• • The Royal Bastards of Galagan
• June 28, 2026

The Royal Bastards of Galagan (Chapter 14)

The Royal Playdate

“Never debase yourself for someone who will not hold a door open for you.”

Lady Renho Takeda

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Lemon Limelight

I didn’t know what to make of Lumen. Sure, we’re all aliens on Drota, but he was so different. He didn’t use cakra to fly or use his powers. He had full control over his body, making his cells release the pressure and revert their magnetic pull to push themselves through the air. He had better control than the best cakra users. 

It was like he was made to break the rules. 

“Do you want to race?” Lumen asked me.

“You’d probably win, I see the way light bends around you, you’re not using cakra to fly.”

Then he turned back to grin at me. His face reminded me of Calcutta, right after she came up with a plan to kill something. “Yeah, I don’t use cakra.”

“Why not?” I asked, still not knowing where we’re flying to. “Everything has it, you must have it too.”

“Why settle for what anyone can use when you have something that’s all your own?” he asked rather than answered, but it got the point across.

I kind of didn’t know what to say to that, but just kept following him in silence. “You’re not much of a talker are you?” he asked me.

“Well, it’s not… the easiest thing to strike up a conversation with a total stranger,” I admitted.

“And here I thought Galagans liked challenges.”

That made my brow furrow. “And what do you know about Galagans?”

“Not much,” he said with a shrug as he descended on this town. 

It was a place where the ground was hardened sand, and the trees around the place were several stories tall, with exposed roots that stood taller than people.

“I know that the Galagan Empire is an imperialist regime that conquered, usurped, and destroyed hundreds of planets in Major Galaxy, yet can only keep around about twelve to full capacity. Tells me that their way of life is inefficient, and they have to rely on abused royal bastards to win their battles. Am I wrong?”

I was a bit speechless as we landed. It’s not like he told me anything that anyone on the galactic internet couldn’t tell you. Maybe that’s why he sounded so hostile, he wasn’t saying anything I shouldn’t have expected him to know.

Then like that, he flipped on a dime. 

He put his hand behind his head, with this grin on his face, and pointed behind to the town filled with small shops, stands, and what were clearly tourists from across the galaxy. “Want to get ice cream? There’s this stand that brings it in from the Milky Way Galaxy.”

The recipe for ice cream was easy to replicate, but getting the seeds from the planets that grew them always tasted better. Knowing it was the original flavor and not some replacement made it more appealing.

So, when he asked me if I wanted ice cream I said, “Hell fucking yeah.”

He knew exactly where to go, this little cart out in the blistering sun, with a long line on it. I couldn’t say that I was a patient guy at that point, but I wouldn’t say I was impatient. I was able to wait for the ice cream. For good ice cream, I could wait hours.

Okay, maybe not hours, but come on, ice cream.

That was all I could think about until Lumen suggested, “You should try the Lemon flavor.”

“Eww, what?” I asked. I knew what a lemon was, another fruit that came from the Milky Way, lot of good food from there, but we started growing lemons across the empire years ago. It’s basically commonplace along with the other fruits from the Milky Way and the Andromeda galaxies. 

I mean, I got my name from somewhere, but lemon ice cream?

“That sounds — and I don’t mean this hyperbolically or ironically or whatever the word is — absolutely nauseating.”

“Have you tried it?” he asked me, his smile falling a bit from his face.

I shook my head knowingly. Weird alien or not, he knew the phrases all moms give. 

“Then how do you know if you don’t try it?”

Now, I knew a lot of things I didn’t like without trying it, and no one corrected me. I didn’t like being shot with bullets, and thanks to the pressure of cakra cloaks and the advancements in laser technology, I had never taken a bullet. 

That would eventually change.

I also knew, that I did not like drinking milk from the carton, and 90% of people nodded their heads in understanding. It didn’t make any good difference.

Thirdly, I knew for sure, you never get ice cream with a fruit flavor. That’s just disgusting, but unlike the first two, when it comes to trying a food or drink for the first time, someone always pointed out, “But how can you know you dislike something you haven’t tried?”

People just fucking know, okay?

