with one arm, Edison raised his hands in protest. Molly started to say something to calm him down, expecting the massive Drenard to shove at him with the large hand on his chest, but the officer pulled away instead.

Wrapping Anlyn in both arms, the officer leaned away from Edison, distancing himself.

Finally, a gesture Molly recognized. And not a good one.

“Wait—” she squeaked.

Edison rose as the crackle of electricity filled the room. A dazzling light whizzed past Molly’s head and struck him in the chest, sending him into a few brief spasms of vibrating limbs before his head crashed back against the bulkhead.

Molly spun to protest—to say the only two words of Drenard she knew—and saw the lance. Horizontal. Level with the deck. Her brain processed the meaning of this as the crackle of ionized atmosphere reached her ears.

The blast hit her square in the chest, launching her into the air and sending her flying toward the bunk.

She dearly wanted to arrest her fall before she passed out, but every muscle betrayed her—all of them contracting at once—vibrating with their refusal to cooperate.

Part VII - The Thin Line

“Symmetry, by surrounding us, makes itself invisible.”

~The Bern Seer~

6

Cole woke up sore. Full-body sore. It felt like he’d just played two games of galaxy ball with no pads on.

He tried to sit up, but the muscles in his stomach spasmed—cramping up and sending him crashing back down on the bed.

The very soft bed.

Sitting up hadn’t worked, so he rolled onto one side and surveyed his surroundings from there. He recognized the place. Or a place like it.

Lisbon.

He and some friends had broken into a five-star hotel, posing as busboys. The lobby, the hallways, everything had looked just like this. He must be in one of those rooms, or in a place just like it.

He rolled onto his back, soaking up the luxuriousness of the sheets and the perfect mattress; he closed his eyes and felt some of his stiffness slide away. When he opened them and looked down at his toes, he noticed the chandelier hanging from the vaulted ceiling. Thousands of crystals were arranged around hundreds of tiny lights, all twinkling like stars through carboglass.

Cole followed the light to the walls, which appeared to be made of a mottled-yellow marble. A darker material, some species of wood, cut up the expansive slabs with window sills and support beams. Above the sills, large panes of glass allowed natural light to pour in, bathing the room in a warm glow.

Slowly, Cole pulled his legs out from the thick covers and worked them to the edge of the bed. It took some effort and a few grunts to get his body to comply. What it really wanted to do was stay there for a week, recuperating.

He swung his feet over the edge—they dangled a meter from the ground. The soreness in his calves and quads warned him not to do it, that they couldn’t promise to catch him if he jumped from such a height. Heeding the warning, Cole rolled onto his stomach and pushed himself backward, sliding toward the ground. The silk sheets slid together like layers of grease.

Yelping, Cole clutched at the heavier blankets, falling to the ground and pulling them after. They barely slowed his crash before smothering him. He swam through the fabric, emerging in a heap of finery that spilled across a landscape of lush carpet, the material piled so high it looked like it need to be mowed.

Cole fought another round of temptation, his body urging him to lie flat on the soft surface, tangled up in silk. Grudgingly, though, he pushed himself up on sore muscles and stood, swaying slightly. Now that he was out of bed and upright, his nakedness felt awkward. He reached down, slowly, as an old man might, and fumbled for one of the sheets.

He attempted to knot the fabric around his waist the way the Glemots had taught him, but the fabric was so slick, it was impossible to tie. It wouldn’t even stay draped over his shoulders, slipping off like beads of water on fur. After some experimentation, he finally settled on a few wraps around his waist, holding the material together with one hand.

Eager to know where he was, Cole approached the window to peer outside. Even from a meter away, however, he couldn’t see through the harsh light lancing into the room. It was just a plane of bright whiteness, nothing beyond. He leaned close and reveled in the heat radiating through; it reminded him instantly of the hot Mediterranean days of his childhood. He closed his eyes and let the heat loosen his muscles. It felt like two suns pouring their energy into him.

Two suns. Drenard. That’s where he was. The L1 between the twin stars. What had happened?

Cole leaned forward and covered his face with one hand, straining for the images. A fleet closed in on SADAR; there was a thud as two hulls locked together; Molly saying something funny. Soldiers.

The last images he had were like scenes from an action holovid: the Drenard guarding him and Walter had raised his menacing lance. The other soldier in the hallway fired off an energy beam into Edison’s room. Then another. Cole couldn’t see the effects of those blasts, but he clearly saw the one that caught him in the chest.

He remembered going down. His body vibrating. The sound of his skull cracking on the decking. He slid one hand around the back of his head and felt the lump; just the slight brush against it sent another thunderbolt through his head.

Where was everyone else?

Cole turned from the window—he couldn’t make out anything through it anyway—and looked to the doors arranged around the enormous room. He went to the nearest one first and found a closet. There were hooks and arms up high and cubbies with baskets in them below. Cole pulled a few out, but they were all empty. He took a moment to snug the silk sheet tighter around his waist and went to the next door.

That one opened into a bathroom twice the size of his quarters on Parsona. He stepped inside. The floor looked like wood, but felt like stone. There were knots and wavy lines in the material, yet it felt cool under his feet. Cole spun back around and looked at the door. It looked like a loose-grain wood, but touching it gave him the same crisp jolt that only marble invokes. He pressed on the door with one finger, and it moved silently and effortlessly.

