The Geodomes: Echo

Her smile began looking strained. "Umm, maybe something easy on your stomach? Anything?"

"Anything is fine, thank you. I will eat what everyone eats..."

"Cool beans! Ok. I just wanted to make sure! My little sister has stress issues and ulcers and I learned to make her all kinds of food that was great but not hard on her. Maybe later we can hang?"

"Umm. Sure," Helena said uncertainly.

The girl smiled and turned, headed towards the back where the kitchen was. Helena watched her in confusion. She pushed the confusion away to analyze later and stepped back. "I am going to go get my PED and then find where I will be working," she said out loud, not really knowing who she was talking to, but wanting everyone to know, just in case.

"Yeah, everyone get you PED's so we can keep track!" Kyle called. "Hey, Helena, I want to talk to you later, ok?" he asked as she took off down the hall.

"Of course. We will all be at the table for dinner soon, I will speak to you then."

"No, I mean alone!" he called.

She paused, curious. "Why?" she asked. "About what?"

He came down the hall so he wouldn't be yelling and the short boy was behind him. Kyle stopped in front of short boys room, but didn't notice him behind him. "You seem to know a lot about what is happening, I just wanted to hear you out is all. Find out everything I can. After what happened to Chrissy... shits just really real, you know? We need to figure shit out."

"Then why not discuss it at the table so input can be gathered from everyone?"

"Not everyone has legit input. I mean, don't get me wrong. Dana is hot as hell and one of the nicests chicks I ever met, but she is legit dumb as fuck. I like her and all, but I don't need her input, not on this. You feel me?"

"Understood. Hey. It's Ryan, right?" she asked the short boy.

Kyle turned, seeing him there for the first time.

"Yeah," the boy said softly.

"Have you checked on the animals? Are they all normal livestock?"

He blinked, then looked mortified. "There are live animals here! Shit! Move dude," he said to Kyle, who moved. Ryan shot in, grabbed his PED and left at a full sprint towards the kitchen and the door to the barn.

"I guess he will tell me later," she said, turning to go to her room to get her own PED.

"Uhh, yeah. So, are you like, on the spectrum or what?" Kyle asked, following her.

"What? No. Maybe. I don't know, I just don't think like most people. Does it matter?"

"I guess not. You were really never tested?"

"I was tested for many things, that wasn't one of them. Is there something else you need?" she asked, pausing outside of her door. It was ingrained into her soul to never let a male into her room.

"Aww, no babe. I will catch you later and we'll talk." He turned and left and Helena stood there a moment wondering how she felt about that. She had never been called 'babe' before and she wasn't sure if she liked it. It felt generic and condescending. Like he couldn't remember her name and he was trying to endear her to him though he had no intention of returning the feeling. It also felt objectifying. No, she didn't like that at all.

She got the PED and looked it over before snapping it onto her wrist. She felt the pinprick, sampling her blood and the electric pulse tapping into her nervous system. Definitely not human tech. She pulled up the display and began navigating through everything as she passed back through the front to look at her work space.

It was a large space with another room set off of it for electronics. The computer system was very advanced as she looked at it. More than anything she wanted to pull it open and look at it.

"Hey, boo," a voice called from the door.

She turned and looked at Blue, her eyes scanning him in the doorway, blocking it, his stance aggressive. "Hello, Blue? Is there something I can help you with?"

"Aww, nah baby girl, I'm jus' checkin things out, ya know? So how a hottie like you get so smart?"

"May I ask why you decided to take your shirt off since it is so cold in here?" she asked, curious to know the answer. She thought she knew, but she wanted to know if she was right.

He chuckled and stepped into the room. "What, you don' like what you see, boo?"

She nodded, that's what she thought. He wanted to be looked at.

"Your tattoos, how come you didn't get them done professionally?" she asked, moving closer to look at the tattoos. She was especially curious about the one on his hand that he had been flaunting. "And what does this one mean?" she asked, taking his hand and pointing to the one he had shown Detroit.

"Means I killed somebody, boo."

"Is it a boast or have you really?"

"Whatchuthank, boo?"

"Umm. I'm not sure. I think that you are trying hard to be someone, but I don't know if it's really you or someone you are pretending to be. I can't tell if you are trying to convince everyone of who you really are or if you are just wearing a hat, so to speak."

"It ain't no hat, boo."

"Why do you call me that? Boo? Like a ghost says boo?"