But that being said, when someone as smooth looking — metaphorically and literally speaking — like Lumen stopped smiling because you wouldn’t try lemon ice cream… you fucking do it.

“Alright, how bad can it be?” I said. My voice definitely cracked in the beginning and the end of that sentence. I did not want to taste the fruit that was my namesake as ice cream.

But Lumen grinned at me, did that weird yet oddly culturally common tap of his fist against my arm, and ordered me a Lemon flavored ice cream cone when it was our turn. 

He got himself a chocolate, which is what I wanted. Figured him for a vanilla guy to be honest.

I nearly went to tap my pockets when I realized I haven’t had a wallet since I poisoned my brother. Lumen read the look of horror on my face, and waved me off. “I know you’re broke, I got us both for today.”

“Well, that makes the lemon flavor easier to swallow,” I admitted as he hand me my ice cream cone.

He handed to me and watched me as we walked, waiting with anticipation for me to try it. I’m sure I looked a little bemused before I took my first lick. 

How that cart made something as sweet as ice cream taste sour at the same time was beyond me, and it tasted disgusting. He laughed as my lips puckered and twisted. His laugh was loud, with this little bubble pop in the back of his throat. 

“Your face was worth the five dollars, let me try it,” he said as I leaned the cone to him. I may have watched the way his tongue moved a little bit too closely. I wanted to see if it was different, but I got distracted and didn’t really notice what I meant to. Instead, I got to see him make a strong twist of his head and squeeze his eyes closed. “Yeah, that’s absolute garbo right there,” before throwing it in the trash. 

I didn’t buy it, so I wasn’t going to complain. 

Then he held his chocolate cone towards my face and said, “We can share.”

Despite, having cold ice cream in my face, I probably looked a little red as I licked that cone. We shared as we walked. I had no idea where we were going, I was just following him at that point, and honestly having a good time.

I couldn’t remember when was the last time I just hung out someplace for sure. If we weren’t on a mission, we were at home in court, acting as enforcers. I think the only time me or my sisters could hang out anywhere was when we conquered a place faster than whatever timetable we were given. 

It’s not much fun though to hang out around someplace you’ve just devastated, and even if we hadn’t, no one was showing us around. 

Just when we were about done with the ice cream, still an hour or two from dusk, we walked past what looked like a club. You’d be forgiven for missing the flashing lights in broad daylight, but somehow not hearing the music emanating from the place is stretch. 

I hesitated for a moment and Lumen and immediately noticed it. “Want to check out the club?” he asked, gesturing to it with his thumb. The way he titled his head let the floppy curl in front of his face hang over his eye like real hair would. There was something incredibly cool about the small things he did.

I blinked a few times before pointing out, “But isn’t it midday?” 

“Yeah, but midday for us is the night for nocturnal creatures, and this planet is the cultural highway.” That made a whole lot of sense and again reminded me of how many different creatures must have been on this planet.

Also reminded me that at some point, Calcutta, Potempta, and I were going to have to figure out how we didn’t know about this place for so long.

But Lumen had that cool look in his eye, so yeah, I nodded my head and told Lumen, “Sure, why not?”

Lumen just gave me that smirk again and started pulling me inside.

Clubs, across any and all planets, were the same. I had only ever been to three, so maybe I was wrong to think this, but to be honest, once something is more or less the same across three planets in three different solar systems, you know its a staple.

The club could pick different colors, but they were all always flashing. They could have weirdly shaped cages to have dancers in, but they still had dancers in weird cages. Clubs always had loud blasting music — it would be techno, rap, guitar, or whatever but it still moved a hundred miles per hour so you had to tire yourself out to dance to the beat.

I saw the appeal, but I couldn’t dance so I started to regret agreeing to go with Lumen immediately. Honestly, the worst thing about it was that it had too much of the one thing I definitely liked deep down, and it was beautiful people, with barely any clothes on. 

Galagan culture, based on what our movies and books could tell me, was very reactive to the Khan on the throne. From what I had always understood, it was rare for a Khan to not seem culturally conservative. Whichever gender the Khan was, was the one meant to sexualize, not to be sexualized except by ‘deviants,’ as my stepmother would say.