Cole left this curiosity for later and turned to the high counter with the mirror above it, hoping to find some water to drink. The surface was made of the same strange material and came almost to his chest. He gave himself a comical appraisal in the mirror, hitched his sheet tight with one hand, and leaned over to survey the deep bowl cut out of the stone.

The only feature beyond the basin were three cylinders vertically slotted in a neat row. Cole twisted the one on the left, and it spun freely, but did nothing. He pressed down on it, then tried pulling it up. The plug slid out of the hole easily and water began flowing through the channel and splashing into the basin. Steam rose from the fluid; he didn’t need to touch it to verify the danger.

He replaced the cylinder and pulled the one on the far right. There was a gurgle, then he was rewarded with bone-chillingly cold water. He forced his sore calves to lift him to the stream, wiggling his stomach up on the edge of the counter so he could reach a sample. It tasted excellent; he drank it in large sideways gulps as it dripped from his cheek and ran back toward his ear.

Raising his head, Cole wiped the moisture from his chin, then cupped one hand and gathered enough to splash on his face and push through his hair. There weren’t any towels nearby, so he made do, wiping himself dry with the edge of his sheet.

Cole picked up the plug from the counter and dropped it back into place, stopping the flow of water. The workmanship was remarkable, to create stone that could prevent seeps while sliding so smoothly. He ran his hands along the counter as he turned toward the exit, walked back to the bedroom and gave the door a slight push, watching it intently as it swung shut with a satisfying click.

This place was outrageous. Cole felt like he could soak it in without an ounce of stress. Surely his friends were being treated just as well.

Was this their thanks for rescuing Anlyn? Or were the Drenards trying to make up for the spot of miscommunication from earlier?

He double-checked his silky coverings and went to the next door. It stood alone on the adjoining wall, right across from the foot of the bed. Larger than the other two, Cole’s innate sense of layout and aesthetics suggested this one would open into a marble hallway. He could imagine the plush runner that would lie beyond, Molly padding down the middle of it, a silk robe fluttering behind. She was probably coming right then to pull him by the hand, the two of them rushing off to see marvelous, alien, things.

I’m back on Glemot, Cole thought to himself, more of the dull aches in his muscles and joints slipping away. He reached for the gold-colored doorknob on the massive slab of rock and it clicked open with a twist. Making sure he had his silk sheet tightly clutched, Cole pulled the door toward him and began to step around it—into the exact hallway from his imagination.

But the gold bars that ran vertically through the doorway were too narrow to squeeze through. Cole looked them up and down, confused. One hand reached out to touch the cold metal barrier in his way. He lingered on the poor design of the passageway before it finally hit him:

This wasn’t Glemot.

It was Palan.

7

Cole shouted down the hallway. He tried Molly’s name first, then ran down the list of crew and friends, thinking of each. Hopefully they were rolling around in their beds, enjoying their captivity with all the bliss ignorance could provide.

But, now that he knew, what was he supposed to do? Lie in bed and wait on his captors? Or was he even being held here? This seemed like an unlikely prison. Perhaps the bars were for his safety? To keep something from getting to him!

The thought put a shiver up Cole’s spine. It seemed the only way to solve the paradox presented by the room. It was too lush for ill intent, but obviously he wasn’t meant to go anywhere else. Until he found out for sure, Cole decided to choose the option that made the lump on the back of his head cease its pounding. He was here as a guest, he decided. Protected in a room he’d never be able to afford for the rest of his life.

He was going to enjoy it.

He returned to the bathroom to investigate the larger basin sunk into the floor. Dropping the silk sheet, he knelt and inspected the three stone stoppers along the wall. Going with his hunch, he pulled the center one out and warm water began flowing into the large rectangular pit. He let it fill a meter up, adding quite a bit of the pure hot water as well. When it was deep enough to cover him, Cole replaced the stoppers and lowered himself into the steaming pool.

“If this is prison,” he said to himself, “I’ll join Walter in a life of crime.”

Almost instantly, the soreness from his capture began melting away. He let out a long groan of pleasure and forced his legs straight, elongating every muscle and tendon to allow the heat in. He lay like that for over an hour, hovering on the border between sleeping and waking, his brain not able to dream or think. Just be.

It wasn’t until his hands felt callous from the pruning that he decided he’d had enough. He rubbed them up across his face and through his hair, pushing tepid water across his skin. With a series of protesting grunts, he pulled himself out of the tub, then removed the stopper by his feet.

The liquid relief swirled away with happy gurgles; he moved in front of the mirror and began stretching, both arms raised high as his muscles cooled. Looking at his reflection again, Cole noticed he’d lost a bit of muscle over the last month. He was too lean. Being on the run didn’t seem conducive to good health, and eating out of pouches had taken its toll.

But his face . . . it looked right. He looked like he ought to look. Happy. Relaxed. He wished Molly could be there to feel it with him, to see him in such good spirits.

Then he remembered he was completely nude.

He grabbed the silk sheet and tried to wipe away most of the water before wrapping it around him. After attempting a few more configurations, he gave up again. The “garment” was destined to be a precarious wrap on his slender hips, one hand formed into a fisted buckle.