Page 8 of Border Control

Oh-Law-rah turns her back to us, scuffing her shoes along the plascrete and murmuring, “Oh, Arabella.”

I get the impression we aren’t supposed to respond to that, but what else should we do? Uncertainty in orders makes a prickling feeling start up in the back of my throat, wrapping around to choke me if I don’t understand quickly what I’m expected to do. Parthiastocks aren’t meant to think for themselves or make decisions: we’re built solely to follow clear directives.

‘What do we do?’Arik sends to me, an edge of panic to his mental voice.

‘Stand still,’I tell him, and a blissful calm spreads like sunrise across the bond at the certainty my order has given him.

But I have no such peace myself, because I’m the one making decisions. What if I give my wave brothers the wrong order and send us to our doom?

Oh-Law-rah turns to face us, and this time her searching gaze turns onto us properly. Her blue eyes take us all in, and I lock my shoulders square, hoping to assuage her somehow.

“It seems you’re keeping your promise to be good,” she says.

“Yes, female,” I bark, staring over her golden head.

“Hm. Rather enthusiastic.” She pulls her eye glasses into her hands, revealing a blue gaze that pins me to the wall. She clicksthe metal arms together as she watches me. “What do you want to do once you've fixed your ship?”

“Whatever you require of us,” is my easy reply.

“Is that so?” She walks closer, and my muscles tense, ready to leap into action at her command. All Parthiastocks hope to please females, it’s bred into them, and my gaze slowly slides down to her eyes to discern what she wants.

She’s so much smaller than us. Parthiastocks are physically large; we were designed to uphold the women's laws and act as their enforcers against any kind of clone. The females I protected were far away, but I expected them to be the same size as me.

Perhaps Olorian females are, but on Earth, these females are tiny. Small, and fiercely independent. Oh-Law-rah doesn't walk around with a retinue to do her chores, she completes them all herself, including piloting her own craft, which is a difficult skill to master. She’s self-reliant and intelligent… and she’s staring up at me with interest.

She is a true beauty, even without scales. Her skin glows as if lit up from the inside, her eyes sharp and inquisitive. She misses nothing, not the flex of my chest as I straighten up and take a steadying breath, nor the way my scales shiver under her inspection. She’s studying me. Me. I have her attention.

Why does it feel so... different? And… good?

No! I wrench my gaze away from hers. I can't risk my mental state being distracted from Nevare for an instant. I'll fail to keep my Apex sane.

A small smile plays on Oh-Law-rah’s face. “How are you doing, anyway? Arabella treating you nicely, I hope?”

“Yes, female!”

She winces, rubbing her left ear. Small dangling pieces of metal dance as she massages the pink shell of her earlobe, sparkling gold. Are they decorations, or perhaps some kind of technology?

She sighs, dropping her hand from her ear device. “I’ll be right back. I need to pack an overnight bag. Maybe for a week, to sort this out.”

“Can I help, female?” I offer. But she doesn’t hear me, pacing out of the partly-built barn and into the yard. She’s already preoccupied with her tasks, so much so that as the restless gray skies start to spit with rain, she doesn’t respond.

I dart to her side, hands raised over her head, and she flinches back from me. “What are you doing?”

Her sharp words and their accusing tone cut me. “Shielding you from the rain, female.”

“Oh. Oh!” She shakes her head. “I wasn't expecting you to run at me with fists in the air. It scared me a little.”

My chest burns as shame spears me. I fall to my knees on the gravel, the sharp dig of pain my just punishment, head bent. “I am deeply sorry, female.”

She's still for a moment, then her warm fingers touch my cheek. A female’s fingers. My rough scales soften immediately, every nerve sensitive to the faint brush of her fingertips and their increasing pressure. She guides my head up to face her, and I accidentally meet her eyes.

There's a flash of something there, behind the cool blue of her irises. Something warm. An image of her cradled against my chest flashes across my mind, and the urge to reach out to her makes my muscles quiver.

An urge I will never act on.

I stay still and Oh-Law-rah turns back to her red land-craft, glancing over her shoulder at me, like I'm some kind of enigma. In truth, I'm desperately simple: the dullard Base whose only job is to take the hits for my wave brothers and stabilize my Apex so he doesn't kill us all.

Simple.