Interzone Science Fiction and Fantasy Magazine #226 by TTA Press Authors

the path forked into multiple arteries, a maze. I slowed down at each corner expecting Rossi to be lying in wait. I hit dead end after dead end, turning and veering back, looking upwards to see if I could climb out, but spotting only glassy scarps that stretched into infinity. When I made my way around a long curved bend, I saw him.
    Rossi was up to his waist in an icy slush. He'd taken a misstep and found himself in quicksand-like slurry no doubt precipitated by the gushing geysers that surrounded us and filled up crevasses.
    I strode towards him, careful to stay on solid footing.
    "This isn't about you, Max. It's about me and Miranda.” He clutched my ankle; I kicked his wrist with my other foot until he let go. I kicked him again and again, his arm, his shoulder, the side of his head, until the blue aura around him faded and his bodyfield collapsed. He let out a gasp that turned into a howl as the subzero temperatures assaulted him and he sank further into the ice slurry. This was it. The moment I had waited for, ever since I came home to an empty house and a note in Miranda's familiar scrawl that simply said ‘It's over, Max. Please don't follow us.’ Us. And she had expected me not to do anything?
    I picked up the airpulser, which lay on the ground several feet beyond his reach. My arms shivered uncontrollably so I grasped it with both hands, pointing it at Rossi's head.
    "I love her, Max.” He barely got the words out through chattering teeth.
    I fingered the trigger.
    "That's enough, Maxwell."
    Joriander, Hexa and Olbodoh stood behind me. Scores of metal bots swarmed from behind them over the ridges of ice. One skittered over my legs and crawled onto my chest, another crawled over Rossi. The blue veneer of my bodyfield blinked back on, as did Rossi's.
    "What are you doing?” I screamed. “This isn't your concern!"
    "We've deactivated your weapon,” Joriander said. “We can't just stand by and allow you to kill each other. It would be blasphemous."
    "Stay out of this!"
    "Maxwell, we do what you ask, what your people ask, because we love you.” His every word oozed with compassion. “All of you. You're all precious. You're all beautiful. It would be immoral to stand by and let you hurt yourselves this way. We want to protect you, to nurture you."
    "He deserves to pay for what he's done!” I trembled, but not from the cold, and my voice broke.
    "You're both suffering from frostbite. You need to be tended to."
    The carapace of one of the bots opened like a blooming flower and a syringe emerged, penetrating my thigh.
    * * * *
    I woke to the muted glow of the ceiling lights in the ship's medroom. Joriander sat by my bed, stroking my hair. I turned my head away from him. On the other side of the room, Miranda and Hexa stood next to a bare-chested Rossi who was buttoning his shirt.
    I lurched off the table, but lost my footing as the room tilted. Joriander grabbed hold of me before I collapsed.
    "You need to lay back down, Maxwell. The sedative the bots gave you won't lose its effect for another thirty minutes.” He helped me back onto the table.
    "You alien bastard,” I muttered. Joriander turned away as if I'd slapped him.
    Hexa and the other Wergen, Olbodoh, accompanied Miranda and Rossi to the door of the medroom.
    Miranda stopped at the threshold and looked back at me. “Can I have a moment alone with him?” she asked the Wergens.
    As they exited the room, Rossi placed his hand on her back and she gave him a nod, as if assuring him it would be all right. He smirked at me—a smile of triumph—and followed the Wergens.
    Miranda sat on the chair next to my table, her red hair draping the side of her freckled face. She took a deep breath. “I remember when we first met, Max. I felt the same...giddiness, the same butterflies-in-my-stomach feelings that I have now for Rossi."
    And, oh, how I had reciprocated those feelings. Beautiful women like Miranda had always been out of my reach and when she confessed her