There’s far more than just humanoids as well. A few Scintians with their glimmering tentacles drift by, a wet-looking salamander-like creature the size of a crocodile tips its leaf hat at me as it strides by my calves, and some floating balls of light quiver in a corner, which is I’m pretty sure is the only visible sign of a group of Telomires, a species that primarily exists on the quantum plane.
I wander my way across the lower floor to a sign that my watch translates asPrivate Lounge. An Arachnoid bouncer perches across the large opening, which is covered with an intricate network of silk strands that make it impossible to sneak past her.
She stands facing downward with her shiny, black rear legs spanning to the top of the opening and her eerily pretty humanoid half almost at my level.
I wave as I approach, catching the attention of her eight glossy black eyes. At least the two biggest ones are in more or less the same spot as a human’s.
Her mouth moves and a series of clicks and hums come out. I try not to look too closely at the way her pointed teeth each articulate individually to make some of the sounds.
“Sorry,” I stammer, tapping my neural implant to turn it back on. “Can you say that again?”
“Do you have an invitation?” I hear her words in a husky, feminine tone. That’s another little pattern I’ve noticed: translated language might tap into some of the same imagination that dreams do, creating totally lifelike sounds with all the richness and nuance of human speech. I’ve had disagreements with other humans about what certain sapientssound like. I think the tech taps into expectations, to some extent. This is a voice my subconscious thinks is fitting for the woman in front of me—and it has an intimidating edge to it.
“I do,” I say, holding out my wrist.
She holds out hers, and our holo-watches vibrate.
“Yours is standard-issue?” she asks.
I nod, understanding the hidden meaning. “My translator is, too.”
She silently hands me a stretchy band made of metal and a decorative ear cuff. From my blacknet research, I understand these both to be signal disruptors, which will ensure my tech can’t send anything back to the ICSS before it can be jail-broken. I slip the stretchy metal cuff around my holo-watch, then tuck the cuff to my ear.
The translator will still work; it’ll just be in ‘offline mode,’ so to speak.
“Right this way. Last chamber on the left.” With two of her legs, she pulls aside part of her silk membrane, creating an opening just large enough for me to slip through. “And tell Sylvie I said hi.”
I turn back to her fang-filled smile and nod. “Will do.”
This area is quiet and dark, so I leave my translator on. The silk here has been dyed deep violet, giving the soft, curved walls a regal aura. Circular frames holding paintings that glitter with impossible colors line the space—but not in the even rows of a human hallway. These are arranged in clusters on every surface, including the ceiling and floor.
I step around a series of gorgeous painted nebulae, and eventually reach the last chamber on the left. The velvet curtain that closes it off from the hall is massive, and I climb more than step through the gap in the panels.
The room is small by Arthropoid standards, about a twenty-foot cube with rounded corners. A cozy circle of furnituredominates the floor, and little cubbies all around hold spheres that glow warm orange alongside potted plants trailing deep purple vines. The walls have been dyed an ombre from goldenrod at the top to deep crimson on the floor.
Sitting on the couch is a plump human woman wearing a translucent dress of silk that shows off the wide swell of her breasts and hips, the rolls of her stomach, and every dimple of her plush thighs.
Shiny, well-loved auburn curls form a halo around her face, and her expression is at once friendly and sharp, like nothing escapes her emerald eyes.
She’s gorgeous. I’m suddenly self-conscious of my stick-straight brown hair, the simple travel dress I wear, and how it hangs loose on my body, the result of losing my appetite every time there’s the slightest change in the cafeteria food or the smallest stressor in my environment, which is often.
The ICSS caseworkers are always on me to eat more; nothing died faster in their care than humanity’s obsession with diet culture. What had they called it? Something like a grotesque fetish of starving each other for sport?
When they offer me the nutrient-dense sludge that’s supposed to get me up to a more resilient weight, I really do try to eat it. But the thick, chalky texture makes me gag.
Over and above the woman stands an Arachnoid whose closest Earth spider analog would be a tarantula. He has grey skin, long dark hair with a white streak, and ruffs of fur around the base of his torso and the knees of each of his spider legs.
“Hello, Celeste,” he says in a rich baritone voice.
I furrow my brow as the movement of his lips matches the words. Is that hisrealvoice?
“You can turn off your translator now,” he says.
The woman turns up to look at him with a teasing smile on her lips. “Yeah, he’s a littletoogood at English.”
Bewildered, I can only nod and tap behind my ear.
“Come, sit,” the woman says, patting the couch next to her. “I’m Andromeda.”
