+++

Salvo kept her eyes wide open for twelve full seconds, only blinking when they started to get dry.

The words that had just come out of the guard’s helmet played back in her head. Or what she thought they’d just said. She couldn’t be sure, their accent was really weird.

But it did sound like Russian.

Something about people coming home…and hating them.

But was it Russian?

And if it was, why were they suddenly using it? Why had they stood there for the last fifteen minutes messing around with that metal thing instead of just talking to them? Why hadn’t they taken off their helmets? Why didn’t the other one have legs?

Lagging about five seconds behind, Trig shouted over, ‘hey, was that Russian?’ and was immediately answered by the triangular-headed figure.

‘… … … … … …’ they said with a slight electronic reverb, pointing towards the triangular pad next to Trig’s elbow.

‘What?’

‘… … … … …’

‘That’s not Russian…is it?’

Salvo was blinking freely again now and put her hands together in a worship pose as she cautiously got back on her feet.

‘Let me handle this,’ she instructed Trig, who nodded with relief and went back to nursing his hand. ‘Assuming I’m allowed to stand up,’ she added, under her breath.

Luckily, the guard didn’t try to stop her this time, or knock her back down with that ‘do anything’ device attached to their hand. In fact, they rose back up with her. Their version of an apology?

‘Five minutes,’ they said softly in Russian, making an awkward attempt at matching Salvo’s hand posturing.

‘I speak only little Russian,’ she replied, keeping it slow both for her sake and the guard’s [but mostly hers – it was important to set a low standard when talking in a language you weren’t very good at]. ‘We are Chinese people. China man and woman. You know?’

The guard repeated the Russian word for ‘Chinese’ and looked back at their colleague, who was busy wiping something off their dress. Maybe something Salvo had left on it when she’d tried to bring down their legs.

As the triangular-headed guard realised the talking had stopped and they were being stared at, they gave up on the dress, tilted their head to the right.

‘Do you know Chinese, the meaning?’ Salvo repeated, looking at both figures.

The general blankness continued.

‘Okay…we are people…man, woman, people. You, not people. Or you…you are maybe people, I don’t know. Your head…have hat. Maybe people. We…me, him…we are people…we are…err… ’ She changed back to Cantonese. ‘Fuck, I don’t know the word for human.’

‘Try people,’ suggested Trig, for some reason mouthing it pedantically after it had already been said.

‘Just tried that, like fifty times.’

‘Another synonym then.’

‘Such as?’

‘I don’t know. Earth people. Earth species.’

‘Earth species? Are you serious?’

‘Okay, whatever, just try anything. A different sentence maybe…I don’t know.’

She huffed out some leftover breath from the Earth species debacle and re-focused on the guard. They were focused on her, too, their helmet completely unreadable. Ten minutes ago, that would’ve made her shudder, but now she had a challenge to distract herself with.

‘We are here, very lucky,’ she said, wincing as she heard her own words sound out.

‘Yes, here,’ replied the guard, helmet pointing down towards the metal device in their hand.

‘We do not want to come this place, but…’ She searched for accident or mistake and came up short, so repeated a classic instead. ‘…we come.’

The guard turned to their colleague again, who still had their helmet tilted right. As if being activated by remote control, they modified their tilting into a wide rotation, using their waist as a hula hoop to spin all the way round. It looked so bizarre that it was almost funny, but Salvo was too busy thinking up more Russian to start laughing.

‘Where is this place?’ she tried, gesturing towards the walls, the machine and the slope they walked up to get there.

‘My Russian,’ answered the human-looking guard, raising a hand which seemed to act as signal for the triangular-headed guard to stop gyrating, ‘it is easy, also. Some word okay. Good starting.’

‘Yes. Understand.’

‘Your people come. Hate you. Five minutes.’

Salvo nodded, catching everything, and shifting into a reflex twitch as she processed the word ‘hate’ again. Did they mean ‘hate’ or ‘help’? Probably ‘help’. Had to be. ‘Hate’ made no sense, didn’t fit at all. She drifted into an accountant’s smile as it dawned on her the guard’s Russian was most likely worse than hers.

‘Sorry. It is three minutes.’

‘Okay. Three minutes. Understand.’

‘What is he saying?’ asked Trig, still trying to stroke his hand back to the level of basic motor functions.

‘Our people are coming in three minutes.’

‘Whose people?’

‘I don’t know. Our people. That’s what he said.’

‘Our people?’

‘Technically, it was your people, but…our people when I say it back to you.’

‘We have people?’

‘Apparently.’

‘Is that everything he said?’

‘Yes.’

‘You understood it? Every word?’

