Now it was Eron’s turn to stop. He drew back his shoulders. ‘Azrael?’
‘He needed a name. No one seemed to know or care what his real one was.’ Blake turned to face him. ‘So I gave him one.’ Green-grey veins formed in a small cluster at her temples. She held a distant look, one she was well practised in. Her inability to focus on general conversation was a trait Eron knew drove Kira to distraction. Eron dug his fingertips into his thighs. ‘I see.’ Though he did not, not really.
It was superfluous to give the creature a name. Ereshkigal sent them a lesser being for the First Meld, a soul of no import in her realm. One that would not be missed should there be any catastrophic failure of the carapace, which was a viable and probable result. The gallu of Kur could not long survive in this godless corporeal world without a shielding. The metal shells constructed by Cym and the Technician— made of Telteriun and blessed by Lahar, one of the last Living Gods—were not unlike those worn by human astronauts; life preservers capable of sustaining life in an environment otherwise uninhabitable. Even the Four – by far the most powerful of all the gallu – would suffer if unshielded on Earth, and without the carapaces would soon have to abandon this world if they intended to survive. The First Meld was a test run designed to reveal any flaws.
‘Right, well I don’t see shit,’ Kira said. ‘Who the fuck is Azrael? And has he brought booze with him?’ She scratched at her head, and the movement shifted her jacket open, exposing her hole-ridden shirt. A sudden lightheadedness gripped Eron. He’d removed that shirt from her body once, the red bra beneath, too. The air grew heated, and Eron adjusted the top buckle on his vest.
‘I need you sober.’ Blake glared at Kira. ‘I need you to pay attention.’
‘Pay attention to what, dear sister? It’s been so long since you called I thought maybe you’d died down here. That would have made two of us.’
Kira smiled at her own humour. The curve to her lips created a dimple in her left cheek, but the memory of the day of the accident brought no mirth for Eron. He recalled the cool and detached way the captain had declared the death of Blake’s father a serendipitous event, and Kira’s horrific injuries an opportunity. The eager way Tamas had agreed. One way to stem Blake’s increasing concerns about the Syranians’ true intentions – despite her obsession with their technology and her own lust for knowledge – was to make her irreversibly indebted to those she had begun to doubt. In truth, they needed her expertise. The captain and Cym were adept with advanced technology, but the nuances of humanity required a certain finesse.
And so, they had brought Blake’s sister, her only surviving family member, back to her.
‘Shut up, Kira.’ Blake wiped at her brow. ‘Are you sober enough to remember this?’
Blake stood at the top of the short flight of stairs leading into the tech room. She tilted her head to look down at her sister. Her large amber eyes were focused. She was present. And, if Eron wasn’t reading her entirely wrong, there was a certain melancholy in her expression.
‘Depends how memorable it’s going to be,’ Kira said. ‘I mean is there going to be skinny dipping in that creepy-ass pool over there? That could be memorable.’
‘Keep your clothes on, Kira. You are not in Tahiti now.’
There was a moment of silence. An unusual occurrence for Kira. Something about Blake’s comment had caught her off guard.
‘You saw that?’ Kira said. ‘That was a private fucking island. Who the hell got a photo? Jesus –’
Eron stared down at his booted feet again. While he had been restricted to the lower levels of the Facility, Kira had not even remained in the country. It should have angered him. Instead, Eron chased the image of her naked body out of his head.
‘No one got a photo. It wasn’t the press who knew you were there,’ Blake said. ‘I had you watched as a precaution. Now please, come on.’
Though Blake dismissed the conversation with a wave of her hand, Eron tensed at Kira’s expression. When she frowned that way, closing up her left eye slightly more than the right, he knew that the intercourse would not be concluded anytime soon. Arguments enlivened her, she seemed to hunt them down and take a stranglehold on them. The sisters’ disputes had been frequent and vocal in earlier days before Blake had distanced herself, and he did not lament their loss.
‘Watched as a precaution? Blake, do you have any idea how fucked up it is that you don’t see anything wrong with spying on me?’ Kira’s vehement lift of her arms seemed to throw her off balance. Eron crossed his own, determined not to reach and steady her.
‘You’re a mess, Kira.’ Blake’s melancholy had left her. There was something hard there now.
‘Well fuck you very much, but I’m not the one watching my sister have sex on a beach.’
Eron shifted on his feet. His inner voice was a solid chorus of sound, telling him to turn and leave. Now. But another part of him, that part that betrayed him so consistently, deadened the cacophony and rooted him to the spot.
‘I didn’t watch you,’ Blake said. ‘I have better things to do. I had information relayed.’
‘Oh, that’s okay then. Not. Jesus. Did Tamas authorise this? The dude needs to deal with some personal frustrations and use porn sites like everyone else.’
The pulse of tension bouncing between the sisters was a palpable thing. But where Kira made it physical in the clench of her fists, Blake held it all in her eyes. Eron felt as invisible now as any time during his solitude. He considered moving away, stepping closer to the Tier and letting its force replace this discomfort.
‘Grow up, Kira. You gave us