With my father being Khan for nearly fifty years before he had me — before he even started showing his age — the empire was as my mom described, ‘a man’s world.’ Men did not have what looked like a competition to see who could wear the most or the least clothes with whichever male they felt opposed to like women. 

I got that that was an oversimplification, but this is my head and I’m trying to build to a point. 

What I was trying to say was, everyone at this club, man, woman, or other — I knew several species with more than two sexes and genders — were dressed like they wanted to fuck. There was this weird feeling where I wanted my groins to just retract to avoid showing off how arousing it was to look anywhere around the room. This feeling directly contradicted the desire to ground my groins with nearly everyone and everything around the room.

Being a socially sheltered kid, I was not used to this kind of betrayal from my own body. I was used to other betrayals, but not this one.

Lumen definitely noticed and was cracking up by the time he paid our entrance fee, convinced the guy not to check my non-existent ID, and dragged me to the dance floor. He knew exactly what my problem was, and if I was learning nothing else about him, it was that he was an enabler.

He pulled me onto the dance floor, and that was the first time I fought him. He didn’t pull that hard, but he realized when I stood my ground that I had power to throw around.

But that didn’t relieve him of that confident look on his face.

I had forgotten that even his clothes were actually a part of his body, and when I stepped back and I was also reminded of how fast he was. His boot’s heel shot out like a fast acting liquid where my foot was going to step, and quickly I slipped. Even faster, he grabbed my wrist, and pulled me to him.

We were chest to chest for a brief moment, where he was so close that I should have been able to feel his breath on my lips, but he didn’t breath. Then he pushed me spinning away from him into the crowd. 

In the moment before I bumped into my first person, I was astounded by the strength he had. He pushed me hard enough that I would have needed to charge my cakra to stop him. 

When I bumped into my first person, they said something in a language I didn’t understand, and shoved me again. Their hand felt so greasy but when I touch my shirt nothing was there. It was just me, and it was still just me as someone shoved me again, making the clammy feelings wash all over me. 

I was shoved again and again, before I found myself surrounded by dancing bodies that were growing less beautiful and more nauseating and slimy by the second. They were all so sweaty, but I knew it wasn’t going to cover me in slime. I knew that, I knew that, but it changed nothing as my arms squeezed tight to my sides. 

The air was getting stale, and it was harder to breath as people kept coming closer and closer, or seemed to. I was already looking for my escape plan, trying to find something when I saw Lumen with his back against the bar, giving me a peculiar look. 

I tried to focus on him, to sense or feel for his cakra to teleport to him. I wanted him to be my anchor, but was met with nothing… when I remembered that he had no cakra to sense.

Then I just started shoving. 

I felt disgusting touching these people, the same people who I found so beautiful, who — if we were alone — I would want touching me, but now I wanted to throw up. Usually, moments like this can last forever but my mind was going blank, and I blink before hitting the bar with my waist.

There was a loud bang which drew a few side comments, but I couldn’t have given a fuck as I let myself fall on my arms. 

Then there was a gust of wind, and I peeked out of my arms to see Lumen leaning against the bar but beside me, looking down at me. He still had that peculiar look on his face.

“Why didn’t you dance?” he asked me. “You didn’t even try.”

In a huff, as if I had just been training for hours, “I can’t.”

“Then why did you say you wanted to go in here?”

I paused at that, because as I remembered it, “I didn’t say I wanted to.”

“You nodded your head,” he was quick to assure me.

His read of things just felt… wrong. I never had this want, never felt it, I just did it. What I wanted was more of the look he was giving me, so I nodded.

“I nodded to say I would,” which left Lumen rather stone-faced, strange for a being who could morph like liquid.

The first thing that drew my eyes from Lumen was the bartender walking by, and I waved him down to ask, “Sir, water please.”

Lumen stopped the bartender to tell him, “He needs a Garini,” as if my order needed correcting.

“I don’t—”

“Don’t worry,” he said, waving around his wallet, “I’m buying, make up for the misunderstanding.” Suddenly, his smirk seemed a bit less cool.

The waiter brought me my drink pretty quickly, but I was doing anything asides from reaching for it. Lumen pushed it a little towards me, suggesting, “It’ll make you feel better, calm you down.”

