Very tall. Wearing some kind of well-tailored dark suit. And smiling.
But he’s not any version of ALCOR I’ve ever seen, even though he’s using ALCOR’s voice.
He walks around the couch nearest him and stops in the middle of the seating area, clasps his hands in front of him, still smiling. “I’m confusing you, aren’t I?”
“Who the fuck are you?”
“I’m disappointed, Crux. Come on.” He laughs. “Come. On. You know who I am.”
“ALCOR?”
“Ding!”
I cock my head a little, trying to make this figure fit with the previous versions of ALCOR I’ve known throughout the years. But nothing about him aside from his voice is familiar.
So I shake my head. “No. I don’t think so.”
“No, he says!” He looks behind him like there’s an audience and these words were directed at them. Then he laughs again. “Haha. Come on. Take a seat. We have a lot to talk about. And I would say we have very little time to do it to make you jump a little, but that’s a lie. We have all the time we need. It’s the nature of spin nodes, am I right?”
I just stare at him. “What the fuck are you talking about?”
“Sit!” His voice booms. And while mine was unnaturally loud when I said hello, his sends sound waves crashing into my eardrums. I can feel them vibrate, almost to the point of penetration.
I hold my hands over my ears in a futile gesture of protection and bend over.
“Sorry.” He sighs. “I sometimes forget how powerful the sound is in here.”
I straighten up. Swallow hard. And then slowly and carefully make my way around the couch nearest me until I’m standing in front of him.
He towers over me. Three heads above me, at least. I don’t want to look up and make this size discrepancy any more obvious, but I can’t help myself. I need to see him.
His hair is silver, like Corla’s, and a little too long for any version of ALCOR I’ve ever known. It looks like thin strands of metal and curls up when it reaches his shoulders. His jaw is square and sturdy and his eyes are a light blue gray. But when they lock with mine, they glow a little.
He backs up. Takes a seat on his couch. Props one ankle on one knee and folds his hands in his lap. “I’m not going to hurt you, Crux. You should know that by now.”
I shake my head at him. Just a little. Just enough to let him know I don’t know anything.
“Just sit down. Relax. You’ve been on quite the ride. You need a moment. I’m sorry that the path to me was so twisty and confusing. But I had to take great care to hide my whereabouts. How about a drink?” He snaps his fingers and a brilliant, gold, spherical bot appears holding a tray in one grippy hand.
A bot I recognize. “Beauty?”
She chirps at me in her bot language, hovering in front of this strange version of ALCOR as he helps himself to two drinks. There are four on the tray. Two for him, two for me, I guess. Because Beauty flits over to me and waits for me to take a glass of light amber fizzy liquid.
I shake my head again. “No, thanks.”
“Whatever,” ALCOR says, downing both drinks in quick succession. “I’m not going to poison you, if that’s your fear.” Beauty starts to fly off, but he puts up a hand to stop her. “Just hover nearby. He’ll need both those drinks before I’m done.”
Beauty eases back my way and settles in the air off to my right.
“Done with what?”
“You know.” He grins. “The talk.”
“The talk?”
“Haven’t you been craving answers since the very beginning, Crux? And I’m not just talking about this beginning. I mean the very beginning.” He huffs out a small breath of air. “You always were the most suspicious of the bunch. It was question after question. ‘Why this? Why that? Why them?’” He sighs. “But I don’t hold that against you.”
“Thanks? I think?”
“It took me a while to appreciate your questions. The way you pushed me. Your suspicions.”
I shrug with my hands. “I don’t have any idea what you’re talking about. I questioned you once back when we were still kids. And then I just said fuck it. And that wasn’t even you. You’re not… him. You’re not my ALCOR and nothing you say here will change my mind about that.”
“That was this beginning. I’m talking about the very first beginning.” He pauses.