‘Every tortured syllable. Serious, his Russian is way worse than mine. I could probably say I was fluent and he’d believe it.’ She paused, looking again at the guard in front of her, their helmet utterly androgenous [as most helmets are]. ‘If it is a he. I’m not really sure.’

‘Okay, then ask them who’s coming, who the people are.’

‘I don’t know if he knows how to say that.’

‘Try.’

‘Maybe it’s better just to wait.’

‘If we do that, it might lead to another misunderstanding. Another numbing hand incident.’ Trig held up his wrist as evidence…then felt slightly embarrassed as his fingers started to wiggle. ‘Shit, it’s back. My hand…’

He grinned like a loon, slapping his previously numb palm with the other and then shouting ‘fuck’ as some kind of light began sketching something on the pad next to him.

‘Wah…’ let out Salvo, matching Trig’s level of shock, crawling backwards all the way to the base of the machine.

The human-looking guard swiped its hand through the air with a flourish, said, ‘your people,’ in Russian then casually strolled back to their comrade’s side.

Objectively, the light show lasted only seven seconds, but to Trig and Salvo it seemed more like seven minutes.

What they were watching…was akin to magic…like in a film or a video game only with real-looking blue and white light and a real-looking backdrop and an attitude of complete nonchalance from the two guards as the sketch completed itself and what appeared to be a human female stepped forward with a cup of something in her hand.

Recovering half of his senses, Trig ran a quick assessment. Very tall, raven black bomber jacket, ash blonde hair pushed right back…no helmet.

A real human?

‘… … … … … …’ the new arrival said, not in any recognisable Earth language, and not to them.

The human-looking guard said something back to her, pointing at her cup. That got a response, and then another from him and back and forth it went for about half a minute. Finally, the woman turned her attention to the room around her, immediately dipping her head and smiling when she saw the two Chinese visitors.

Sipping whatever was in her cup, she bent down and patted Trig once on his head, once on his shoulder and three times on his arm.

‘Hey, what are you-…’

‘… … … … … … …?’ she asked, switching to what sounded like Russian.

‘I don’t understand.’

‘… … … … …?’

Trig looked over at Salvo, who was already climbing back onto her feet again. She hadn’t caught everything the woman had just said, but some of it was Russian. And she wasn’t wearing a helmet. Which meant they were breathing the same air. Which in turn meant she had to be human.

‘You speak Russian?’ asked the woman, following Trig’s look.

‘A little,’ said Salvo.

‘You are Chinese.’

‘Yes.’

‘From … … … … or … … …?’

‘Sorry?’

‘… … … … or … … …?’

‘I don’t know the meaning. Sorry.’

The woman scratched the back of her head, glancing at the two guards; the human-looking one, who due to the continued use of the helmet probably wasn’t human after all, responded with a casual tap of the wrist, while the definitely-not-human, triangular-headed one performed another oddball waist spin.

‘We do not want to come this place,’ said Salvo, going back to regurgitating what she’d said a few minutes before, ‘but…we come. It is not we want.’

‘This is no good.’

‘Sorry?’

‘You need a … … … … … … … be better.’

‘I don’t understand.’ Salvo looked back at the machine, but all the lights were off and, frankly, it was fuck all help anyway. ‘Do you speak Cantonese?’

‘What?’

‘Or Mandarin?’

‘No.’

‘English?’

‘Okay, this … … … … … … … shit.’ The woman pulled out a device from her jacket pocket and held it up in the air. ‘This can help you. Okay?’

‘What is it?’ asked Trig in Cantonese.

The woman looked down on him and let out a deep breath. Trig knew from Zinc Burger experience what that meant, she was about to unload on him, but this time he was mistaken.

Either through great mental discipline or general fatigue, she pressed something on the device in her hand, which at closer sight resembled a tiny, metal ouroboros with two green flakes stabbed into its body, and attached it to the side of his neck.

Trig was too slow to swat her away, so braced for pain instead.

It didn’t come.

If anything, it tickled.

The device made some beeping noises, a wave of…something chilly…passed through his body, from head to ankle, and then it was pulled out again.

‘You are good,’ the woman said, scanning the device.

Trig looked over at Salvo for translation, who repeated the same thing in Cantonese.

‘Good for what?’

‘Good for what?’ she repeated in Russian, back to the woman.

‘… … … healthy … … … .. … … vaccines … … … …no danger. He can … … … … … …different place … … … … die.’

‘What did she say?’

‘I don’t know.’

‘It sounded like at least two sentences.’

‘Something about healthy, and vaccines. A different place.’

‘That’s all you got?’

‘Yes,’ she lied.

Trig felt the side of his neck, waiting for some kind of delayed soreness to break out. It still didn’t happen. He kept his fingers there anyway.