“I don’t drink, like at all,” I told him, my muscles unmoving.

“No wonder you’re so tight, and here I thought it was all of your muscles,” he joked as he poked at my arm. 

I didn’t look at him, I just looked at the drink, that looked more and more green the more I looked at it. Then he rested his hand on my shoulder and whispered into my ear in a way that made my head tingle. “You’re stressing yourself out, and the way to do that is to loosen up your brain. The drink will help.”

“How could it?” I questioned. 

“It’s nice hot water for the brain.”

“It has ice in it.”

I could feel his lips grazing my ear as he whispered, “I’m being metaphorical.”

Then he reached down and lifted it to my face, as he told me, “Gotta drink it all at once.”

I never knew how long he held it in front of my face before I downed it. I wanted to believe I had held out a while, but he asked and I wanted to do.

That drink burned its way down my throat, and it’s basic taste wouldn’t abandon my tongue. It was worse than the lemon flavored ice cream, and it wouldn’t leave.

My tongue sputtered and I felt like spitting but then he said, “Spitters are quitters,” and I couldn’t help but laugh. I felt him patting my back as he did, and as I tried coughing to get rid of the taste, he left his hand there. I stayed still so it would stay.

When he removed his hand he asked, “What does it feel like?”

My eyes fluttered open when he said that, “What? Haven’t you had it before?”

“Yes, my systems tell me how it should make a person feel, but I’m bio-organic nano-bytes, I can’t… really feel it.” 

For the first time, he struggled to say something, which was a nice change of pace. He gestured with his open hand as he tried to find the words. 

“It’s like, my body simulates it, but I’m not really, buzzed. I get this foggy feeling around my head and the insatiable need to talk, but… I’m still all there. None of my inhibitions are removed, I turn them off manually. Honestly, I could turn if off at anytime.

“You can’t do that,” he said while pointing at me, as I started to feel a bit sweaty and loose.

“No, but with all of my cakra, I need a really strong…” as I was saying it, it was like a wave rolled over my mind. I wasn’t drunked, but I felt dehydrated without being thirsty, or maybe off-balance is a better way to say it?

Lumen rested his chin in his hand as he looked up at me, and asked, “What does it feel like?”

“Like… like…” I repeated as I tried to form thoughts. “Like the buildup, between me and… me… is a film, a little flimsy film… and I just gotta push a hole to let me out.”

“Hmm,” he hummed, as if jealous, “I like the way buzzed you describes things. Tell me more.”

“Another time,” I said, as I forced my cakra to run through my body, flush out my systems, and free my mind… or board it back up again. I didn’t even know what I thought about being buzzed at that point.

“Poohey,” he mocked complaint as I was left sweaty, but definitely sober. “Well, we could get something real to eat, this place is really only known for food and clubs until its less dusk and more night.”

“Is it that late already?” 

Lumen stood up and wrapped and arm around my shoulder to lead us out. He told me, as he moved a hand across our vision, “The sky, like the world, tends to shift pretty quickly when you’re not moving, Lemon.”

“Wow, so deep, so much thought,” I teased him.

“Shut up,” he said, chuckling and hitting me on the shoulder.

I was glad to out of there, but to see that the sun setting already was more than a bit surprising. It didn’t feel like we had been in town for that long. By the time we finished eating or got food at all, it might already be night, and I still had training in the morning.

“I know the perfect place to grab food, then we can find something to eat.”

That confused me a bit. “Why wouldn’t we just eat there—”

“Do you eat meat?” he interrupted me.

“Yeah,” I said with a shrug. I was pretty beefy, and Calcutta wasn’t there to make me look small, what did he think I ate? “I need protein to be this big, and I can’t stomach tofu.”

“Oh thank god,” he said, resting his hand over his… well it wasn’t where my heart would be. He placed his hand on his neck and joked, “I can’t stand people who act like they’re not a part of the food chain.” 

At least I hoped it was a joke.

He dragged me to another food cart, with a line of people who looked like they were finishing their day partying. A bunch of nocturnal creatures who realized they partied until their morning. I guess that would be called an all-dayer?

