I watch him leave with my mouth open. He doesn't look back. He just...walks away.
"What... why did he laugh?" I turn to look at the emerald girl in the room. "What the fuck?!"
"Hmm? Ah! Don't worry!" She smiles at me. "He is just a very lazy man. I think he wouldn't bother to run even if he could."
I stare at her.
"His people do not believe in labor." She nods, as if that explains anything. "But he'll get mad if I tell you his history first~!" She winks at me.
I don't... I don't understand.
"Okay, now that you're comfortable! Let's go eat!" She grabs me by the wrist again.
"Hey, I can walk-" I yelp.
"I know!" She chirps. "But I like holding hands. Don't you like holding hands?"
"This is not holding hands!" I complain, but she doesn't seem to listen to me.
She leads me out of the massive room, down another hall, and then through a door. On the other side is... a cafeteria. Or something like it.
It's a large room, with more high ceilings, and pale, light blue walls. There are long tables, made of the same wood, with padded chairs lined up to them. There are three people at a table in the corner, and as we walk in, their heads turn to look at me. One of them is a woman with some kind of...head piece that reminds me of a butterfly. She has compound eyes, and her skin is a deep blue. She wears a short, tight dress that seems to accentuate her very clear hourglass figure.
I look away. I don't want to stare at her chest or something.
The other two are men. One of them is some kind of red and black furry creature, with long white hair and long white whiskers on a red face. The other is a pale, almost sickly-thin looking man. He has a short ponytail of red hair, and two bony protrusions on his head that remind me of sawed off horns. His eyes are a dark blue.
None of them say anything. They just watch me as I walk with Mira, but they seem almost like they're examining me? Like they're looking me over.
I'm not fond of it, but I have to admit, I'm not that surprised. Most aliens I've seen are...rude at best.
There are two others in the room who don't seem to be eating. One is another... gem? I think. I'm not sure, but it's definitely some kind of rock creature. It's not the same as Mira, though, and is a shapeless mass of rose quartz, just sitting on a counter and...watching everyone. The other is a woman who is quite beautiful. She has midnight blue hair that is short and curls around her face. She has dark brown skin, and her eyes are a deep, burning yellow. She's wearing a full skirt and a tight bodice, and she smiles when I look at her. She has a tray in her hands, and she heads over toward one of the tables.
Are these all...?
Which of these are guests? Slaves? What are they - we - doing? Mira drags me over to one of the tables and she sits down, pulling on my arm for me to sit with her. I stare at her, and then at the table. There's no food at all.
"This is where you eat?"
"Well, yes." She blinks at me. "But it's not served yet."
There are. Very clearly people eating right now. I point to the table with the three people who were looking at us.
"Oh. That's because they have different diets. You'll get food in a bit! See, there's the server."
That brown-skinned woman. She's the server? She heads over to our table and smiles down at me. "Do you have any poisons?"
I frown at her. "What?"
"You are... human?" She tilts her head. "What is poison? To you?" She asks, speaking slowly.
"I mean...uh. There's a lot of things that are poisonous to me." I swallow. "Like...lead."
"Lead?" She frowns, her pretty features pinching in polite confusion.
"Xilukulkas prepared a list." Llywelyn appears and slides into the seat across from me. "He has specific instructions. Why didn't you ask him?" He lifts a brow at the woman.
"It would be rude to bother him while he is entertaining guests." She says, primly.
"Yes, of course." He rolls his eyes. "But you can't expect a sub-sapient to know what s'nilia wo' they're allergic to."
I feel my eye twitch. "I'm. Sapient." I grit my teeth. "And why does he have a list of what humans are poisoned by?"
"Why wouldn't he?" Llywelyn snorts. "He always does his homework on any new acquisitions."
Acquisitions. He's making it sound like I'm some kind of pet.
"I... I'm not some-"
The woman ignores us and pulls out a very thin device and slides her finger across it, eyes scanning whatever display it has. "Ah, yes, lead. And... arsenic, mercury, cyanide, aspernium, gala- Galsinic, really?" She looks at me as if I'm going to be able to explain my inability to consume a thing I have never heard of. And when I don't answer, she just sighs and continues. "This is quite the long list..."
"Switch tabs. He prepared a list of edibles." Llywelyn says, tone bored. "It's probably easier to remember."
