claws through his fur. “Fuck,” he groaned. “Even inside this room, I cannot guarantee your safety.”
He frowned, peering past the glass into the dancing lights of the Anomaly.
“They’d drive you mad,” he’d said to me once.
His wild expression made me wonder if he had already lost some of his sanity. After having spent who knew how much time in this place, I wouldn’t blame him if he had. He definitely seemed to exhibit some signs of paranoia.
“You know your crew,” I said, wishing to gauge the severity of the danger he had been talking about. How much of what he feared was a genuine threat?
“I do. I have studied every species here in detail. I’ve also learned what motivates each individual, by watching them for years.” A shadow drew over his features. “I killed ninety-seven of them the day I took over and declared myself their captain. Then I’ve shot another hundred and fifty-three, re-enforcing my rules and maintaining the order ever since.”
He met my eyes, as if waiting for a reaction.
I didn’t know what exactly he wanted me to say. That the killings he’d done must have been justified, considering the savage nature of his people? Or that I understood that it hurt him having to commit those murders?
“They are a wild, unrefined bunch of criminals,” he continued as I kept silent. “Murderers, rapists, and cannibals. Anyone who had a conscience, manners, or honor had been exterminated long before I took power. Nothing good survives here, Svetlana. Nothing beautiful, delicate or feminine, either.”
I shifted, taking a step closer.
“How did you survive?”
“By making myself smarter than them. I’ve read, I’ve studied, and I’ve watched. Then, I’ve figured out how to overpower them and prevent them from rebelling against me. Their minds and hands need to be occupied. I try to funnel their aggression into productive results, by keeping them busy. There is always work to be done around here. My authority is absolute. I ruthlessly eradicate any doubt about that. But it does not go undisputed.”
He paused again, gazing at me. It occurred to me that it might be the only time Vrateus had ever talked to anyone this openly about himself.
“You think all I need to do is to command and they will obey?” he continued. “Every order I give, I need to supervise to make sure it’s executed the right way. I have to be physically present, everywhere at once. Because if I’m not there to check and reinforce, they slack off. Every one of them is just waiting for me to slip up and make a mistake.”
He rubbed his face in the now familiar gesture. His exhaustion might be more noticeable by the end of the day but listening to him now I realized he was always tired, no matter how much rest he got.
“Svetlana, I don’t know what prior knowledge you have about the species of the Dark Anomaly. You seem to have come from a gentler, better place, where women feel safe on their own. But it’s different here.”
He looked closely at me.
“Do you think a release once a week would take care of my crew’s sexual frustration? It won’t. Dimos come several times a day. And that’s when they’re single. If they catch a scent of a female, they can spend days doing nothing but having sex. Continuously.”
He was no longer arguing or even trying to convince me in anything. He seemed to be stating facts, letting me do whatever I wanted with the information.
“Errocks have two cocks each, and they are only truly satisfied when they come from both. Simultaneously. Ognats chew the heads off their females during mating. Kreers have a birth rate of one male to ten females, because they mate in the water, often drowning the female during sex. Like ognats, they are cannibals. They eat everything they kill. Everything.”
He drew in a lengthy breath, as if talking had exhausted him even more.
“Nothing would stop the monsters I call my crew from satisfying their basic instincts if they got within leaping distance from you while you were walking anywhere alone.”
Faced with the horrific nature of the inhabitants of the Dark Anomaly, the argument died in me.
“Do you understand me?” he asked, peering at me intently.
“Yes.” My knees gave in, and I sank to the floor right where I stood.
Silently, he offered me the cup from the tray. Bejewelled and embossed, it appeared to have come straight from a storybook’s pirate treasure. Except that no one here had come from a