There was this Chiroptera species that was about waist high with no eyes, that was whistling all the time to keep himself balanced. But there was also another similar-looking creature, another Chiroptera species that was twice the size, taller than me, but definitely had eyes. They were singing, and they had Lumen clapping along.

Then someone cursed at them to order their food. The two… bats I guess gave the guy dirty looks, which freaked me out because I couldn’t tell how the shorter one knew where to look. Bats were not common animals I came across. 

When we went up, the guy who ran the food truck, a couple of Pyrie, spoke to Lumen in a language I didn’t understand. This was the first time I couldn’t understand one of the Pyrie and saw one outside of the palace since I got here. Judging by the long locs they had, I’m assuming my master and the other masters shaved their heads.

I knew then how I was gonna try to make fun of Howl the next time I saw him.

Lumen turned around with food before I knew it, and started flying up into the air. He was almost fast enough that I didn’t get to smell the food he had in his hand.

Almost.

The spices and sauce that lathered that chicken… well, it probably wasn’t actually chicken, but smelled almost like chicken, with a bit more lime. Whatever it was, it had me flying after Lumen. 

He realized I was chasing him after the third time he looked behind himself, smirking to find me on his tail. I kept chasing after him until I realized where he was heading.

Now, I’m not a religious person, wasn’t back then, and won’t be until I die. That didn’t make me completely ignorant of what a religious place looked like. They always had a different air to them. They were opulent, covered in art, made from the oldest woods and the whitest stones, and things tended to be calm. It wasn’t this supernatural calm, but a mood everyone cultivated because they didn’t want to speak or even lift their heads in the house of their god.

For some reason, Lumen was flying to one. 

“Why are we heading here?” I asked him.

“To eat!” he said. “The top of the needlum has a great few of the moon.”

“Isn’t that,” I started say, “and maybe I’m crazy, but… disrespectful? This looks like a church.”

“I did just call it a needlum,” he said. “It’s no big deal.”

“Do they not care?” I asked.

“Who knows, they just never get up onto the roof before I’m done eating,” he chuckled to himself. 

That’s when my heart started to feel heavy in my chest again. It was strange to feel guilty then, and I’d bet that’s why I didn’t know what I was feeling. I had blown up a dozen planets by that point, which had many churches, so why would I feel bad now? I had heard of ‘out of sight, out of mind,’ but this… was a whole new level.

“We can eat somewhere else,” I said for reasons I didn’t understand, and he ignored me for reasons I didn’t want to. 

“Lumen,” I called his name, as he set down, and then he shushed me. 

He landed on this little tower at the top of the three-pronged building. There was a little bump, where people who could fly clearly would sit. 

When he sat down, I tried to convince him to go again, “We shouldn’t be here, let’s—”

And then he held out my food in front of me. “Lemon, lighten up,” he said, before tilting his head and smirking up at me, “you might enjoy yourself.”

That felt like an insult, like I had never done that before, but that was so rude, I didn’t consider it to be true. Between that, the guilt, and the smell of the delicious food from the strangely pedantic food cart, I barely registered how he took my wrist and pulled me down to sit beside him.

Then Lumen started eating like I wasn’t even there. That’s when I started to stew, and despite the heavenly smell in my lap, I couldn’t eat a bite. I could only look over my shoulder, waiting for someone to start throwing things at us. I was used to that, but at that moment, it would have felt deserved.

I was powerless like that for what felt like hours.

“You know, for a prince of Galagan, you were kind of pathetic today,” Lumen said out of nowhere.

I didn’t respond for a solid minute because it took me a minute to realize who the fuck he was talking to.

I slowly turned towards him as he watched the sunset, eating his sandwich. “What the fuck did you just say to me?”

“You were pathetic,” he said, as his eyes didn’t change a bit, “no matter what I did, no matter how far I pushed you, you always said ‘yes.’” 

Then he slowly turned his eyes towards me, and the painted-on look they had finally revealed how lifeless they were. 

There wasn’t really emotion, or something resembling acknowledgement for life. I couldn’t even say that he was looking through me. His face was a drawing on a doll, made to resemble what derive a response from me, just enough that he could manipulate me.