He laughed. "Yeah baby girl, just like that. Like a ghost says boo. I cain't tell if you is just trippin or if you is legit turnt."

"Umm. As I don't know what that means, I am going to go to my next question. Why did you come back here? You are the butcher, correct?"

"I was lookin at the pool an' I saw you. You have a man, boo?"

"Like, a boyfriend? No. Boys are a distraction and I am not allowed to..." she paused. There was no one to tell her anymore what was a distraction and what wasn't. No one to say what she could and couldn't do.

"Shiiiit. You even been kissed, baby girl?"

"Umm, no. No thank you. I imagine at some point I will have to find a mate in here, but not soon. No. Umm, excuse me please?" she asked, trying to move around him to the door.

He laughed and blocked her way. "You act like I was wantin' up on you, shiit girl, I was just askin'. You're too short and skinny anyway, I like a nice set a tits and a ass. You aint got no tits hardly. That ass is just aight. Naw baby girl, you ain't my type. I might fuck you if you begged me to. Maybe that's how I feel. You never know, right? You seen a cock, boo?"

"Of course, I have had several anatomy classes and art classes with male models."

"You seen a cock like this?" he asked, reaching into his loose pants and pulling out his dick. She had seen dicks before, but what she hadn't seen was one that was pierced like this one was.

"I hope a professional did that," she said, touching the piercing lightly.

"Mmm, you like that boo?"

"Like it? Why would I like it?"

"You wanna touch it again? Why don't you come over here and kiss it, suck it for me."

"That doesn't sound pleasant at all, no thank you."

"Shiiit girl," he said, moving closer , biting his lower lip and rolling the snakebite piercings in his lip. "Come 'ere." he said, his voice low. He took her by the wrist and pulled her hand up, wrapping her hand around his cock with his hand. "You like that? That feel nice? You like this nice fat cock, baby girl?"

She looked down at the cock growing thicker in her hand, then looked up at him and his ice blue eyes, hooded and watching her. "Not really?" she answered, unsure what he was wanting from her. "I'm sure it's great as dicks go, but if I ever decide to go all in and have sex, I am going to find a guy who is more suited to me. Smaller, less... metal. Less ink. I do like how you have it shaved though. That is decidedly better than hairy."

"You sayin my cock is too big, boo?" he asked, leaning closer and jerking her hand faster on his cock. "Why don't you get on your knees for me, baby girl? Let me come on that pretty face."

"No thank you."

He grinned. "How bout you suck my cock and swallow my load then?"

"No thank you! Will you please let me go now?"

"Mmmm, boo, I'm gonna come soon. Come closer," he whispered, pulling her in closer and shoving her down to her knees.

He held her there, his hand on her shoulder, his other hand over her hand on his cock, jerking himself off in front of her face with her hand.

"Open your mouth, boo," he said, his voice ragged.

"No! I don't like this, let me go!"

"Open!" he demanded, squeezing her shoulder almost painfully.

She let out a small sob, trying to twist away, but he held her, jerking himself harder and faster as she struggled in his grip.

"Open!" he yelled, pressing his cock to her mouth suddenly as he jerked.

With a cry of fear, she opened her mouth and he shoved his cock in as he came, squirting into her mouth and looking down at her with hooded eyes.

"That's fuckin' right baby girl," he said, his voice thick. "Swallow. All of it. Mmm. Lick me clean. Yeah, you like that, boo? Yeah you do. You loved your first cock, didn't you? No cryin' baby girl. Wipe your face. Look at me. You my bitch now, boo. My little cum slut. You gonna swallow up all my come with them lips, ain't you? Yeah. Get up," he demanded, pulling her up off the floor. "Look at me. You want me to fuck that tight little cunt, baby girl? You want me to lick you till you hollerin for me? Yeah you do. You come back to my room tonight, boo. Your boy will take care a you. You feel me?"

"Can I leave now?" she asked softly, still trembling.

"Yeah, aight. But you keep ya mouth shut, aight?"

She nodded and he let her go. She left at a run, fleeing to her room and to the bathroom where she forced herself to vomit, then washed her mouth out and brushed her teeth. She curled up and sobbed in her bed until Dana called her on her PED.

"Hey! Dinner! You coming?"

"Be right there!" she said brusquely, quickly running to wash her face.

She was quiet at dinner, sitting between Dana and Libby. She listened to the others talk with her head down. She didn't want to look up and see Blue. Why was he so forceful and angry?

