The Bad Batch: Tech and Vel

24. Revilement

Vel paused for a moment, hand hovering above the control panel. This felt wrong, but she also felt entitled to know one way or another. She pushed the data card the rest of the way in, taking a deep breath as the machine began to whir as it read the information on Tech's card. Wishing she'd been able to do this on her own datapad instead of having to sneak into the central communications center, she shifted her weight anxiously. She only had a few minutes, max, before Arthen would notice she was gone.

He'd asked her to join him for an evening soiree with his friends, around whom she had always felt self-conscious due to her awkward hobble. She was almost completely healed from her initial bedridden paralysis, but she still didn't feel worthy of all these slickly-dressed, high-minded folk. She had worn a simple, floor-length black gown, and would much rather have been in her quarters in plain loungewear, but Arthen had been even more insistent than usual. He seemed unwilling to let her out of his sight all of a sudden, and what had started as flattering affection was starting to come across as controlling attention.

A small ping brought her thoughts back to the present, and she scrolled quickly through the information on the screen. As it flew past her eyes, her heart sank. Transmission after transmission, dated throughout the last number of months, rerouted to the same medical staff inbox. She felt a rush of emotions that were impossible to distinguish -- anger, fear, confusion, warmth, chill... She should have ejected the card and left at that moment, but she couldn't resist opening one of the random transmissions in the middle of the list. 

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{ENCODED TRANSMISSION//24-4219-1249581//HAVOC2^CACHE}

GREETINGS ONCE AGAIN. CONSIDERING THE HIGHLY FACTUAL CONTENT OF MY LAST FEW TRANSMISSIONS, AND IN LIGHT OF RECENT EXPLORATION OF NAUTOLAN LITERATURE, I THOUGHT I MIGHT DELIGHT YOU WITH AN ATTEMPT AT A POEM IN THE STRUCTURE OF IAMBIC PENTAMETER, IN WHICH I DESCRIBE WHAT I FIND MOST ENTICING ABOUT YOUR PERSONALITY AND INTELLECT...

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She scrolled down, laughing in delight and feeling a growing warmth in her chest as she began to read his description of her "morose yet intriguing start" of her time with them. But her little interlude came to an abrupt end at the whoosh of the door. She backed out of the message and pressed a button to clear the screen, but the machine was responding too slowly. She yanked the card out, slipping it inside one of her long sleeves, and turned around, crossing her fingers that one of the comm employees had simply forgot something after leaving for the night.

Not so lucky. Arthen strolled in, drink in hand, his brawny, athletic frame smartly dressed from head to toe. He had wavy golden hair cut neatly around his head and bright blue eyes that currently blazed at her from across the room. He was ruddy-cheeked and slightly sloppy in his movements as he stalked toward her.

"So you lied to me," he said, with a rusty voice that put a chill down her spine. He was nothing like his normal self. "This doesn't look like the refresher."

"I wanted to send a message..." Vel began, frantically struggling to make something up, but Arthen didn't let her finish.

"To who, Vel? Your dead parents? Your siblings, of which you have none? Your academy roommate from ten years ago?" he interrupted, gesturing grandly with his drink hand, sloshing a bit onto a nearby desk. 

Dread filled her chest and Vel gripped the edge of the console behind her. The atmosphere felt as though it were about to break, and she felt an immense sense of danger. She racked her brain for options, and one came to her immediately as if sent by a friend. She closed her eyes, reaching down to that place within, urgently directing all of her energy toward getting one single idea across.