The Irreversible Reckoning

  ***

  Taking a shower alone was risky, but I chanced it that day because I could not find Rohanna and Yumi, and I knew that Illa and Janna would absolutely not agree to accompany me. As I walked into the steaming shower room, I immediately noticed that the only other group of women bathing at that time were, of course, Sylvie and her friends. Even though one of their number had been thrown to her death by Brynna, they all seemed to be in a rather chipper mood. They took no notice of me as I shyly removed my towel and quickly jumped in between two of the tile walls.

  “So, did you see it?” One of them asked, and her voice was positively breathless.

  “I saw the outline of it, but trust me, that was enough.” Sylvie said, and I knew by the tone of her voice that she was smiling her cat-like grin.

  “God, was it huge?” Another girl asked.

  “So huge. Everyone says the former Rexprimus is hung like a horse, but James—oops, I’m sorry,” She giggled like a schoolgirl, “Commander Maxwell is bigger, I’ll bet.”

  “Oh, well, that bitch, Brynna Elohimson doesn’t know what she’s missing…”

  “She does know.” Sylvie said, “And believe me, that brings so much joy to my cold, dead heart, I almost feel like a human.” I peeked over, and I saw that she was standing, totally naked, in front of her equally naked friends. They were sitting in front of her attentively, and as she was talking, she was washing herself, and because she was standing up while they were sitting down, and because their attention was so fixed upon her, she looked like a teacher and they looked like her pupils. That was a strange comparison, to say the least, but Sylvie was very strange, and the situation I had accidentally found myself in was very strange, as well.

  “The Rexprimus was the most handsome man in all the world until Commander Maxwell came here on the ship all those years ago.” Sylvie continued dreamily, “And God, after what I saw the other day, I have to be with him. I have to show him how I feel.”

  “How will you do it?”

  “One night when it’s just me and him. When that pathetic little lepus is tucked away in bed, sent home for the night. I’ll ask him if there’s anything else he wants, and when he says no, I am going to take off all my clothes and say, ‘Are you sure?’ I’ll make him forget the name ‘Brynna Elohimson’ for good.”

  They all giggled at that, and for some reason, I found myself randomly, unbelievably, totally and completely enraged. In their sockets, my eyes burned, and I knew that if there were a mirror in the bathroom, I would see that my irises were glowing red. Looking at the situation as an outsider (which I was), I should have seen that Sylvie had every right to feel the way she did about Brynna—Brynna had brutally murdered one of her friends, and Brynna was roundly unpleasant to be around—and her crush on James was harmless, even though part of the joy she took in her attraction to him was due to the fact that he had once been Brynna’s man. My anger at Sylvie was misplaced, or so I thought, and still, it did not stop me from nosily turning the shower off, wrapping myself in my scratchy towel, and storming towards her.

  “Too bad Commander Maxwell barely even looks at you, let alone looks like he wants to touch you.” I snapped, and because I did not want to betray just how angry I was, and thus allow her to think I was rattled, I kept my voice calm with just a little touch of gloating. Her friends looked up at me, their mouths agape for a moment, and Sylvie looked particularly affronted, which she should have, because I was purposely trying to affront her. She looked down at her friends, and then back up at me, and then down at her friends again.

  “Get up, you idiots!” She spat at them through clenched teeth before turning her attention back to me, “I suppose you think because you’ve worked for Commander Maxwell for a total of five minutes that you know everything about him. He’s distant towards everyone, but towards me…”

  “He is just as distant. He has never looked at you, smiled at you, or even spoken anything to you that wasn’t a direct order. Yes, Sylvie, he is really into you. I might be a pathetic little rabbit, like you just called me, but even I can tell that he’d sooner screw Brynna, whom he hates with all of his heart, than he’d screw you. At least he looks her in the eye when he talks to her.”

  She was totally stunned, but she regained herself quickly.

  “He doesn’t look me in the eye because he’s fighting his urge to…”

  “Not looking people in the eye is a sign that one, a person feels inferior to the person whose gaze he is avoiding, and we know that’s not the case with Commander Maxwell and you, or two, a person feels as though the one whose gaze he is avoiding is undeserving of his attention, and between those two options, Sylvie, I think we know which is the correct one.” I didn’t know where it came from, but I found myself saying, “That is Body Language 101.”

  “You don’t know shit about what you’re talking about!”

  “Nice sentence.” I said as I turned away.

  I knew she was going to act probably before she did. She lunged forward, going for my newly washed hair, but I whipped around, swung my arm back while my fist was clenched, and nailed her perfectly in the side of the face with my fist. She stumbled sideways, slipping and sliding in the water until she finally fell. She landed sprawled out, and I saw more of her that day than I had ever or would ever want to see.

  “Oh, my God…” I started to say, because my body had reacted so quickly, I would have been unable to stop it even if I had wanted to.

  “You fucking bitch!” She growled at me as she pulled herself up onto her feet. “You think because you share a cell with the First Queen that I won’t beat your ass to death right here? You think she’s going to protect you? I’m not afraid of her! She’s fucking pathetic. Do you think I’m not going to rip your ugly fucking face off because you’re her friend?” She asked me in a trembling voice.

  Very coolly, and as my final word in the fight, I said, “Yes, Sylvie… I do think that,” before striding away with so much confidence, I knew I had to have become possessed by another spirit. In fact, the entire fight had to have been the result of my possession by this other spirit, because there was no way that I ever could have been so bold, or so sassy, or so angry…

  I giggled to myself, my heart swelling with pride. I didn’t know if I would have wanted my mom and dad to see me confront her like that, because of some of the things I had said, but then, I knew that they would have seen it as justified. I could almost see them, grinning even though they knew they should have been telling me that it was somewhat wrong to confront her that way.

  It was not until I heard Sylvie furiously muttering to her friends that she would make me pay regardless of who my friends were that the fear I had known my whole life came back. I returned to my cell, trembling from the cold that pervaded every inch of that ship, and from that old fear. It had felt so good to be different for that moment of boldness, but I feared most of all that this pathetically fearful little rabbit, as Sylvie had called me, was simply who I was, and regardless of any random, blurred moments in that image, it was simply who I would always be.