Chapter 17
CHAPTER
SEVENTEEN
ZAN
The glossy black rock wall behind us slams closed. Another wall directly rising in front of us.
There are two paths, one to the left and one to the right.
And as we both consider the direction, a strange light flickers over the walls in front and behind us, transforming the blank black rock into something completely different.
“I fear we’re inside of a labyrinth,” I say, watching the mirage of images splash across the rock walls.
“Oh, fuck no,” Lily swears. “We’re not just inside any—”
She pinches the bridge of her nose, looking both adorable and exhausted.
“You know this place?” I ask her, studying the strange language scrawled across the walls.
The translator doesn’t pick it up, and I wait for her signal. If she has some knowledge of this strange hologram we’ve been forced inside of then she should lead.
“Oh, everyone knows this place. This is the worst labyrinth of them all on Earth.”
“What is it?” I ask, staring at the bright yellow and blue shapes congealing like a toddler youngling fever dream across the walls.
“It’s an IKEA,” she says, with the tone of a female who has witnessed unspeakable crimes in such a place.
“Welcome to your next obstacle,” Ken announces from somewhere outside the labyrinth.
My skin prickles, the scales on my spine standing up in trepidation for what is to come.
“Zan, you have been placed inside a human mating ritual the likes of which the outer worlds have never seen. This is an IKEA superstore, and humans often take their mates here to find objects of all sorts, collections for their home decor, candles, spherical meat, and other strange items humans seem to prize.”
“Books?” I ask.
“Not usually,” Lily says with a groan.
“Your task is to navigate this labyrinth of capitalism, locate the flat-pack furniture at the end of the course, and assemble it before time runs out. You will know time is running out when the wave of lava appears. By then, it will be too late. Good luck,” Ken says.
“Look right here,” I tell Lily, pointing to what appears to be a map of this strange place. “This dot, this is where we are.”
“Don’t pay attention to the map,” Lily says, staring at me. “Trust nothing. This whole place is designed to confuse you. Follow me,” she says, a determined look on her face. “And whatever you do, don’t think for once that the toilets here are real.”
“Humans prefer to frequent places with fake toilets?” I ask, completely bemused. “What is the purpose of a fake toilet?”
“I really can’t answer that question,” she says, shaking her head. “That is not for us to know. Let’s move.”
Her voice snaps with the same tone as a military commander, and it’s all I can do to not throw her over my shoulder and spirit her away from this terrible, soulless place.
“Meat spheres?” I ask instead, choosing to distract both of us. “I would like to understand more of your food lore if you consume meat regularly that’s been shaped into a sphere.”
She gives a deep sigh, holding my hand, tugging me along through a path of the most surreal rooms I have ever seen.
Hundreds of what appear to be resting places for humans line the walls, along with seating of all kinds and colors, tagged in a language I cannot understand.
“It’s weird that the signs don’t translate,” she says, following the direction of my gaze.
“Is this typically a language that you can understand?” I ask her.
She laughs, but there’s no humor in it. “No one can understand these signs except for the people in the country where IKEA is from.”
“And this is part of your mating ritual, to navigate this place with your partner?”
I feel slightly honored that I am with her if that is the case, and I puff up my chest, walking faster as she navigates us around a strange assortment of plush animals that remind me of the bunny sneakers she lost within our first few days here.
“Would you like me to take these and make them into shoes for your feet?” I ask, pointing at a particularly large plush snake.
“I don’t think that’s a good idea,” she says. “I don’t think we should touch anything.”
It’s too late. I’ve already put my hand around the plush snake.
Lily shrieks as the soft fur changes to scales.
“Holy shit!” she yelps, the tongue flicking from the now-live snake. “I told you not to touch it!”
“It can’t hurt me. I’m holding it around its neck,” I tell her, but I am undeniably moderately displeased with this escalation.
“You’re right, I shouldn’t have touched it. Now where are these toilets?” I ask her.
“That’s the problem with these places. They’re impossible to find, and all you can see are fake toilets.”
She sounds vaguely panicked, her eyes bulging slightly at the snake writhing around my arm now, squeezing it as tight as it can.
“Don’t worry,” I tell her. “We have much worse on my planet. Snakes are native to your planet as well, if what I’ve read about their geography is correct.”
“Oh, that’s really reassuring,” she says. “Quit playing around. We have to go. I don’t want the lava wave to catch us.”
With that, I manage to extract my arm from the snake’s grip and fling it as far as I can away from us.
Hopefully it will find its way to one of the fake toilets and have a happier ending than a lava wave.
“Swore to myself I’d never come to one of these places again,” Lily says, snarling.
“Don’t get me wrong, their bookshelves hold up fantastic, and I really like a lot of their storage cubes.
But navigating this place—” she throws up her hands, and I’m not sure I’ve ever seen her quite so irritated and competent at the same time.
“Absolutely not. The minute they announced they could do contactless delivery; I was all in.”
She gives me a long look. “Did they do contactless delivery on your planet?”
“I do not know,” I tell her.
“Right, of course not. They don’t do it as much now, of course, after the Roth invaded. But anyway, I had some IKEA furniture in my apartment back home that’s lasted me since college.”
“College?” I repeat.
“School,” she explains. “School for adults, and don’t worry about it.”
“There is a prize for anyone who bests this place?” I ask, confused. “That is why it is a human coupling ritual?”
“Yes, and the prize is the meat spheres,” she says knowledgeably.
She’s picked up the pace now, practically racing through the strange rooms full of mismatched housewares, dishes, and lamps, and some kind of eating utensils that are shiny and strange and very different than the wooden ones we use on my planet.
There are soft, fuzzy pieces of fabric designed to go on floors, it appears, and I want to take my time sifting through all of these puzzle pieces of humanity to figure out how they fit into my Lily’s world.
“You possessed many bookshelves?” I finally ask.
Lily is panting, running faster than I’ve seen her this whole time, her bare feet slapping along the floor.
I want to offer to carry her, but I know she won’t let me. Not with my wing damaged, which brings me disgrace, but it is what it is.
“Yes, I like to read,” she says. “Books are a little bit harder to find after the Roth invasion, so the ones I have I like to take care of. Or I did, you know, before all this.”
“I will make sure that you have your books.”
She gives me a brief grin, still holding my hand, then tugs me along.
“Faster now,” she says. “We’ve got to get through all these plants, and then we should pop out on the part where all the flat-pack furniture is kept and the checkout lines.”
“The checkout line,” I repeat, intrigued by the idea. “What do you mean a checkout line? What does that have to do with any of these things?”
“Well, you have to buy it. So, you know—you know what, can we just focus? Let’s get through this, and let’s find that flat-pack we’re supposed to assemble. That’s going to be the real challenge here.”
“How hard can assembling furniture be?” I ask, thoroughly confused.
From the look on Lily’s face, I have a feeling the real challenge is not navigating this labyrinth of the human IKEA and digesting meat spheres.
Not at all.