“You ate ice cream anyone could have told was horrible, because I asked; you went into clubs you don’t like because you thought I would like it; you didn’t say a word out of spite after I threw you onto a dance floor that made you uncomfortable; you didn’t say no to a drink I pushed in your face that you didn’t want; now you sit on a roof you’re uncomfortable to be on because I asked you too. 

“That’s all pretty pathetic.”

Then he pulled back to look at the sunset. “Also, this place was a church, but now its a rehab, no one actually gives a fuck that we’re up here.”

“Oh,” I said, silent on everything else he said. I just found myself looking down, thinking about everything I did today. I never considered that he was keeping track of everything.

“Howl said you had a self-esteem problem, but I had a feeling it was more of a self-respect thing.”

I tried to ignore him as I sat there, wallowing in how I let this guy I just met walk all over me. 

“God, I really thought you were going to hit me after I pushed you onto the dance floor, but you didn’t do a damn thing.”

I wanted him to like me so much. Each time he pushed me, I felt myself pushing back, but I just… I wanted to keep being around him, around someone, who wasn’t my fucking sister. God, it’s only ever us, and they’re not even here and…

“I could list off the number of reasons you have this problem, but that would probably sound like a cruel and unusual punishment.”

This life was so lonely, never being allowed to have anything real, to have to fight for it, was that what it was like for everyone else?

“And they say you’re supposed to be one of the most feared people in the—”

“Would you the fuck shut up?!” I screamed in his face. I was sitting there, trying to think and he just wanted to spout of insults. “What are you? A constipated twelve-year who gets off on shitting on people? I fucking get it already you unused roll of toothpaste!”

I didn’t know why I was breathing so much after screaming at him. That took more out of me than a three-hour long sparing match.

I stared into his fake painted on eyes, and looked into them until he smiled again. It didn’t have the condescension as it usually did, and yet I had no trust in it. Then he turned away, with that smile, closed his eyes and began to quietly eat his food, satisfied as if he accomplished some sort of mission.

That only made me feel more defeated. I remember turning back to the sky, with my uneaten food in my lap and just set it aside. “I’m so lonely, I… I don’t have… I’ve never had real friends, companionship, however you want to say it, and I think I would do just about anything for it.”

Lumen stopped eating, peeked out at me with one eye. “What about your sisters?”

“I love them, more than anything, I don’t doubt they love me, we’d do anything for each other, we’re… we’re truly family,” then I looked at him, to find some kind of understanding from someone, “but that’s not the same.”

Lumen paused with a noodle in his mouth, and he slurped it up as he turned away to set his food aside. When he looked back towards the sun, he gripped the side of this little needle tower and squeezed. 

“I’ve been alone all my life, I’ve never seen so much as images of my people,” he told me, “I’ve only ever heard the disembodied voices of my parents or my creators. I don’t know the difference. So… I didn’t know that there was a difference between family and friends. I thought you could survive off of one.”

“Surviving… and living… aren’t the same.”

We both sat there for a bit, looking forward, with this hollow feeling in us. It dawned on me that my loneliness must have felt like little more than a pity party. At least I had my sisters, but he had no one, and never had anyone. How could he understand what I wanted if he never had it himself?

“So,” he said, slow to find his words, a first for today, “I guess its hard for me to understand where you’re coming from. You’re a destroyer of worlds and yet you’ll bend over just to make a new friend?” 

“I… I don’t have many friends,” I said again. 

“I-I got that, but that’s no reason to lose your self respect. I think… I think that you think to yourself, ‘what do I have to do to keep this person with me,’ so you did everything I asked, but no one is worth your dignity. Not me, not your sisters, not your family, not any lover you’ve had or will have…” I slowly looked to him, and finally found something resembling pity. “Well, maybe debase yourself for a pet animal or two, but no one else.” 

We were able to share a small chuckle over that. 

Then I felt his hand on my shoulder. “What you want, is the subsistence that makes life worth living, but it can just as easily take what life you have instead. I know that sounds harsh and impossible. I know what it’s like to be alone, and as terrible as it is, loneliness doesn’t deserve anyone’s soul.” 