‘If you know Russian better, I can … … … you,’ said the woman, attaching the device to Salvo and meeting no resistance whatsoever. ‘Don’t worry, we can talk … … …’

Salvo nodded and did the same thing she did whenever she got an injection at the clinic: look at something in the distance. But there was no distance in this cavern-like area so she focused on the two guards instead.

That didn’t help much.

Something about the beeping noises matched the weirdness of the two helmeted figures, one with oddly red skin and the other performing ludicrous waist movements, not to mention the melting their legs into the ground trick that one had done earlier, and the totality of it all, the sudden realisation that she was probably on another planet or in a different dimension made her reach out to the most familiar thing nearby.

In this case, the Russian woman’s arm.

Apart from a brief flinch, she didn’t seem to mind. Salvo kept her hand there until the device had completed its process and was pulled out of her neck.

‘You are good also,’ said the woman.

‘What does it mean?’ asked Salvo.

‘Safe. Healthy.’

‘Okay. Wait, is that mean…I am sick? Before?’

‘Come.’

The woman put her hand over Salvo’s, which was still gripped to her forearm, or, technically, her jacket sleeve, and led her over to the triangular pad. It didn’t come across as forceful, and the woman’s body language wasn’t hostile, but there was something too abrupt about all this. And something unnerving about the three inch scar line running down the back of her guide’s hand.

‘Trig,’ Salvo whispered, almost completely inert as the woman pushed her arms so they were within the edges of the pad.

‘It is okay. This is a very … … … …’

‘What is this?’ she asked, switching back to Russian.

‘… … … … … … … … many times. Do not worry.’

‘What?’

‘Very fast.’

‘Trig…’

Trig stumbled over towards Salvo, putting his right hand out to grab her and yank her away from the pad, but something was holding him back.

He rotated and saw the two guards had him by the waist.

‘Hey, get off me.’

‘… … … … … …’ the triangular-headed one said, pushing Trig forward towards the other pad while holding up the stamping toy in their spare hand.

‘… … … …’ replied the Russian woman, who pointed at Salvo as some kind of evidence. ‘He says you are both … … … …’

‘What?’ muttered Salvo, looking down at the pad, seemingly drugged.

‘But I say to him you are … … … … … …’

‘I can’t…’

‘Salvo,’ shouted Trig, still trying to wriggle out of the guards’ grip. ‘I think they’re gonna teleport us.’

‘Now?’

It was a strange response, and an accurate one because as soon as the word had left her mouth, the light show returned and began to sketch her out of existence.

Trig stopped struggling and watched, half in horror, half in fascination.

It’s not death, it’s not death, it’s not death, his brain repeated over and over and over, but it sure looked like it.

Salvo’s legs were gone, her torso was faint, the top of her skull was shimmering…and then a few seconds after that, the pad was empty. As if no one had been standing there at all.

‘Teleported,’ Trig spat out, looking at the two guards for confirmation then, when they emitted back the usual nonsense, turning to the Russian woman and raising his eyebrows dramatically.

She sipped more of her drink and said something short and cold, or that’s what it sounded like to him.

‘Can you speak anything else apart from Russian?’

‘… … … … … …’

‘Can you at least tell me if this is teleporting?’

The human-looking guard leaned over and placed their lava-skinned hand on Trig’s jacket, nudging his arm closer to his side.

Then the light show started up again.

First as a faint glow, then as a more insistent glow and, finally, as a heavenly flashlight.

His eyelids dropped, surrendering early.

The skin on his hands tingled.

One of the guards, he didn’t know which, patted him on the neck as patches of dark matter began to appear.

Words formed in his mind and went nowhere.

He looked down at his legs and saw they were still there but the floor…it was different, as if he were standing in another place.

Fluorescent blue worms swam through and around the light, sometimes avoiding, sometimes merging with the dark matter.

A soft, weightless feeling passed through his body as if everything internal had been sucked out and replaced with foam.

He had no mouth.

No fingers.

No feet.

The blue worms became ten, twenty times their previous size before subsuming themselves into one overwhelming mass and everything was impossibly blue for a fraction of a second, or an eternity, or three seconds, and then it shrank and the worms detached and nothing was blue at all.

Limbs returned.

His mouth.

A physical sense of a tongue.

The dark matter became dark patches of greenish wall, and signs and faces.

It was a room.

Salvo was there, shimmering, her vague hands patting all over her body like she was covered in ticks.

And the lightness…was gone.

Heavy.

He felt suddenly heavy.

Then normal again.

Around him was everything he’d just seen, Salvo, other faces, dark greenish walls, all in a slightly more settled state.

‘Wah…’ he said, the same word he’d been trying to get out when the light show had begun.

Fucking wah.