"Oh! Of course." She nods, swipes again, and then smiles. "Ah. I see. This is simple enough!" She gives me another smile, and then turns and walks away.
I stare at her back, my lips pressed in a thin line. "I don't like her."
"I don't like you." Llywelyn retorts, dry. "But we are forced to co-exist regardless. So get used to her."
"You." I point at him. "Stop calling me sub-sapient."
"I can't. It's what you are." He crosses his arms. "Unless you've somehow become sentient in the last five minutes, you are, in fact, sub-sapient."
Mira tilts her head at me and smiles. "But she resists the conditioning."
He makes a face. "So do you. Doesn't make you sentient." He glances at me. "It's just a technicality, anyway. Don't get your skirt in a twist. We're all equal here anyway." He waves his hand dismissively.
I frown at him. "I don't...understand. Why is it different? Whether I'm sapient or...sub-whatever."
Llywelyn lifts a brow. "Weren't you taught this at the camp? They teach you about Constant and your role in the Galactic Empire, don't they?"
"I wasn't taught. Anything." I grit my teeth once more. "I was electrocuted daily because I couldn't say 'hello'."
"Hm." He hums. Thoughtful. "Stubborn. Very Xilogian. Barely sentient themselves..." He sighs. "Well, there are species out there that qualify as sentient. Species who have the ability to think, feel, comprehend, and communicate at a high level. They are welcomed into the Galactic Empire as equals and expected to contribute in equal measure to what they receive. Then there are those who do not qualify as sentient. Sub-sapients. They function off of emotion, instinct, and most of them are not as intelligent. Humans, for example."
"We're plenty intelligent." I snap.
He ignores me. "You can be trained and given rough understanding of Constant, but aren't expected to contribute or understand civilization. Sub-sapients aren't given recognized personhood by the Galactic Empire. They're usually used for labor." He shrugs, looking almost apologetic. "Or as pets."
I stare at him in horror.
Mira touches my shoulder. "It's a very glorious life! To exist to serve and to give yourself so completely to someone else is so...! Intimate and fulfilling. Hehe. Sentients don't understand."
I recoil from her hand. "Fulfilling?!"
I can't believe this.
How? How can anyone think that slavery is...fulfilling?!
"Oh, yes. To have no worries, no fears. To be provided for and protected and to give all of yourself in return..." She sighs and smiles a dreamy smile. "It is. Beautiful."
I look between her and Llywelyn. "Are you..."
"Don't look at me." He waves a hand. "Kolumer are weird. You get used to it."
Mira's brow furrows. "We are not weird! We're normal! Everyone should be so blessed as to give themselves to serve!"
"Isn't it a shame you're too broken to serve?" He asks, a smirk on his lips.
She whines loudly, and puffs her cheeks out. "I'm not broken!"
"A Kolumer who can't be conditioned. How sad, how pathetic." He rests his cheek on his palm, elbow on the table. "Our Master has to keep you like a useless pet."
"I am a very pretty pet." She huffs. "He likes me."
"Because you entertain him. You're like a circus attraction."
"I. Am sentient." I interrupt. "And you have no right to talk about me like I'm not."
Llywelyn glances back at me, eyeing me for a moment, before leaning back in the chair. "So it seems. You're condition resistant, after all. His Majesty would have a fit, if he knew." He shrugs. "But you're still human. You are, legally, a sub-sapient. And so you belong to our Master." He tilts his head. "But don't feel bad. If you were going to end up somewhere, there's no better place than this."
"The palace!" Mira interjects.
A look of longsuffering passes over his face, as his eyes briefly close. "A human would not serve. In the palace." He grits his teeth out, as if it's a struggle to speak to her at all.
"The palace?" I look between them.
She blinks at me. "Do you not know-"
"She JUST said she doesn't know anything, Mira. Those stupid Xilogians couldn't figure out what to do with a Condition Resistant." Llywelyn sighs. "No, she doesn't know. But I am not sitting through children's lessons over lunch. Tell her later." He sighs and closes his eyes, leaning back in his chair. "I just wanna eat. Not listen to a bunch of sub-sapients fumble over basic trivia."
I squint at him. "You said you're a 'sentient'."
"Yes. Unlike you." He doesn't open his eyes.
