of blood and lies ; dystopian

39

Present

Drinking had become how we passed the time.

Some nights, it was silent as we lay beside each other and drank ourselves to sleep. Other nights, we would laugh until reality crept into the room.

I didn't know what tonight was going to be.

We sat against the door, eight empty pouches of whiskey between us.

"Do you know what I think is funny?" I said.

"Oh, do tell," Karro hummed, his words slurred. He leaned his head back against the door, looking at me from the side of his eye. The past few hours had been a mix of bickering and light conversation. I told him of my routine, and named every General I'd ever beheaded; he praised me for it.

"Everything," I continued. I slid down the door until I lay flat on the floor. Through the window, it was a clear starry night. "I think everything is funny. I mean, everything is a fucking joke. Man. The Blood."

I laughed. I didn't understand what I was saying, but it felt like I made sense. To the whiskey it was clear.

"Continue," Karro said. His fingers fiddled with the end of my strands. Goosebumps spread down my neck.

I bit my lip and continued to focus on the stars. The rest of the room spun. I wanted to count every star to keep my mind from going insane. How had Karro not gone insane? Had he?

"Do you think there is a sector for space?" I asked. Order. Intelligence. War. It was branded into me. But, I believed him. It all made sense. The timeless place, the power the Murthaa had over aging, and this place; there had to be other sectors.

"Probably. There was so much. I wish you could have seen what I saw. I can't even describe it. You just had to be there--"

Karro stopped. He looked down at me. I looked away from the stars to meet his eyes.

If I weren't so drunk, I would have told him that I could have been there, but he chose otherwise.

I grunted and shifted on the ground. I twisted my body until it was perpendicular to him. I rested the back of my head on the top of his thighs. I didn't look away from the stars. I was scared they would disappear.

Karro hadn't looked away from me.

"I want to see it," I admitted. I sounded like a slurring mess. "Before we kill them all."

"We?" His brow perked.

"Of course." I grinned hard.

I sat up and pointed at my chest. I thought I was going to say something. Well, the alcohol had something to say. A passing dark cloud distracted me. My hand fell limp and rested on his chest. I stared up at the cloud, mouth low.

"You will," I stated. "Because you are my bitch."

I laid my head back down on his thighs. He shifted and held my head in place against him.

"Oh no." Karro barked out a laugh. I flinched. "That's not how this works. I think it's the opposite, actually."

I dug my nails into his thighs. It was my drunken attempt at harming him. My tongue was too loose to offer some sharp response.

"I was going to say that it is funny. Man has no idea about anything. We don't know anything, either. Yet, we were the ones controlling it all." I stopped and frowned. I didn't understand what I was saying anymore. "That's funny."

"Real funny." Karro sounded bored.

"And they just don't care about--" I hesitated. "Well, I don't know how to word this without sounding like a conniving lying little bitch. As you so gracefully stated."

"You have said it more than me at this point."

I'd slap him for that remark if I were sober.

"They don't care or try to understand it all. They just accept it. Like, look at how they live. So comfortably. They work their shitty little jobs. Live their shitty little lives. They just accept that they are going to die. Poof."

Karro stayed silent. He brushed a hair from my brow. I fixed on a star in the sky.

"I'm not sure which is worse though," I continued. "To walk among Man, or to walk among The Blood."

My head shot up. Karro jumped.

"Have they ever delivered spaghetti in those pouches? Fuck, I'd kill someone for some spaghetti right now."

"No," Karro answered.

"Fuck," I hissed. I returned my head to his thighs. "I will kill the cooks after I kill the nurse."

Karro laughed at this. I shuddered at the noise.

I locked my gaze back on the specific star I'd been fixed on all night. "That star is you," I blurted.

"Which one?"

I pointed toward the window with a wobbly finger. I doubted he could tell which one I was talking about.

"The one in the cluster. It's brighter."

Karro did not look up at the stars. He was still looking at me. I sucked in a breath and tried to ignore his hot gaze.

"Which one are you?" Karro asked, brushing another strand of hair from my face.

I frowned at the question. I was too drunk to be thinking this critically.

I quietly scanned the sky for any sign of myself.

I couldn't find any.

"I don't think I'm there," I admitted. "I'm probably a giant asteroid that fell from space and wiped out an entire civilization."

Karro laughed and threaded his fingers deeper into my hair. The tips of his digits massaged against my scalp. My eyes fluttered shut.

I opened my mouth to speak again, but Karro's mouth slid against mine before I could. I was grateful for it. I would have started with something I did not wish to discuss.

Karro kissed me hard through the night; harder than he ever had before.

He kissed me until we were an entangled bundle of limbs on his bed. Until we both fell asleep against each other's mouths, forgetting everything prior.

It horrified me how happy I felt.