"Helena!" a boy called, grabbing her attention. She looked across at the tall, lanky boy with curly black hair.

"Yes?"

"I asked if you were from here in Florida?"

"I imagine we are all local, we were chosen for our age, our health and our ability to procreate as well as each of us having a unique ability that will help the collective. You are a woodworker, right? How long have you been doing it?"

"My poppi taught me when I was young."

"You look mostly hispanic but your name is very english."

He smiled at her, leaning back. "My mom is... was Puerto Rican, my dad is white."

"What about you?" she asked, turning to look down the table at Brooklyn, a girl she had been curious about.

"What fucken about me?" the girl asked angrily.

"You are obviously of african descent, but you are something else too. Is it Korean?"

"The fuck do you care?"

"Easy," Kyle said, sitting up. "I think she's on the spectrum."

"Naw, boo just says it like it is, don't you baby girl?" Blue asked, leaning up to look around Jae and Libby.

"I don't think like other people..." she said, her cheeks going pink. "I'm done, I'm going to bed early."

"No! Hold on Helena," Kyle said quickly.

"Just Hell."

"Sorry, it doesn't suit you," he said. "We are going to talk and I want you there. Ok?"

"If I must," she said obligingly, nodding in his direction. She looked back to Brooklyn. "It's Korean, right?"

"Yeah," the girl answered, scowling at her.

Helena turned to the medic, the tall skinny boy with glasses. "You are Mike, right?"

"Yeah," he answered brightly. "You guessing my lineage next?"

"No, you are germanic from the looks of it. I was wondering why the glasses? Since they aren't real."

His smile slipped away and he raised an eyebrow. Finally he shook his head and smiled. "You got me. I knew I would be on camera and my girlfriend says I look great in them."

"You do, I just didn't know why you were still wearing them."

"Do me next," Libby teased.

"You aren't from here but you try to hide it. You still have a slight vietnemese accent, especially with certain words. I don't like the orange color the bleach turned your hair and neither do you. You keep looking at it like you were hoping for something better."

"Holy shit!" Libby laughed.

"Do me!" Denise said, leaning up.

"You want people to think you are hard and you pretend you are ok with looking so androgynous. You even play into it by cutting your hair and acting like a tomboy, but you don't really like girls, you just say it to be cool. Dana and Laurel are the prettiest girls here and you haven't given either of them a second look. You have given Mike several looks though, most of them hopeful."

"Shit!" Denise said, sitting back. "I guess I asked."

"What about me, boo?" Blue asked, sitting up and smirking.

"Detroit is wrong about you. The tattoo is based in reality. You really did kill someone, but you didn't do it because you are hard, it was an accident. You played if off though and you wore it like a badge of honor, but really you are ashamed of it. You did grow up in a bad place and all of your friends are as black as Detroit and Dominique are. Those two still hate you though, for trying to appropriate their culture, even if you did grow up in it. And you are a jerk."

There was some nervous laughter.

David McGovern leaned up, looking down at Helena from across the table. "What about me?" he asked and she watched his lips moving.

"You used to get made fun of a lot until you got bigger and you grew into your face a bit. You homeschooled, like I did and you aren't used to a lot of people always looking at you. You are shy. The reason you came has to be something like... I think someone told you you should say yes. Because you are the sort of different hot that they look for in models. Right? Something like that?"

His eyebrows climbed. "Yeah... My cousin Lilli showed me a bunch of models and how they had my cheekbones, and more that had a mouth like mine. She said I could be a model. Now at least."

"Yeah, I can see that," Brooklyn said, clearly interested.

He looked at her and blushed with a shy smile.

Helena looked past him to Detroit.

He spoke quickly. "I didn't ask."

"No, but for the record, you are completely suburban. You are even smart, good grades and everything. I am guessing your dad is a bricklayer and you hate manual labor, that's why you were so angry when your job was announced. You were going to school for something else. Business, probably."

"Sports medicine," he said, scowling.

Blue was laughing into his hand.

"You gonna say somma that wicked shit on me?" Dominique asked.

"I wasn't going to, but since you asked. You are from the same place as Blue. You have seen him. Unlike Detroit though, you want to pretend you aren't. So, Detroit, the name? It's because your dad wanted an athlete right? With a memorable name? Did you get hurt or were just not very good?" she asked, genuinely curious.