"But you also said that the empire welcomes sentient species as equals."
His ears twitch.
"So why are you also calling this Xilkakas your 'master'?"
The veins in his chest suddenly blaze a bright blue-purple. He glares at me and his voice comes out with a hiss. "My reasons are none of your business, sub-sapient. It's not something that someone like you would understand even if I tried to explain it!" He snarls. "I'm done talking to either of you. Just let me eat my lunch in peace." He turns his face away from us and huffs.
Mira leans in and whispers. "He's embarrassed."
"Nish'ian Reh!"
I stare at the glowing fish man. And then the statue woman.
I...
I don't know how I feel about any of this.
Well, no, I'm deeply offended by blue-face and. The Galactic. Whatever. No, I'm not offended. I despise that Galactic Empire. But I also feel... oddly disconnected from it. From the hate. From the music playing lightly in the room. I feel...
Like somehow I've left myself behind in that dressing room.
I swallow and shake my head, trying to dispel the dizziness I suddenly feel.
"Why..." I say, licking my lips, just to try to break my thoughts from that strange feeling. "Why are some of the words he's saying... nonsense?"
He'd mentioned something about some species not communicating in words, but those are clearly some kind of words. They just don't sound right.
Mira giggles, "Oh. Some words don't have direct translations. If the closest meaning is too far away or would break up the sentence too much, Constant just adapts it to something that your mind is capable of parsing as an individual word and leaves it." She leans in, completely unnecessarily, and whispers, "Llywelyn has a foul mouth." She giggles again, as if that's the funniest thing in the world.
I... I don't know what to say to that. I just look at the table, the wood grain, and I try to parse the feeling in my chest. The feeling of... the past. It's like. Like I've been moving so fast for so long that now that I've stopped, I'm not sure what to do with myself. I'm...
Scared.
I'm scared.
I'm scared and confused and I want to go home. I want to be anywhere but here. I want to see Alistair again, and Hestia, and... I want to be angry, but it feels like I'm too tired to be angry.
And that...
Makes me even more terrified.
A ceramic plate is placed in front of me, and I blink and look up at the server woman. She smiles, and I see she has two plates in her other hand, which has distended to look a bit... reminiscent of a gecko. "I have made a meal with what you have listed as safe." She tells me, voice melodic and smooth. "If it tastes strange, please tell me and I will adjust it."
What...what I... "Oh, um. Thank you?"
She nods and then places the second plate in front of Mira. The last one she sets on the table in front of Llywelyn. "Do you require anything else?"
"No. Leave me." He doesn't even open his eyes.
"Of course." She bows her head, turns and leaves.
I stare at the plate in front of me. The food looks like... noodles, I think? Except I know for a fact that there is no way I'm eating noodles made from wheat. It looks more like a clear glass noodle. They're mixed with... some kind of greens, a variety of colors that remind me of shredded lettuce, some purple slivers, and dark green chunks. There's a slice of something that reminds me of a hardboiled egg in a lot of ways, except it's dyed blue, and it seems to be a different consistency.
There's a bowl of something that I guess is a soup? It's a dark green and yellow, and there are little dumplings in it. There are two pieces of bread, and a small cup of some kind of liquid.
The smell... is reminiscent of seafood.
I swallow. It's... not quite as human looking as the food the aliens - Xilogians? - fed us in the caves after the first test, nor what Anna and the others could make at the tidal pump station. But the portion size is much larger and I...
I'm very hungry. My stomach growls at me to remind me of that fact.
So I take the utensils and slowly scoop up some of the noodles and eat them.
It...
Tastes good. Sort of. The flavor is similar to shrimp? There's some kind of broth that's sour and salty and I have to admit that I like it, despite myself. The dumplings in the soup are kind of strange - they taste... fishy, but also a little sweet? The bread is like a French loaf. Crisp on the outside, soft in the middle, and when I taste the liquid, I find it's a thin, sweet wine.
I think. I've never actually had wine. But it tastes similar to the alcohol I sneaked back at home. The burn is there when I swallow it.
After the first bite, my hunger takes over and I simply start eating. I don't pay attention to how quickly I eat, or how much. I just... I just feel like I haven't eaten in days.
And... I suppose it's possible...
Maybe I haven't.