Chapter 7
DAVE
The hotel suite was the second largest the establishment offered, occupying the corner of the second floor with two bedrooms behind matching doors and a living room that opened onto a balcony with a view of the harbor.
The only suite fancier than this one was currently being used by Losham as his command center while the mansion was undergoing restoration.
The Eight had asked for an arrangement where they could stay together, and the suite was a good solution.
The two bedrooms had originally been outfitted with one large bed per room, but now both had two beds, so four could occupy each room.
It wasn't as comfortable as their rooms in Navuh's mansion, of which there were four, but the view here was better.
Over there, their rooms faced the backyard, which now had a big hole in it, and a crane that hauled debris straight from the basement.
Number Four was sitting on the floor next to the coffee table, a deck of cards he had bought from the gift shop downstairs in his hands. He was shuffling them over and over again but failing to reach the perfect performance he was striving for.
"It looks easier than it is," he muttered, gathering the cards.
You don't need to master it, Number Two thought. You only need to deal them.
I want to master it.
The cards squared up, fanned, attempted the bridge, and exploded across the table. Two of them slid onto the floor.
Number Six picked them up and handed them back without comment.
The room was warm with the smell of the food they had ordered.
The service cart was parked beside the sofa, and on it were three tiers of small cakes, a platter with fruits that the kitchen had carved into shapes suggesting tropical flowers, two bottles of wine in an ice bucket, a tray of olives, a selection of cheeses and small biscuits, and a pitcher of water.
They had ordered everything they thought a woman might like, but none of them actually knew what women wanted and enjoyed, and the absence of data had translated into ordering one of everything they thought was appropriate for the occasion and the late hour.
"We ordered too many cakes," Number Eight said. "What if she doesn't like cake?"
He was sitting on the arm of the sofa with his feet on the cushion, which Number One had asked him not to do, and which Number Eight kept doing anyway.
"Everyone likes cake," Number Three murmured under his breath.
Number Eight grimaced. "I don't. Sweet things make me nauseous."
"We know," Number Three said. "When you are nauseous, we all are."
"Anita might not like sweet stuff." Number Eight was the most volatile of them, but he occasionally made fair points about what they did and didn't actually know.
"We could have ordered a salad," Number Four said.
Number One arched a brow. "Why would she want a salad?"
"Mattie eats salad, and she's a woman," Number Four replied as if that explained everything.
When Number One shared with the collective what he thought about the generalization of women, Number Eight made a noise that was almost a laugh but not quite.
Laughter was difficult for all of them. The muscle memory of it had survived the merge, but the impulse rarely did, and what had come out from Number Eight's throat was a short exhale.
Number Four set the cards down on the table, and his mind retreated into the hive, merging fully with the others and sharing his sense of unease.
It wasn't exactly nervousness because that was too strong a feeling, and they had transcended those. What they felt was a kind of pre-event wariness. It was being aware that they were not prepared for the situation about to unfold because they had no related experience to draw from.
They didn't know what to do with a woman other than sex, and since they had transcended those base urges as well, they were left with nothing.
"I remember sex," Number Six said. "It made me feel good."
Number Two grimaced. "It felt good while it lasted, and then it felt bad."
They had been very young, and their exposure to women had been limited to the brothel, which had been a transactional venue.
None of the women there had been present enough in the moment to instruct them in how she wanted to be pleasured.
There had been no need. The venom bite had done all the work, and the women had soared on the clouds of euphoria regardless of their fumbling.
That was why they had always been eagerly welcomed.
It hadn't been their immortal good looks or their stamina.
The artificially produced drugs were not the only ones these women were addicted to. The venom was a potent drug as well.
In a way, it was part of the transaction.
The collective recognized the distinction clearly now that they were older and their hive mind was capable of processing more nuance than their individual minds ever could.
"We shouldn't mention the past unless she brings it up," Number Two said. "She is a veteran, so she might remember us."
The idea sent a ripple of potent unease through the collective. What if one of them had used Anita's services? Did they even remember the faces of the women they had been with?
"I remember just one," Number Six said. "She kept urging me to bite her. I don't remember her name, though. I don't think I ever asked."
I don't remember any of them, Number Eight thought.
They spent the next few minutes in silence, sifting through all of their memories from the brothel and bringing up forgotten faces to the forefront of their combined consciousness.
"I just hope none of them is Anita," Number One said. "If she is, we pretend not to remember her."
The others agreed.
Number One's thoughts drifted to Sullha again.
The other seven had registered the displacement immediately. Number One's attention kept slipping to the play yard at the enclosure and the bench that overlooked a sandbox, and to the woman who still laughed at things he said or faces he made.
He'd forgotten how to be funny. Hadn't been funny for the past six years, but being near Sullha had coaxed out vestiges of his former humor.
You are leaking again, Number Three thought.
I can't help it.
"Yaaf," Number Four said.
Hearing the name his mother had given him spoken by one of the other seven felt like a punch to Number One’s gut. Sullha was allowed to call him that, but Number Four hadn't been granted permission. In the collective, his operating designation was Number One.
Don't use that name.
"It floats to the surface whenever you think of her," Number Five said. "You are not Number One when you do that."
The collective had circled this for days, debating whether it was the beginning of love that they could all experience through him.
I am not in love, Number One thought.
You are getting there, the collective thought back.
Was he?
The thing about being a hive mind was that there was no privacy among the Eight of them.
Every emotional spike was logged, every heart rate increase was distributed across the network, and avoidance of a topic was next to impossible.
He could not lie to them. He could not even hide from them.
He could only refuse to label his feelings.