I think that was when I finally understood how Lumen’s face made his expressions. It so perfectly turned emotion into a painting, focusing on the most important details were rather than giving all the details. Sometimes it felt like there wasn’t truly anything behind his eyes, but other times there seemed like there were more behind his than anyone else’s.

“You’re the last of your kind, right, that… is actually unbelievable coming from you. How is loneliness not the worst thing?” 

“I didn’t say that,” he corrected me, “you misinterpreting what I’m saying, grasping at things I clearly don’t mean.” 

“I… sorry.” 

“I know, I know you only grasp at frill strings, you want so deeply to have someone to relate to. I guess I can understand in some basic way, hence why you’ve essentially been my bitch all day.” 

I chuckled a little that time, as I asked, “Excuse me?” 

“We already established that you have indulged me all day, let’s move on.” 

“Move on to what?” 

“I don’t know, like how does a prince not have any friends. I’ve been to other planets, kids were hired to be friends with the prince if they were really insufferable. Tell me why you are as traumatized as you are, to put it bluntly.” 

Bluntly. That was a strange word for me. It was so familiar, Calcutta was blunt, my father was blunt, they never spoke to hide anything. They didn’t mince words or waste time, they cut and they cut deep.

But blunt still felt like a foreign word because they were the only ones I had ever known to be blunt, and they were always blunt.

“Galagan isn’t like that,” I told him, and he spoke before I could continue. 

“No, I kind of figured that, that’s why I’m asking.” 

I arched my brow at him, and he raised his hands in surrender before gesturing me to continue.

“It’s all about the bloodline, preserving it, strengthening it,” I explained as I looked down at the muscles in my arms, the ones that could snap spines, crush necks, and obliterate whole nations. The product of the bloodline that couldn’t be soiled. 

“If we grew up with someone we might actually want to grow old and have a family with them.” 

“And you can’t do that?” 

“More like not allowed. There are no lines of royal bastards, we’re all supposed to die childless, less competition for the throne.” 

“Then… how does the royal line continue?” 

“Well, the non-bastards can, but only with the noble families, the Diadects.” 

Lumen’s face kind of twisted. When he looked confused it looked more like someone scrunched up his face more than it tightened. That was the first emotion I saw his artificial face fail to convey. 

He didn’t notice it, and I didn’t mention it, I just listened as he said, “I’ve heard of those, such interesting names, and so very eugenic, your class system.” 

That confused me, made me consider that maybe he didn’t know what eugenics was. “Huh? No, it’s just the Khan and the royal families, everyone else can be with whoever else.” 

Lumen tilted his head at that, and it made me feel like I had just somehow debunked my own train of thought. 

“That’s separating the strongest genetic lines from the peasants, that’s a form of eugenics,” he pointed out, “you’re purposely breeding for stronger and stronger broods of people.” 

“I… I guess our class system did lead to eugenics.” 

“Hmm,” he mumbled before shaking his head. “No, I believe — no, I would bet that eugenics led to your class system, an ugly scourge of a thing. The desire to breed the best, to be the strongest, made your society the way it is.” 

Even though he was making a lot of sense, with the way he said it, and the way he talked over me and everything else I was feeling… I told him, “You say that like you were there,” with all the doubt I could muster.

“I may have been,” he said as if he were gloating. He actually raised his arms and slowly crossed them behind his head. He puffed out his chest as he definitely gloated, “I’m older than anything else I know, and lucky me, I don’t feel a day older than the day I first woke up.” 

I snorted.

He smirked, before telling me, “But really though, anyone with a basic understanding of sociology could reverse engineer your species customs that way. It’s not terribly deep.” 

At first, I thought he was going to be nice, but that wasn’t it. “You know, you’re kind of an ass.” 

Then he gave me that familiar smirk. “You just noticed?” 

In that moment, I couldn’t help but feel myself smirking too, smiling even. We were looking into each other’s eyes and smiling like a couple of assholes, and that was the realest thing we did the whole day, all as the sun was going down. 

I guess we were having what could be called a moment. As the sun was going down, and we were looking into each other’s eyes, we were leaning closer together. This was one of those stupid movie moments you see, and never think would happen in real life. 

Turns out they don’t, because then came the explosion on the horizon that stopped us cold.