Blue laughed harder.

"Fun as this is, if everyone is done, we should go to the living room and talk about important things?" Kyle said, standing. "That was great, Dana, thanks."

Dana smiled her stunning smile.

Helena decided right then that she liked Dana, she was genuinely good despite how she looked. She stood when everyone else did and hung back. Blue moved like he was going to come to her, so she quickly went to Mike and walked with him. "Is Chrissy better? Is she in her room?"

"She's in the medbay. I think some of it is mental and not just physical. Her whole family was out there, brothers, sisters, grandparents, everyone. I think she said she had twenty seven family members out there?"

"That is too bad," Helena said sadly. "We have all lost everyone but each other. You should get her and bring her in, include her. It will help her."

"It would!" Libby said in agreement. "Sit with me, Hell!" she said, pulling Helena to the couch next to her.

Helena noticed some pairing up as they sat. Not just Kyle and Dana, but Jae and Emma and Austin and Brooklyn. She nodded to herself since they were such obvious couples, at least ethnically. If the trend continues, Detroit and Dominique would be next.

Mike brought Chrissy out with the help of Michael and she looked Michael over. He saw her looking and gave her a smile, which confused her. Was he flirting or just being nice? It didn't matter, she didn't' like his looks. His dark, disheveled and messy hair. Not contrived to look good messy, just really messy like he didn't care. A couple months of patchy, scraggly growth on his face. She hated facial hair. She also decided she didn't like blue eyes, then she made a connection.

"They call you Blue because of your eyes," she said to Blue, speaking to him unintentionally. "You are the only one among your friends with blue eyes."

"Tha's right, boo," he said, winking at her.

She looked away quickly, blushing. She saw the short boy sitting in the chair right next to her, his head down. She leaned on the arm of the couch.

"When you picked MountNever-Rest, you meant it to speak about your size, didn't you? But it was taken to mean that you never slept, you were always gaming and then it got away from you. You were never trying to fool anyone, you just didn't know how to fix it."

He eyed her, blushing, then nodded slightly.

"But that's not what's really bothering you?"

"My girl came to me last night and said she thought she was pregnant," he whispered.

"I'm sorry."

He lifted a shoulder in a semblance of a shrug. "I didn't think she could, she was on the pill. And I was gone for so long at that tournament in Bali, it had been three months since we even... We got into it when I said I was doing this, she wanted me to stay the weekend because I was leaving for another Con this week. I don't know if it was a lie or real."

"If it was three months then she would know for sure and I doubt she would have waited so long to tell you. She was only trying to manipulate you. And if she really was pregnant and hadn't told you, then it was because it wasn't yours."

He blushed again and hunched in on himself.

She decided she liked his kind brown eyes. David and Mike also had brown eyes and she also found them pleasant to look at.

"Ok, so I wanted to talk to everyone," Kyle said, standing and pacing wher everyone else was sitting. "By now most of you have looked around. We saw the list of our other jobs. Did everyone see the list? Open your PED's I will cast them to you."

Helena opened her PED and looked at the list of secondary jobs, then blinked at hers. Writing? They wanted her to write? No one ever wanted to read the books she wrote!

"Do I look like someone's fuckin' maid?" Dominique asked, her attitude skyrocketing. Helena looked at her listing. Janitorial.

She looked at all of them. "Oh! Libby, you are a counselor?"

Libby was smiling. "I get that. My mom was a guidance counselor, I kind of thought about it before I decided I wanted to raise bees and save the world. Do you write?"

"Yeah! I have a lot of scifi books already and... I guess I will have to write new ones or rewrite them since they took my computer."

"So it looks like we will all be really busy, some of us more than others. We can... hey dude, where you going?" Kyle asked Ryan.

The short boy just hunched more and kept walking. "Be right back."

"Anyway, we can get it set up so those that aren't as busy can help out, like home boy that just left. And Chrissy."

He continued pacing and talking, but mostly everyone was looking at their PED's. Blue looked up while she was looking around and smirked at her, blowing her a kiss. She looked away quickly, scowling at the wall.

She was looking at her own PED, starting to feel tired when she saw Blue sit up out of the corner of her eye. He nudged Michael next to him and showed him something.

"Hole' up there," Blue said standing and smiling, bouncing on his toes. "Check this shit. Check it boys. You can fuckin claim any girl you want by having sex with her. Not shit about how. Any fucking girl you want."